Agric. Econ. - Czech, 2023, 69(10):385-393 | DOI: 10.17221/235/2023-AGRICECON

Structural and weather-related factors of the sustainable intensification process in agriculture of the European Union regionsOriginal Paper

Jakub Staniszewski ORCID...1, Anika Muder ORCID...2
1 Department of Macroeconomics and Agricultural Economics, Institute of Economics, Poznañ University of Economics and Business, Poznañ, Poland
2 Thünen Institute of Farm Economics, Braunschweig, Germany

Sustainable intensification (SI) is a widely discussed concept that aims to increase agricultural production without harming the environment. This study assessed the process of SI that took place in the EU regions from 2004 to 2018 and the impact of structural and weather-related factors. In doing so, a single index based on DEA environmentally adjusted efficiency and kernel regression were applied to data from the Farm Accountancy Data Network (FADN) Public Database and the Agri4Cast resource portal. The study found an overall positive trend of SI in the EU regions in which land and animal concentration had a significant impact on this process. Sun radiation, as the only significant weather variable, had a decreasing impact on efficiency due to potential droughts. The findings emphasise the need for political support for regions with a low degree of SI and for those particularly affected by climate change.

Keywords: concentration; data envelopment analysis; environmentally adjusted efficiency; non-parametric regression;  productivity; performance

Received: July 13, 2023; Revised: August 31, 2023; Accepted: September 4, 2023; Prepublished online: October 24, 2023; Published: October 30, 2023  Show citation

ACS AIP APA ASA Harvard Chicago IEEE ISO690 MLA NLM Turabian Vancouver
Staniszewski J, Muder A. Structural and weather-related factors of the sustainable intensification process in agriculture of the European Union regions. Agric. Econ. - Czech. 2023;69(10):385-393. doi: 10.17221/235/2023-AGRICECON.
Download citation

Supplementary files:

