Hesitations and Aspirations of Farmers in Nature-Protected Areas

Angela Turck () and Wiltrud Terlau
Additional contact information
Angela Turck: International Centre for Sustainable Development (IZNE), Bonn-Rhein-Sieg University of Applied Sciences, 53757 Sankt Augustin, Germany
Wiltrud Terlau: International Centre for Sustainable Development (IZNE), Bonn-Rhein-Sieg University of Applied Sciences, 53757 Sankt Augustin, Germany

Sustainability, 2023, vol. 15, issue 4, 1-12

Abstract: Pursuant to Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 15 of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development of the United Nations, one pivotal target is to halt biodiversity loss. This paper’s objective is to analyze why and how German farmers hesitate to implement more than the prescriptive measures with regard to cross compliance and direct payments under the European Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) and what their aspirations are for possible incentives to bring biodiversity into focus. By applying a mixed methods approach, we investigate the experience of individual farmers by means of a qualitative approach followed by a quantitative study. This analysis sheds light on how farmers perceive indirect influencing factors and how these factors play a non-negligible role in farmers´ commitment to biodiversity. Economy, policy and society are intertwined and need to be considered from a multi-faceted perspective. In addition, an in-depth analysis is conducted based on online focus group discussions to determine whether farmers accept financial support, focusing on both action- and success-oriented payments. Our results highlight the importance of paying attention to the heterogeneity of farmers, their locations and, consequently, farmers’ different views on indirect drivers influencing agricultural processes, showing the complexity of the problem. Although farmers’ expectations can be met with financial allocations, other aspects must also be taken into account.

Keywords: biodiversity; farmers’ heterogeneity; incentives; Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs); mixed methods approach (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2023
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/15/4/3196/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/15/4/3196/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:15:y:2023:i:4:p:3196-:d:1063415

Access Statistics for this article

Sustainability is currently edited by Ms. Alexandra Wu

More articles in Sustainability from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().