Contours and Silhouettes of agriculture and the environment in 2015

Contours and Silhouettes of agriculture and the environment in 2015 - Background report of the NRLO foresight study Agrochemicals, Nutrients and Energy in Agricultural Systems in 2015; by P.J.M. Diederen. The Hague, NRLO, June 1997.
[Original title: Contouren en silhouetten van landbouw en milieu in 2015 - Achtergrondstudies voor de verkenning hulpstoffen en energie in landbouwsystemen in 2015]

Summary

The Contours and Silhouettes project reported here is part of the NRLO exploratory study Agrochemicals and Fossil Energy in Agricultural Systems in 2015 (HELI 2015). The key question in this study is: `What are the strategic research directions for the future that offer a perspective of an environmentally-friendly, economically sound and socially accepted Dutch agriculture in the first decades of the next century?'. This exploratory study is built on three cornerstones. There is an outline of the initial situation and an inventory of possible objectives (ideals), there is a study of possible (technical and managerial) strategies, and there are sketches of possible boundaries within which Dutch agriculture may have to function at the beginning of the next century. The first cornerstone gives the starting point, direction and goal, the second provides optional methods and instruments in order to reach the goal from the starting point, and the third supplies us with a framework within which the effectiveness and efficiency of these methods and instruments can be appraised.

The present study gives the third cornerstone: possible pictures of the social and economic environment of Dutch agriculture around 2015. These pictures are based on the perceptions of representatives of the business community, policy circles and societal organizations, supplemented by elements from the literature. The report has three parts: an inventory of the relevant themes on the basis of interviews (sections 2 and 3), a brief anthology from current literature (section 4), and finally a synthesis on the basis of which driving forces are drained.

Environmental impact and environmental objectives

Agriculture contributes to environmental problems in a number of ways. There is the use of manure, ammonia emissions and pesticide losses, the emission of greenhouse gases and the exhaustion of scarce resources such as fossil fuels and phosphate ores, drought and the systematic decline and fragmentation of the countryside. The environmental objectives laid down by the government represent the constraints within which agriculture functions. In this way environmental objectives also guide investment decisions and decisions relating to research and development. Various individuals and organizations involved are likely to look differently upon the role and the levels of environmental objectives and environmental standards in different ways. On the one hand there are those who believe that the reason for setting objectives is to get the agricultural community moving. The standards have therefore deliberately been set very high. However, the environmental risks that we are currently running and the contribution of agriculture to them are being overestimated. On the other hand, there are those who consider the present objectives to be too broad. The present objectives cannot be final objectives because they are not ecologically sustainable. Technically speaking it is possible to meet more ambitious objectives.

Themes

During discussions many themes were touched upon that can have an influence on the future of Dutch agriculture. Table I gives a summary of these.

Driving forces

A list of possible driving forces (see Table II) was derived on the basis of the clustering of different possible developments in the themes mentioned. The first group of five has a direct effect on our dealing with the environment, and the second group an indirect one.

Pictures of the future

An analysis of the connections between the driving forces given above results in two possible pictures of Dutch agriculture in twenty years' time. In the first of these the environment does not have a high priority in society and in policy, and the market dominates. Agriculture focuses on traditional markets and continues along traditional technological paths. In the second picture the environment enjoys high priority and there are more restrictions on the operation of market forces. Tighter policies stimulate entry into new markets and the development of new technological trajectores. Further completion of these pictures depends on energy price trends, the position of agriculture within the rural economy, the relationship between the agricultural sector and the government, and the dynamics of technological and organizational constraints.

Table I: Relevant themes

Culture:

appreciation of material prosperity, life experience and quality of life;
appreciation of freedom and independence, spirit of free enterprise;
dealing with uncertainty; avoidance or acceptance of risks and societal insecurity;
importance of competition as a driving force in life; importance of the market as an allocation mechanism;
interest in sustainability and the environment;
degree of acceptance of scaling-up and globalization; appreciation of small scale;
ways of dealing with differences in income, prosperity and opportunities to develop.

Consumers:
importance of consumer demand for environmental-friendliness of the supply;
degree to which consumers take note of sustainability and animal welfare and are prepared to pay for them;
degree of acceptance of intensive agricultural production;
trend in per capita meat consumption.
Producers:
degree to which the agricultural sector maintains a separate protected position in the economy;
chain integration and the loss of autonomy;
outlook for bulk and niche markets;
degree to which farmers react defensively or offensively to environmental problems;
outlook for nature conservation on farms.
Government:
degree to which the government confers power and responsibility to the sector;
the degree to which the relationship between the government and the agricultural sector is cooperative;
policy focus: determination of processes and procedures or attainment of prespecified objectives;
scope for national (environmental) policy;
the role of a long-term vision;
development and basis of environmental objectives;
future of the Ministry of Agriculture, Nature Management and Fisheries.
Market:
more market allocation and far-reaching deregulation or more government and more regulation;
possibilities to internalize negative externalities through taxation;
energy and transport prices;
tradable pollution rights.
International:
the demand for food on world markets and its significance for the Netherlands;
consequences of countries from Central and Eastern Europe joining the EU;
development of the Common Agricultural Policy;
developments in the area of trade barriers in the context of the WTO negotiations;
importance of environmental policy in the EU.

Rural areas:
degree of integration of agriculture and other rural economic functions;
scope for multifunctional development of rural areas;
developments in town and country planning.

The knowledge system:
support base for the knowledge system in the agricultural sector and government;
scope for IT applications in the sector;
importance and acceptance of biotechnology;
scope for the development of new technological paradigms;
organization as a bottleneck in the implementation of environmental technology.

1.Protection of the environment and nature: do sustainability and the environment get low or high priority?
2.Environmental technology: will the search continue along current technological paths or will new technological paradigms evolve?
3.The position of agriculture in the countryside: will agricultural activities become more isolated or will traditional fault lines fade and will integration take place?
4.National and EU environmental policy: will policies be relaxed or lightened?
5.Energy prices: will they go up or down?
6.The importance of market forces: will we be relying more and more on the free market or will resistance against more market forces and competition rise?
7.The relationship between government and the agricultural sector: mistrust and antagonism or trust and cooperation?
8.Competition and sales: according to traditional lines (specialization in bulk production) or niche market development and non-agricultural activities?
9.Production organization and production technology: static or dynamic?
10.Readiness to accept uncertainty: acceptance or avoidance of (economic and environmental) risks?
[NRLO Home]