Verbal working memory has been attributed to a left-dominant neuronal network, including parietal, temporal and prefrontal cortical areas. The current study was designed to evaluate the contribution of these brain regions to verbal working memory processes and to assess possible hemispheric asymmetry. The effect of repetitive transcranial stimulation (rTMS) on performance in a verbal working memory task both during, and after an rTMS train (110% of individual motor threshold, 4 Hz) over nine different scalp locations was studied [bilateral middle frontal gyrus (MFG), bilateral supramarginal gyrus (SMG), bilateral inferior parietal cortex (IP) and three different midline control sites]. Significant performance deterioration was observed during rTMS over the left and right MFG and left and right IP. There was no consistent interference effect across subjects over the left or right SMG and the three different midline control sites. The interference effect with the given stimulation parameters did not last beyond the rTMS train itself. The data provide evidence for a symmetrical, bilateral parieto-frontal verbal working memory network. The data are discussed with respect to the competing ideas of a parieto-frontal central executive network vs. a network that processes the inherent semantic and object features of the visually presented verbal stimuli in parallel.

The Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) is currently undergoing a reform process which is embedded in a political context that is required to effectively and urgently respond to climate change and biodiversity loss. The CAP beyond 2020 has to be in line with the international goals of the Paris Agreement and the Convention on Biological Diversity and at the same time foster mitigation strategies for increasingly challenging natural conditions to secure food security in the long term. Yet, despite the fact that the above‐mentioned objectives call for a complete reorientation of the subsidy scheme, this article shows that the reform proposal does not provide the instruments needed to adequately address these objectives, although a few promising approaches (e.g. ‘eco‐schemes’) have been put on the reform agenda.

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