Policy Consultation on Sustainable Agriculture and Rural Development In the Carpathians Policy Assessments for Sustainable Agriculture and Rural Development in Mountain Regions (SARD-M) National Reports in Romania, Slovakia and Ukraine Prepared by national consultants: Emilian Burdusel - Romania Radoslava Kanianska - Slovakia Oksana Maryskevych - Ukraine UNEP-Vienna ISCC June 2006 CONTACT INFORMATION Regional Focal Point Contact: Harald Egerer Address: UNEP – Interim Secretariat of the Carpathian Convention JOE 25 - Vienna International Centre PO Box 500 1400 Vienna, Austria Phone: (+43) 1 26060-4545 Fax: (+43) 1 26060-6730 E-Mail: [email protected] Website: www.carpathianconvention.org SARD-M Team Contact: Dominique Legros Address: Sustainable Development Department Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) Viale delle Terme di Caracalla 00153 Rome, Italy Phone: (+39) 06 570-54204 Fax: (+39) 06 570-53250 E-mail: [email protected] Website: www.fao.org/sard/sard-m The opinions expressed in this publication are those of the authors alone and do not imply any opinion whatsoever in the part of FAO (UN) Policy Consultation on Sustainable Agriculture and Rural Development in the Carpathians. Final Report/UNEP-ISCC (2006) 2 Table of Contents Executive summary 4 List of figures 6 List of tables 7 Abbreviations and Acronyms 8 Introduction 10 1. Land-use in the Carpathians 12 2. Evolution of the employment structure 17 3. Agricultural production and forestry 22 4. Economic performance of agricultural producers since 1990 37 5. Biodiversity of farmland and forestland 41 6. Survey of rural development 50 7. Existing policies and strategies affecting directly or indirectly SARD in the 56 mountain areas 8. Institutions responsible for designing and implementing the policies for SARD 76 in the mountain areas 9. Challenges and opportunities for SARD in Romanian, Slovakian and Ukrainian 86 parts of the Carpathians Annexes Annex 1 Article 7 on sustainable agriculture and forestry of the framework Convention 89 for the protection and sustainable development of the Carpathian Mountains Annex 2 Administrative units in the Ukrainian part of the Carpathians (Figure 1) 90 Annex 3 Economic efficiency value and production expenditures of farms in the sample 91 mountain districts of Lviv region in the Ukrainian Carpathians References 92 Policy Consultation on Sustainable Agriculture and Rural Development in the Carpathians. Final Report/UNEP-ISCC (2006) 3 Executive summary This report is a result and product of the “Policy Consultation on Sustainable Agriculture and Rural Development in the Carpathians” in support of the assessments of strengths and weaknesses of the mountain policies in the Carpathians implemented in 2005 in the framework of the FAO Project for Sustainable Agriculture and Rural Development in Mountain Regions (SARD-M) which aims to strengthen mountain populations’ livelihoods with improved policies for sustainable agriculture and rural development. Activities under the project in the Carpathians have involved many different partners (i.e. governmental bodies, civil society and international organizations) and their results have been discussed at a regional expert’s workshop. During the months of June to August 2005, three national consultants Emilian Burdusel from Romania, Radoslava Kanianska from Slovakia, Oksana Maryskevych from Ukraine, carried out three country surveys in Romania, an EU accession country, Slovakia, a new EU Member State, and Ukraine, an EU neighbouring country. Through the analysis of the strengths and weaknesses of SARD-M related policies, institutions and processes, the objective was to identify priority areas for sub-regional and regional policies and options that need to be addressed from an economic, environmental and social perspective. Based on the findings obtained from the three policy assessments conducted at the national level, recommendations and proposals for follow-up activities were drawn up for the Carpathian level. The three draft assessments were discussed during an expert workshop on Strengthening SARD-M policies for the protection and sustainable development of the Carpathians, organized by the United Nations Environment Programme Vienna – Interim Secretariat of the Carpathian Convention (UNEP Vienna – ISCC), together with the FAO SARD-M Project and EUROMONTANA in conjunction with the Conference on “Integrated Rural Development in the Mountain Areas of Central and Eastern Europe and the Balkans”, held on 24 October 2005 in Liptovský Mikuláš, Slovak Republic. This workshop drew high-level participation from the Minister of Agriculture of the Slovak Republic and Ministries from other Central and Eastern European countries, experts from different branches and from civil society along with representatives from international organizations. The participants revised the assessment results and enriched the outcomes of the consultation through valuable comments and by elaborating 22 recommendations and proposals for follow-up activities which are published in a separate document. 