Download file235-2023-AGRICECON_ESM.pdf

File size: 623.14 kB

References

  1. Bale¾entis T., Kri¹èiukaitienė I., Bale¾entis A. (2014): A nonparametric analysis of the determinants of family farm efficiency dynamics in Lithuania. Agricultural Economics, 45: 589-599. Go to original source...
  2. Bale¾entis T., Blancard S., Shen Z., ©treimikienė D. (2021): Analysis of environmental total factor productivity evolution in European agricultural sector. Decision Sciences, 52: 483-511. Go to original source...
  3. Barnes A.P., Thomson S.T. (2014): Measuring progress towards sustainable intensification: how far can secondary data go? Ecological Indicators, 36: 213-220. Go to original source...
  4. Buckwell A., Uhre A.N., Williams A., Polakova J., Blum W.E.H., Schiefer J., Lair G.J., Heissenhuber A., Schiessl P., Kramer C., Haber W. (2014): The Sustainable Intensification of European Agriculture - A Review Sponsored by the RISE Foundation. Brussels, Belgium, Rural Investment Support for Europe (RISE): 98.
  5. Czekaj T., Henningsen A. (2013): Panel Data Specifications in Nonparametric Kernel Regression: An Application to Production Functions. IFRO Working Paper. Copenhagen, University of Copenhagen, Department of Food and Resource Economics (IFRO): 57.
  6. Czy¿ewski A., Staniszewski J. (2018): Sustainable intensification of agriculture as the composition of economic productivity and environmental pressure measures. The Scientific Journal of the Warsaw University of Life Sciences Problems of World Agriculture, 18: 80-90.
  7. European Commission (2020): EU agricultural outlook for markets, income and environment 2020-2030. Luxembourg, Publications Office of the European Union. Available at https://ec.europa.eu/info/sites/default/files/food-farming-fisheries/farming/docu ments/agricultural-outlook-2020-report_en.pdf (accessed Mar 4, 2022).
  8. Expósito A., Velasco F. (2020): Exploring environmental efficiency of the European agricultural sector in the use of mineral fertilizers. Journal of Cleaner Production, 253: 119971. Go to original source...
  9. FAO, IFAD, UNICEF, WFP, WHO (2018): The State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World 2018: Building Climate Resilience for Food Security and Nutrition. Rome, FAO: 202.
  10. Ferreira A.A.S., Almeida A.N. (2021): The inverse relationship between farm size and productivity in Brazil: a non-parametric analysis from kernel regressions (A relação inversa entre o tamanho das propriedades agrícolas e a produtividade no Brasil: uma análise não paramétrica usando regressões kernel). Revista de Economia e Sociologia Rural, 59: e224128. (in Portuguese) Go to original source...
  11. Gadanakis Y., Bennett R., Park J., Areal F.J. (2015): Evaluating the sustainable intensification of arable farms. Journal of Environmental Management, 150: 288-298. Go to original source... Go to PubMed...
  12. Godfray H.C.J., Garnett T. (2014): Food security and sustainable intensification. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences, 369: 20120273. Go to original source... Go to PubMed...
  13. Godoy-Durán Á., Galdeano-Gómez E., Pérez-Mesa J.C., Piedra-Muñoz L. (2017): Assessing eco-efficiency and the determinants of horticultural family-farming in southeast Spain. Journal of Environmental Management, 204: 594-604. Go to original source... Go to PubMed...
  14. Kuhn L., Bale¾entis T., Hou L., Wang D. (2020): Technical and environmental efficiency of livestock farms in China: A slacks-based DEA approach. China Economic Review, 62: 101213. Go to original source...
  15. Lampkin N.H., Pearce B.D., Leake A.R., Creissen H., Gerrard C.L., Girling R., Lloyd S., Padel S., Smith J., Smith L.G., Vieweger A., Wolfe M.S. (2017): The Role of Agroecology in Sustainable Intensification. United Kingdom, LUPG: 163.
  16. Lyu X., Peng W., Yu W., Xin Z., Niu S., Qu Y. (2021): Sustainable intensification to coordinate agricultural efficiency and environmental protection: asystematic review based on metrological visualization. Journal of Land Use Science, 16: 313-338. Go to original source...
  17. Pretty J.N. (1997): The sustainable intensification of agriculture. Natural Resources Forum, 21: 247-256. Go to original source...
  18. Rockström J., Williams J., Daily G., Noble A., Matthews N., Gordon L., Wetterstrand H., DeClerck F., Shah M., Steduto P., De Fraiture C., Hatibu N., Unver O., Bird J., Sibanda L., Smith J. (2017): Sustainable intensification of agriculture for human prosperity and global sustainability. Ambio, 46: 4-17. Go to original source... Go to PubMed...
  19. Sintori A., Liontakis A., Tzouramani I. (2019): Assessing the environmental efficiency of Greek dairy sheep farms: GHG emissions and mitigation potential. Agriculture, 9: 28. Go to original source...
  20. Skevas T., Lansink A.O. (2013): Reducing pesticide use and pesticide impact by productivity growth: The case of Dutch arable farming. Journal of Agricultural Economics, 65: 191-211. Go to original source...
  21. Skevas T., Serra T. (2016): The role of pest pressure in technical and environmental inefficiency analysis of Dutch arable farms: An event-specific data envelopment approach. Journal of Productivity Analysis, 46: 139-153. Go to original source...
  22. Soliman T., Djanibekov U. (2020): Assessing dairy farming eco-efficiency in New Zealand: A two-stage data envelopment analysis. New Zealand Journal of Agricultural Research, 64: 411-428. Go to original source...
  23. Song Y., Zhang B., Wang J., Kwek K. (2022): The impact of climate change on China's agricultural green total factor productivity. Technological Forecasting and Social Change, 185: 122054. Go to original source...
  24. Soteriades A.D., Foskolos A., Styles D., Gibbons J.M. (2020): Maintaining production while reducing local and global environmental emissions in dairy farming. Journal of Environmental Management, 272: 111054. Go to original source... Go to PubMed...
  25. Staniszewski J. (2018): Attempting to measure sustainable intensification of agriculture in countries of the European Union. Journal of Environmental Protection and Ecology, 19: 949-957.
  26. Staniszewski J., Kryszak £. (2022): Do structures matter in the process of sustainable intensification? A case study of agriculture in the European Union countries. Agriculture, 12: 334. Go to original source...
  27. Staniszewski J., Guth M., Smêdzik-Ambro¿y K. (2023): Structural conditions of the sustainable intensification of agriculture in the regions of the European Union. Journal of Cleaner Production, 389: 136109. Go to original source...
  28. United Nations (2022): World Population Prospects 2022. New York, United Nations: 52.
  29. Weltin M., Hüttel S. (2023): Sustainable intensification farming as an enabler for farm eco-efficiency? Environmental and Resource Economics, 84: 315-342. Go to original source...
  30. Weltin M., Zasada I., Piorr A., Debolini M., Geniaux G., Perez O.M., Scherer L., Marco L.T., Schulp C.J.E. (2018): Conceptualising fields of action for sustainable intensification - A systematic literature review and application to regional case studies. Agriculture, Ecosystems and Environment, 257: 68-80. Go to original source...
  31. ®áková Kroupová Z., Èechura L., Havlíková M., Hálová P., Malý M. (2018): Shadow prices of greenhouse gas emissions: An application to the Czech dairy production. Agricultural Economics - Czech, 64: 291-300. Go to original source...

This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International (CC BY NC 4.0), which permits non-comercial use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original publication is properly cited. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.