NATURAL ASSETS
this does not necessarily yield the best use of land from society’s perspective. “Our research shows how taking account of multiple objectives in a changing environment fundamentally alters decisions regarding optimal land-use.” The team analysed the significance of changing land-use not only for agricultural production, but also for emissions and sequestration of greenhouse gases, open-access recreational visits, urban space and wild-species diversity. It has been predicted that climate change
effects may benefit agriculture in the UK, due to warmer, drier weather reaching colder, wetter regions, for example the upland areas of Scotland, Wales and North of England. But the effects vary regionally.
“While some areas will benefit from increased farm output, in the longer term this improvement may be tempered by increasing drought in the southern and eastern lowlands of England”, says Professor Bateman. “Here spatial targeting of policies can generate major gains.” Professor Bateman also highlighted that the
predicted benefits will not occur if there is an increased frequency of extreme weather events, such as occurred this summer. “This will cause droughts which will obviously impinge on food production.”
Our nation is heavily dependent on imported
food and subject to the effects of climate change on the global food system. UK food self- sufficiency has declined rapidly in the past few decades, from almost 80 per cent in the 1984 to 60 per cent in 2010. “There is also the wider issue that climate change globally may disturb the international balance of food supply and demand and raise prices”, warns Professor Bateman. The team’s modelling revealed that a policy scenario favouring intensification of farming achieves the highest gains when comparing future food production in terms of market value alone. But this is not necessarily good for the UK as a whole. Significantly, when environmental and social values are factored into the analysis the maximum food scenario delivers lower overall values than the current baseline. Here the policy scenario with the highest gains is one that supports sustainable use of natural resources. Results also show that conserving biodiversity incurs relatively low costs. The research recommends implementing an approach that considers both the total value of land, rather than just the market value of agricultural produce, and targets different regions based on their environmental characteristics. “We need to look at all of the values associated
with land use and take them into consideration in making decisions”, says Professor Bateman. But a new direction for land use decisions will not necessary be easy to achieve. Implementing policy change comes with some major challenges. The first challenge concerns the motivations of land managers. How can changes be delivered
12 SOCIETY NOW AUTUMN 2013
The effect of climate change may benefit some areas of the UK, but drought is a likely problem for the south eastern lowlands of England
without encouraging land-use that is privately beneficial?
“In the UK, the obvious mechanism through which that goal could be achieved is reform of the European Union’s Common Agricultural Policy”, says Professor Bateman. Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) payments
to UK farmers are currently in excess of £3 billion per annum, with relatively little assessment of their environmental performance. Professor Bateman suggests securing the participation of land mangers by reforming the CAP to a Payment for Ecosystem Services system, which would reward farmers for delivering ecosystem services. The second challenge recognises the need for a mechanism to implement the suggested area-based targeting of policy. Varying policy from region to region would increase the pressure placed on both decision-making and administrative bodies. A further challenge acknowledges the difficulty in targeting rewards for delivering ecosystem services, when the costs of doing so differ across regions and land managers. Professor Bateman concludes: “If society wants
to change land use it needs to be prepared to pay for it. Furthermore, if we want to increase food security in an increasingly uncertain world this is unlikely to be a costless operation.” n
Jennifer Garrett is a writer on social science, nature and the environment
i
Professor Ian Bateman Email
i.bateman@
uea.ac.uk Telephone 01603 593125 Web
www.uea.ac.uk/environmental-sciences
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