Let it grow! A new “flower”culture

Ness writes*

The intensification of conventional agriculture plays by far the largest role in deforestation, terrestrial biodiversity loss and greenhouse gasses worldwide. However, did you know that sustainable agriculture — especially through agri-environmental schemes — is actually flourishing in Europe? Yes, even (but more-so especially) the Netherlands with its current nitrogen crisis and extraordinarily biodiversity-poor agricultural lands!

Agri-environmental schemes can be defined as governmental programmes set up in order to aid farmers in managing their land in a sustainable fashion. These “eco-schemes” pay farmers to provide public goods by preserving ecosystems, which provide regulating services that are valued but unavailable in markets. In Europe, according to the Common Agricultural Policy reform, such schemes have involved attempts at organic farming, agro-ecological practices, precision farming, agroforestry and carbon farming. “Attempt” is truly the word here, given that 41% of eco-schemes are “completely misaligned”. Specifically within the Netherlands, misalignment is true for complex, high investment schemes like agroforestry, and organic farming, with cultural controversies within farm communities playing a large role in this pushback.

Additionally, alternative sustainable agricultural methods may not only have high costs, but may also be detrimental to farmer incomes. For instance, in the case of agroforestry, planted trees may end up shading crops in a cold and dark country.

Which brings us to wildflowers.

Perennial sown wildflower strips within agricultural lands are a nature-based solution that is cheap, scalable and biodiversity friendly. These strips are considered conservation areas within agriculture since they improve pollinator abundance for threatened species like beetles, moths, bees, butterflies as well as supplying food sources like seeds and invertebrates to birds. For farmers, benefits include increased pest control, and higher agricultural yields. Wildflower strips also sequester carbon and improve soil quality, but it’s unclear whether these benefits are worth their costs in the short and long-term.

Wildflower strips are becoming better known, but they are not common in conventional agricultural landscapes. Efforts mainly concentrate in urban areas in the form of insect hotels and highways (also called honey highways) due to the country’s National Pollinator Strategy. In intensively cropped agricultural areas, first of all, wildflower strips have a tough time competing for scarce space. Secondly, while they are easily implemented in term of buying and sowing seeds, management influences the effectiveness of wildflowers on pollinators. Farms which do not lay in the “Goldilocks zone” (surrounded by 25-55% natural habitat) are less likely to attract pollinators. So, is it worth implementing wildflower strips in intensively managed farms in the Netherlands, if wildflower may not even attract pollinators?

Bottom Line: Sustainable agricultural methods are growing, offering the potential for supporting functional agrobiodiversity and increasing farmer incomes simultaneously. Wildflower strips have been implemented to an extent in the Netherlands, but intensively managed farms could see higher costs than benefits, which also depends on their location.

* Please help my Environmental Economics students by commenting on unclear analysis, alternative perspectives, better data sources, or maybe just saying something nice :).