Is farming enough in mountain areas? Farm diversification in the Pyrenees

López‐i‐Gelats, Feliu; Sendra, María José Milán; Bartolomé, Jordi

doi:10.1016/j.landusepol.2011.01.005

Cited by 75 publications

(43 citation statements)

References 45 publications

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“…Objectives of part-time and leisure-oriented farmers are particularly diverse and the aspiration to achieve high production and income levels through farming, as assumed by mainstream agricultural policy, is considerably less pronounced. Our analysis also highlights pronounced differences in availability of farm labor and opportunity costs that strongly affect farmers' behavior, in line with findings from other European mountain regions [68]. By relating our analysis of farming objectives and attitudes to farm census data, we were able to develop a farmer typology that could be qualitatively integrated within a simulation framework to assess land-use changes in a mountain region.…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 75%

“…Empirical research increasingly highlights the importance of considering multiple objectives [28,[63][64][65] as well as attitudes and preferences towards more nature-friendly farming when representing farmers' decision-making [62,[65][66][67]. In addition, farm diversification and associated constraints on labor availability (and other aspects of part-time farming) are thought to strongly affect farming system development and decisions on land abandonment, particularly in mountain regions, and have been highlighted as important elements in recent farmer typologies [68,69]. Historical accounts of land abandonment in the study region and interviews with farmers and the agricultural extension office confirm the importance of this aspect and of considering socio-economic factors alongside environmental (i.e., parcel) characteristics when assessing land abandonment and reforestation.…”

Section: Developing the Agent Typologymentioning

confidence: 99%

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Sensitivity Analysis of a Land-Use Change Model with and without Agents to Assess Land Abandonment and Long-Term Re-Forestation in a Swiss Mountain Region

Brändle

Langendijk

Peter³

et al. 2015

Land

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Land abandonment and the subsequent re-forestation are important drivers behind the loss of ecosystem services in mountain regions. Agent-based models can help to identify global change impacts on farmland abandonment and can test policy and management options to counteract this development. Realigning the representation of human decision making with time scales of ecological processes such as reforestation presents a major challenge in this context. Models either focus on the agent-specific behavior anchored in the current generation of farmers at the expense of representing longer scale environmental processes or they emphasize the simulation of long-term economic and forest developments OPEN ACCESSLand 2015, 4 476 where representation of human behavior is simplified in time and space. In this context, we compare the representation of individual and aggregated decision-making in the same model structure and by doing so address some implications of choosing short or long term time horizons in land-use modeling. Based on survey data, we integrate dynamic agents into a comparative static economic sector supply model in a Swiss mountain region. The results from an extensive sensitivity analysis show that this agent-based land-use change model can reproduce observed data correctly and that both model versions are sensitive to the same model parameters. In particular, in both models the specification of opportunity costs determines the extent of production activities and land-use changes by restricting the output space. Our results point out that the agent-based model can capture short and medium term developments in land abandonment better than the aggregated version without losing its sensitivity to important socio-economic drivers. For comparative static approaches, extensive sensitivity analysis with respect to opportunity costs, i.e., the measure of benefits forgone due to alternative uses of labor is essential for the assessment of the impact of climate change on land abandonment and re-forestation in mountain regions.

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 75%

Section: Developing the Agent Typologymentioning

confidence: 99%

Sensitivity Analysis of a Land-Use Change Model with and without Agents to Assess Land Abandonment and Long-Term Re-Forestation in a Swiss Mountain Region

Brändle

Langendijk

Peter³

et al. 2015

Land

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“…However, research on farm diversification and pluri-activity on marginal Spanish Pyrenean farms, found that 'the more the farm diversification practices are applied to more aspects of the farm household (e.g. labour, land, capital) the more the capacity of farm households to secure their well-being through farming decreases (L opez-i-Gelats et al, 2011;790). They conclude that activities like farm tourism and particularly off-farm employment, although they increase family income, in agricultural abandonment risk areas, they induce further abandonment, or at least do not reverse the current trend (L opez-i-Gelats et al, 2011).…”

Section: Pluriactivitymentioning

confidence: 99%

High nature value mountain farming systems in Europe: Case studies from the Atlantic Pyrenees, France and the Kerry Uplands, Ireland