1 It is important to underline that despite the importance of SARD-Mas a policy domain in the Carpathians, such a comprehensive study in the context of the SARD-Mapproach for the Carpathian region has not been undertaken before in any of the seven countries. In order to conduct these rapid assessments, national consultants individually gathered general information on specific aspects of agriculture and rural development in the mountain regions and attempted to evaluate the effects of EU accession and influence of the Carpathian Convention on national agri-environmental policies. The assessments present an extensive survey of the overall and local situations of sustainable agriculture and rural development in the Carpathian mountains of the three countries. They specifically focus on crucial aspects that need to be taken into consideration to provide elements for a diagnostic of policies, institutions and processes for SARD-M in the Carpathian region, namely: (1) land-use, (2) employment in agriculture, (3) agricultural production and forestry, (4) economic performance of agricultural producers, (5) biodiversity value of farmland and forestland, (6) economic, 1 See Brief Summary (http://www.fao.org/sard/sard-m) which also includes a regional policy SWOT assessment based on the three countries surveys prepared by Jan Seffer, Lead Consultant. Policy Consultation on Sustainable Agriculture and Rural Development in the Carpathians. Final Report/UNEP-ISCC (2006) 4 social and cultural aspects of rural development, (7) policies and strategies affecting SARD-M, (8) institutions in charge for designing and implementing the policies for SARD. As an entry point for the analysis, Article 7 2 of the Convention on the Protection and Sustainable Development of the Carpathians was selected. The Carpathian Convention, a multilateral platform for cooperation between all the stakeholders at the regional level, attempts to achieve a good balance between the three pillars (i.e., economic, environmental and social) of sustainable development. It is hoped that the results of the assessments can be transferred into action on the ground in the Carpathian countries and lead to the development of policies that are acceptable and able to be implemented by stakeholders in a position to actively influence the process. The implemented activities are expected to potentially lead to the development of the future Protocol on the Sustainable Agriculture and Rural Development and Sustainable Forest/Forest Management to the Carpathian Convention on the basis of the conducted analyses under the “demand-driven” SARD-Mproject. Undertaking such a comprehensive study is obviously a difficult exercise. As the assessments were to be conducted within a short period of time, they were meant to be an exercise of reflection that provides main elements for a diagnostic of the current strengths and weaknesses of the SARD-Mpolicies. Given that SARD is a process that involves multiple sectors strongly linking agriculture and rural development and stakeholders at all governance levels, the assessments were heavily driven on the collections of the opinions of the different components of society at different levels, i.e. national and decentralized levels of government, civil society, including the private sector, and also take into consideration the multi-sectoral nature of SARD. Approaches and techniques employed within the analysis depended to some degree on the availability of reliable statistics and time-series data. This however was not always available for mountain regions, which hampered efforts to achieve accurate project results. Nevertheless, even where discrepancies and challenges exist with respect to data availability, the assessments should be viewed as an opportunity to identify data gaps and encourage the collection of relevant information for future endeavours. The development of policies for sustainable development is an iterative process that allows for national and local levels to act in a coordinated and participatory manner to develop coherent policies that balance the economic, social and environmental objectives of sustainable development. It is therefore important to see if processes/mechanisms are in place to allow for a country, within and outside the government, to learn from its experiences in order to develop the human and institutional capacities to act strategically for sustainable rural development in mountain