Swiss Agricultural Policy and the Environment: An Example for the Rest of Europe to Follow?

Abstract

The independence of Switzerland from the EU has allowed the development of unilateral agri-environmental policies. Article 31b provides a comprehensive approach to ecological farming that now covers more than half of the farmed area of the country. It is a progressive direct payment system developedin full consultation with farmers and contrasts with environmental incorporation in the Common Agricultural Policy in a number of significant ways. Despite a number of modifications to the scheme in its initial implementation,it provides the foundation for a pervasive sustainable agriculture in combination with the production of high quality ecologically-based food products.

Associating conservation/production patterns in US farm policy with agricultural land-use in three Iowa, USA townships, 1933–2002

“…This effect is most apparent in Switzerland, where independence from the EU has allowed greater emphasis on environmental outcomes that decoupled farm income from price supports, connects specific food products with environmentallyfriendly farm practices, and promotes biological diversity on farmland (Curry and Stucki, 1997). The Swiss system depends heavily on direct farmer payments, but policymakers continue to enhance efficiency by connecting societal objectives to specific payments (Mann and Lanz, 2013).…”

EUROPEAN BRIEFING: The Transition to Environmental Agriculture in Europe: Learning Processes and Knowledge Networks

“…This has an advantage over the EU system in providing funding for extension rather than training, but the programme has been unable to impose effective control on the quality of environmental extension delivery to the extent that this requirement has now been dropped from the programme, although it remains strongly encouraged (Curry & Stuki, 1997).…”

“…The many variations by country span some 104 individual schemes in Germany (Wilson, 1994), re ecting a broad conceptualization of the environment and a federal government structure, through a singular holistic scheme in Switzerland (Curry, 1997), to rather fewer policies in Spain, re ecting an already extensive agriculture and a preoccupation, in places, with land abandonment (Mitchell & Baldock, 1995). Within the EU, the historically low involvement of southern member states in schemes has been somewhat reversed by the implementation of the Agri-Environment Regulation (2078/92).…”

“…But in other European countries too, GATT negotiations and European Union alignment have provided a new impetus to formalizing the environmental content of agricultural policies. In Switzerland, for example, 1992 agricultural policy reforms introduced a system of 'ecological farming' that now covers over half of the farmed area of the country (Curry, 1997;Swiss Federal Of ce for Agriculture, 1995). Many commentators (see for example, Lowe & Whitby, 1997;Potter, 1996a, b;Winter, 1996) have suggested that these reforms of the 1990s marked the beginning of a longer road to fuller environmental incorporation into European agriculture.…”

Farm assurance schemes: can they improve farming standards?

“…Agricultural policy reform began in the early 1990s to manage over production and an industry-wide financial crisis. New policies moved Swiss farming away from solely food production towards responsible stewardship of the countryside and local communities (Curry and Stuck, 1997). Today, around half of the farmed area is in organic production and direct payments are only available in exchange for environmental management.…”