O’Rourke

Charbonneau

Poinsot

2016

Journal of Rural Studies

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“…As for continental mountains, two variables could explain the decrease of diet diversity when elevation increases: i) landscape composition, creating outbreaks of certain prey species, and ii) limited number of species. Indeed, in mountainous areas of France, land use poli cy led to an agricultural specialization towards grass production and towards lar ger parcel sizes (López-i-Gelats et al 2011). This promoted the emergence of multiannual vole (Arvicola terrestris and Microtus arvalis) population fluctuations at large spatial and temporal scales (Delattre et al 1992, Giraudoux et al 1997, Delattre et al 2006, Foltête et al 2008, Berthier et al 2013.…”

Section: Elevation Effect On the Sdi Value Of The Barn Owl's Diet Indmentioning

confidence: 99%

Eco-geographical variation in the diet of the Barn Owl (Tyto alba) in mountainous areas of France

Halliez

Becel²,

Canella³

2015

Ornis Hungarica

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Because of the worldwide distribution of the Barn Owl (Tyto alba) and the easily way to find its pellets, it is often used to diet studies. To investigate the eco-geographical impact of mountainous areas on its diet, we conducted studies in the Jura, Alpes, Central and Pyrénées mountains and we also did pellet analysis from 8 sites in the Jura mountains. Analysis of the tooth and skull content of pellets allowed us to draw up two types of change in the diet of Tyto alba in correlation with mountain elevation. The first one concerns the Jura, Alpes and Central mountains, where the diversity of the diet declines with the increase in elevation. The second one concerns the Pyrénées mountains, where there is no change in the diversity of the diet, perhaps because of the higher diversity of small mammals caused by mediterranean influence. Thus, it seems that elevation cau ses a decrease in diet diversity of Tyto alba in continental mountains (Jura, Alpes and Central mountains) probably because of more homogeneous landscapes dedicated to grass production. However, in Mediterranean mountains (Pyrénées), a more diversified small mammal guild provides a constant level of diet diversity.Keywords: Barn Owl, small mammals, mountain, mediterranean influence, continental influence Összefoglalás A gyöngybagoly (Tyto alba) egész világon való elterjedése, és köpeteinek könnyű fellelhetősége miatt gyakori alanya táplálkozási vizsgálatoknak. E dolgozatban a hegyvidéki környezet gyöngybagoly táplálko-zására kifejtett öko-geográfiai hatásait teszteltük a Jura, az Alpok, a Francia-középhegység és a Pireneusok terü-letén gyűjtött minták alapján, és köpet-analízist végeztünk a Jura-hegységből származó, 8 különböző területről gyűjtött mintából. A köpetekben talált fog-és koponyamaradványok analízise alapján két csoportot lehetett elkü-löníteni: a Jura, az Alpok és a Francia-középhegység területén a táplálék-diverzitása csökkent a tengerszint feletti magasság növekedésével, míg a Pireneusok területén ilyen változást nem tapasztaltunk. A különbség abból adód-hat, hogy a kontinentális hegységekben (Jura, Alpok, Francia-középhegység) a tengerszintfeletti magasság nö-vekedésével a homogénebb élőhelyek kedveznek a fűfélék növekedésének, így a kisemlős diverzitás is csökken, míg a mediterrán hegységek (Pireneusok) területén egy sokkal változatosabb kisemlős közösség biztosítja a táp-lálék-diverzitás állandóságát.

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Is farming enough in mountain areas? Farm diversification in the Pyrenees

Cited by 75 publications

References 45 publications

Sensitivity Analysis of a Land-Use Change Model with and without Agents to Assess Land Abandonment and Long-Term Re-Forestation in a Swiss Mountain Region

Sensitivity Analysis of a Land-Use Change Model with and without Agents to Assess Land Abandonment and Long-Term Re-Forestation in a Swiss Mountain Region

High nature value mountain farming systems in Europe: Case studies from the Atlantic Pyrenees, France and the Kerry Uplands, Ireland

Eco-geographical variation in the diet of the Barn Owl (Tyto alba) in mountainous areas of France

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