STRATEGIC SCIENCE ADVISORY PANEL
SUBJECT: NERC: FUTURE PRIORITIES ON SUSTAINABLE AGRICULTURE
MEETING: 15&16 JANUARY 2007
SUMMARY
This paper sets out:
- The NERC science strategy themes that are of relevance to the Sustainable Agriculture agenda
- The key areas where NERC funded research contributes to the Sustainable Agriculture agenda
ACTION
The panel members are invited to:
- Note and discuss the paper outlining NERC's future priorities for Sustainable Agriculture
Dr Faith Culshaw, NERC, will give an oral presentation on NERC's future priorities for Sustainable Agriculture
Science & Analysis Group
December 2006
FUTURE NERC PRIORITIES ON SUSTAINABLE AGRICULTURE
1. The Natural Environment Research Council (NERC) is currently developing its new strategy. There will be a public consultation (phase 2) in early 2007.
2. In September 2006, NERC Council discussed which areas of science would be of priority for NERC over the next strategy period. Several of the strategy themes are relevant to the Sustainable Agriculture agenda:
- Climate systems- focusing on more research on climate variability and change leading to predictions on shorter time and space scales: local to regional and seasonal to decadal.
- Biodiversity - focusing on taking a whole ecosystems approach.
- Sustainable use of natural resources - including energy, soil and water.
- Natural hazards - including extreme weather and flooding.
- Environment, pollution and human health - including diffuse pollution
3. NERC is also developing, with the other Research Councils under RCUK, some multidisciplinary proposals for the Comprehensive Spending Review. One of these addresses the 5th of Treasury's five key challenges - the effect of growing pressures on natural resources from increasing human population and environmental change. The NERC-led initiative, entitled "Living with Environmental Change" (LWEC), is supported by other funders in addition to research councils, through the Environment Research Funders Forum.
4. LWEC will address policy issues related to the fact that we live in the midst of human-induced climatic and environmental changes that challenge our social and economic well-being. LWEC will address a number of the major climatic and ecosystem service uncertainties highlighted in the Stern review of the economics of climate change. The science will focus on producing interdisciplinary probabilistic predictions of local and regional scale climate and environmental change and its impacts on: natural resources, life-quality and infrastructures. Predictions will be made at scales similar to those used to manage the economy and will involve approaches that help us adapt to and mitigate impacts. LWEC will aim to help secure resilient ecosystem services. Areas likely to be addressed within LWEC that are relevant to the Sustainable Agriculture agenda include:
- water availability/quality, inc. droughts & flooding, in developed & developing countries
- environmental and societal impacts, and development, of new energy economies
- crop yields for sustainable food production as air composition and climate changes
- population growth: impact on natural resources from changes in migration and urbanisation
- sustainable ecosystem management to contribute to poverty alleviation in developing countries
5. NERC does not directly support research on agricultural production. However, the emphasis in agricultural research (and agricultural practice) is moving away from a focus on production to environmental custodianship and food security, i.e. the concept of sustainable agriculture. Sustainability requires understanding of how the numerous and complex ecosystem services that agriculture depends on can be maintained in a state that preserves their functionality at acceptable cost, whilst preserving the integrity of the wider ecosystem. The emphasis on environmental custodianship in particular, draws NERC squarely into this emerging research agenda.
6. In this sense, the broad collective of NERC science is relevant (e.g. climate change, biodiversity, catchment science, etc).
7. More specifically, at least 35 current grants (totalling ~£4.6m) have specific relevance to agriculture (eg impacts of pesticides and diffuse pollution from agriculture). NERC, in partnership with BBSRC and ESRC is funding a number of relevant interdisciplinary research projects through the Rural Economy and Land Use Programme (see Annex 1). NERC's Centre for Ecology and Hydrology supports research in the area of Sustainable Farming and GM Crops (Annex 2), and works in partnership with DEFRA (and other funders) to produce the Countryside Survey.
8. Finally, of the recommendations put forward by the DEFRA Research Priorities Group report on Sustainable Farming and Food, NERC indicated that the following were strongly within its remit:
- The behavioural and regulatory changes that will be needed to respond effectively to environmental change
- Development of indicators to model the impact of climate change on sustainable land use
- Research to characterise the potential environmental footprint of new land use patterns at the catchment level (concentration and specialisation of agriculture, novel crops, abandonment of economically marginal land, active re-creation of habitats).
- Research to assess and develop practical biofiltration methods to tackle both direct and diffuse pollution from agriculture at field, farm and catchment scales. This might include cover crops, semi-permanent crops, permeable reactive barriers along critical river reaches, trapping of ammonia and methane from livestock wastes and filtration of dirty water from livestock units.
- Research to improve the environmental impacts of grassland agriculture. Impacts to be considered might include biodiversity, water quality, nutrient losses, and management of plastics.
