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An institution of the Federal Ministry for Agriculture, Regions and Tourism

'Facing the sixth mass extinction and increasing of : what role for the EU strategy to 2030?’

Presentation given by the Public Hearing organised by the Committee on the Environment, Public Health and Food Safety (ENVI)

Thursday 14 January 2021

Director DI Thomas Resl, MSc. [email protected], www.bab.gv.at extinction and biodiversity

• Species extinction is evident and brings many negative effects for agriculture as well as for the society.

Can agricultural practices increase biodiversity? • Yes, this is shown by several studies e.g.: • evaluation studies of the Austrian Agri‐environmental Programme (ÖPUL) • or the EU‐wide study “Gains to species diversity in organically farmed fields are not propagated at the farm level” by Schneider, M. K. et al. (2014) • Positive influence by: • low‐to‐medium intensity of farming • organic farming (minor impact compared to low‐to‐medium intensity of farming), but • the decisive factor for the number of species is the diversity of 2 Agricultural production without area‐wide crop protection

yield losses of up to 32% pests

weeds

possible yield realized diseases yield

3 Source: Oerke, E. C. (2006): Crop losses to pests. In: Journal of Agricultural 144, p. 31–43 ‐ Illustriation by Noelppa, S. (2017): Der Nutzen von Pflanzenschutz als wesentlicher Bestandteil moderner Landwirtschaft in Deutschland Relative volume yields organic to conventional in Austria Soy 91%

Sugar beet 73%

Triticale 69%

Soft‐Wheat 64%

Corn 63% Ø66%

Rye 62%

Table‐Potatoes 51% Ø Weighted volume yields per area 2003‐2015 4 Source: Brückler, M., Resl, T. and Reindl, A. (2017): Comparison of organic and conventional crop yields in Austria Regional disparities: dry and humid areas Ø Weighted volume yields per area 2003‐2015 Dry 53% 73% 74% Humid 58%

55% 62%

Occasionally dry

52% 65% 58%

5 Organic [t] Conventional [t] 5 Source: Brückler, M., Resl, T. and Reindl, A. (2017): Comparison of organic and conventional crop yields in Austria Synthesis of organic supply and demand in Austria

Steigende Bio‐Umsätze aber stärker steigende Bio‐Flächen (als Produktionsgrundlage)

Permanent Grassland 32%

+ 9% * 23% 21%

+ 10% * Arable land

11% 9% + 4% * Food sales 5% 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019 2020

* Development from 2008 to 2019 6 Source: Key‐quest/Roll‐AMA, 2020; Invekos‐Daten, 2020; Comparability of data sets limited, but trend is evident Interactions between productivity and biodiversity?

Conventional farming higher yields – lower biodiversity

More agricultural land is needed to produce the same amount of food. According to Noleppa (2017), the positive biodiversity footprint reverses and turns into a .

Organic farming lower yields – higher biodiversity

Source: Noelppa, S. (2017): Der Nutzen von Pflanzenschutz als wesentlicher Bestandteil moderner Landwirtschaft in Deutschland Proposed strategies to improve the biodiversity situation in the EU

• Biodiversity strategy • with the provision of at least 10% of agricultural land for biodiversity

• Farm‐to‐fork strategy • reduction of the use of protection products (‐50%) • expansion of organic farming (to 25%)

• But does this lead to an improvement in the situation for biodiversity?

8 Fields of tension

• Have the interrelationships of the proposed measures been sufficiently researched? • Do we address the regional circumstances of individual member states or regions? • Lower land productivity puts more pressure on available agricultural land for regional production? • Export of biodiversity loss to other continents due to lower yields in the European Union? • Are a large number of consumers willing to pay more for food from near‐ natural or organic production?

9 An institution of the Federal Ministry for Agriculture, Regions and Tourism

'Facing the sixth mass extinction and increasing risk of pandemics: what role for the EU Biodiversity strategy to 2030?’

Presentation given by the Public Hearing organised by the Committee on the Environment, Public Health and Food Safety (ENVI)

Thursday 14 January 2021

Director DI Thomas Resl, MSc. [email protected], www.bab.gv.at