Post a comment on the text below

Box 4.7 Planned water measures under the rural development plans 2014-2020

The latest programming of the CAP Rural Development Plans offered a wide choice of measures to farmers wanting to reduce the pressures of their farm operations on the water environment. These included for example investments in assets (e.g. modernization of manure storage, water saving technologies, wetland and river restoration), agroforestry, agro-environment and climate operations (e.g. soil conservation technique, conversion of arable land into grassland) and organic farming. In addition, some Member States, such as France, used compensation schemes for the compulsory uptake of measures supporting water policy (e.g. WFD, drinking water) objectives.

At European level, the RDPs 2014-2020 planned the following:

• 46% of RDPs’ budget on Priority 4 was planned on Priority 4 “Restoring, preserving and enhancing ecosystems related to agriculture and forestry”
• 8% of RDPs budget on Priority 5 "Promoting resource efficiency and a low carbon and climate resilient economy
• 15% of the agricultural land within their RDP area, equivalent to 21 million ha, was planned to under land management contracts to improve water management during the planning period. This varied greatly between Member States, with some planning to contract up to 80% of agricultural land under contract.
• 9% of irrigated land, equivalent to 776,842 ha, were planned to be switched to more efficient irrigation system.
• 36% of the budget of RDPs was to fund agro-environment and climate operations, with some RDPs going up to 83% of their budget.
• Almost most RDPs planned to fund organic farming.

Overall, the issue of water pollution from agriculture is well covered, and to a less extent abstraction and hydromorphological pressures. Most measures tackling water pollution from crops focused on more efficient use of fertilisers and pesticides through improved product application. Some measures put a limit on total use, sometimes targeting specific crop types such as fruit and vegetable crops, olive orchards and vineyards. More ambitious measures ban the use of pesticides. Measures on livestock focused on improve fertilization practices on grassland and feed crops, improved manure storage and wastewater treatment on farms. More ambitious measures, proposed in few RDPs, aimed to reduce stocking density.

RDPs planned to reduce abstraction pressures predominantly by improving efficient water use in irrigation systems and increased rainwater harvesting. However, this was rarely accompanied with ambitious targets for water saving, running the potential that most saved water would serve to irrigate more crops or more water-intensive but more valuable crops. Few RDPs supported the conversion to less water consumptive crops, selection of crops or varieties/hybrids with a lower water demand and more resistant to droughts, and application of water saving crop and soil management, which are important for adapting to climate change.

Less than half of RDPs supported changes in crop and soil management practices, such as crop rotation and low and no till agriculture. Few promoted more profound changes in land use, such as flood management, wetland creation, remeandering or conversion to agro-forestry – although these measures could have multiple benefits to reduce pollution, abstraction and hydromorphological pressures.

Source: Rouillard and Berglund, 2017