- Research to inform the development of indicators of soil health with practical applications in farming systems. This research could identify the impacts of agricultural practices on soil biodiversity under different climatic conditions and identify the factors determining resistance to perturbation.
- Research to inform the development of predictive models for catchments: Good practice advice relevant to a range of catchments; and policies to tackle diffuse pollution. Research might use a combination of systems analysis, modelling, field experiments and monitoring to investigate the relationships between land management practices and the quantity and quality of surface water (run-off) and ground water (infiltration) at the catchment scale.
- Determine the spatial distributions of land at field, farm and catchment scales that offer high potential for recreating habitats and/or reintroducing species. Re-creation might include both natural regeneration ('rewilding') and active intervention.
- Research to inform the development of landscape policies and the implementation of agri-environment schemes. This might include integration of research information gathered at field, farm and catchment scales for defined 'landscape character' zones to determine the optimum geographical scale and pattern of individual land uses from specific viewpoints (for example ease of land management, enhancement of biodiversity, improving visual amenity, protection of the environment, maintenance of healthy soils).
Pamela Kempton
7 December 2006Annex 1
RELU Research Themes
- The integration of land and water use
- The environmental basis of rural development
- Sustainable food chains
- Economic and social interactions with the rural environment
Projects funded through RELU on Sustainable Food Chains
Large Research Projects
The Role of Regulation in Developing Biological Alternatives to Pesticides (Wyn Grant)
Comparative Merits of Consuming Vegetables Produced Locally and Overseas (Gareth Edwards-Jones)
Realising the Links between Quality Food Production and Biodiversity Protection (Henry Buller)
Implications of a Nutrition Driven Food Policy for the Countryside (Bruce Traill)
Managing Food Chain Risks (Richard Shepherd)
Overcoming Market and Technical Obstacles to Alternative Pest Management in Arable Systems (Alaistair Bailey)
Sustainable and and Safe Recycling of Livestock Waste (Dave Chadwick)
Warmwater Fish Production as a Diversification Strategy for Arable Farmers (David Little)
Small Projects
Impact of Private Sector Environment Standards on the Ecological Performance and International Competitiveness of UK Agriculture (Richard Baines)
Sustainability and Animal Welfare (Mary Fredlund)
Knowledge for Environmentally Sustainable Agriculture (Alison Hodge)
Farmer Perceptions of the Environmental Cost of Local Versus Overseas Food Production (Elizabeth York)
The Costs and Benefits of Pecticide Use in the UK and Kenya (Paul Cross)Annex 2
Ecological Processes and Modelling: Research on Whole Farm enhancement
Between the years 1998-2002, CEH and the Farmed Environment Company based at Manor Farm near Malton in North Yorkshire set out to determine whether it was possible to increase biodiversity on a single farm without compromising profitability. During the four years an increasing proportion of land on Manor Farm was removed from cropping and managed in ways designed to increase farm wildlife. These areas included set-aside, and field margins, corners and field-centre 'islands' sown with appropriate mixtures of native plant species.
Bird surveys showed a 41% increase in total number of breeding territories over the four years, with two species formerly absent colonising the farm during the period. Replicated margin experiments showed substantial increases in many types of invertebrate in restored field margin habitat over cropped control plots, with different margin types favouring different types of invertebrate. Some types of small mammal were shown to respond positively to increasing field margin width.
Details on line at: http://www.ceh.ac.uk/sections/epms/manorfarm.html
The above research was developed (with funding from a range of partners) across six farms as part of the BUZZ project that made a significant input to the Defra Entry Level and Higher Level schemes.
Details on line at: http://www.ceh.ac.uk/sections/epms/buzz.html
More recently the same group has been studying the effects of different farmland landscapes on pollinator species such as bumble-bees.
Ecological Processes and Modelling Research: The Farm Scale Evaluations
The Farm Scale Evaluations, one of the largest ecological experiments ever undertaken, investigated the potential impacts of the large-scale adoption of three genetically modified herbicide-tolerant (GMHT) crops on farmland wildlife in Britain. The impacts of the management of GMHT and conventional beet, maize and spring and winter oilseed rape on a range of weeds and invertebrates were measured over three years. (details on line at http://www.ceh.ac.uk/sections/epms/fse.html )
Nutrient impacts from various sources including agriculture
A new EU FP6 Integrated Programme led by CEH is NitroEurope. This is a very large project that will run until 2011. Details online at: http://www.nitroeurope.eu
Ammonia studies are also conducted by the same research team at Edinburgh who also co-ordinate a range of ongoing monitoring activities. Details online at:
http://www.cara.ceh.ac.uk
Some work relates to integrated catchment management and monitoring relevant to sustainable agriculture. More at: http://www.ceh.ac.uk/sections/sfe/sfe.html