The Spatial and Temporal Variability of the Effects of Agricultural Practices on the Environment

Abstract

It is widely known that agricultural practices can alter natural ecosystems, both from a qualitative and quantitative point of view. Indeed, over the years, the intensification of production through excessive or inappropriate use of pesticides and fertilisers in the agricultural sector has had a negative impact on natural resources. This negative environment impact has had both minor and major consequences for the natural resources present in the different areas of the European Union (EU). This variability depends mainly on the different agricultural training of farmers and on their ability to practise sustainable agriculture. Hence, with a specific set of agri-environmental indicators provided by the Eurostat database, this paper analyses the spatial and temporal variation of the agricultural land-use practices and the related environmental effects in EU countries. In pursuit of this aim, descriptive statistics and multivariate analysis (factor analysis and hierarchical cluster analysis) were adopted to determine the similarities/dissimilarities between the different types of agricultural production in the EU and the dominant dimensions of agricultural production and activities there in terms of their impact of natural resources in order to identify "homogeneity" among member states. The main contribution of this paper lies, above all, in the fact that the classification of these countries in four agro-ecosystems, with similar use of energy, pollution factors, and natural resources, could be useful as a tool for policymakers. Importantly, it could help them to define different incentives that could encourage farmers to adopt more sustainable agricultural production methods.

Soil microbial communities in the face of changing farming practices: A case study in an agricultural landscape in France

“…Farming practices were heterogeneous across the Fénay landscape, despite similar production situations across the whole area [ 97 ]. They changed progressively but significantly between 2011 and 2016, in agreement with observations reported at the European Union level [ 98 ]. Farmers reduced the plowing frequency, while soil bacterial richness tended to decrease or to be stable over time.…”

Resilience in Retrospective: The Trajectory of Agro-Pastoral Systems in the Centro Region of Portugal

“…Like in other studies focusing on the resilience of SES with emphasis in the social subsystem [2,5,46,84,85], we used in-depth interviews with different groups of stakeholders to build a conceptual model enabling us to better understand the causes, the effects and the endogenous and exogenous factors that have changed people's behavior and the structure in the Serra da Estrela agro-pastoral system. For this purpose, we qualitatively analyzed the structure (variables, relationships and feedbacks) of this SES from the local community's point of view.…”

Environmental Impacts of Conventional versus Organic Eggplant Cultivation Systems: Influence of Electricity Mix, Yield, Over-Fertilization, and Transportation

“…Chemical fertilizer can also be associated with high levels of natural radioactivity [40]. Excessive use of fertilizer and pesticide in conventional systems is known to have major consequences on indigenous natural resources in different areas of the European Union (EU) [41].…”