6 DRIVERS OF CHANGE ON ASSOCIATED BIODIVERSITY
6.9 Positive drivers on biodiversity for food and agriculture
Policies and programmes have been a key driver in terms of promoting and safeguarding biodiversity for food and agriculture.
Agro-environmental policies and programmes such as the Regional Environment Programme (RMP) have been particularly effective in this respect. Established in 2005 (White Paper Nr.70), the RMP is a central component in the national environmental efforts in agriculture. Through the provision of grants that are managed by the Norwegian Agricultural Authority35 the programme contributes to the sustainable performance of agriculture. Interesting examples in this respect are the provision of agricultural grants for maintaining endangered native livestock breeds (e.g.
Telemark cattle, the Norwegian spæl sheep and the Fjord horse) and for the prevention of nutrient runoff from agricultural areas. Regarding the latter, USD 28 million was spent on relevant projects in 2011 (Norwegian Ministry of Climate and Environment, 2014). Support provided through the RMP has also contributed to the conservation and restoration of unique agricultural landscapes, including biodiverse pastures that offer a habitat to a range of valuable species, like for example salamanders. The decisions on the content of the RMP are taken at the county-level. However, national priorities, such as those that have been set by the Ministry of Climate and Environment with respect to the species and habitats to conserve, are also taken into account.
Other examples of positive drivers on biodiversity for food and agriculture include, inter alia, acreage subsidies36 that are being allocated to farmers to up keep, maintain and develop the agricultural landscape, subsidies that support organic farming and farm ponds establishing projects. Environmental subsidy schemes, such as those that promote the conservation of grasslands, of lichen pastures (reindeer farming) and of harvested forests, also contribute to safeguarding biodiversity of for food and agriculture.
The Nature Diversity Act includes a number of provisions that are of importance when it comes to reducing adverse impacts on biological, geological and landscape diversity. Among others, the Act
35 The Norwegian Agriculture Authority is the agency of the Norwegian Ministry of Agriculture and Food that is responsible of ensuring that all subsidy schemes and regulations are administered uniformly across the country and throughout the value chain. At present, Norway has about 100 different subsidy arrangements related to agriculture, including subsidies that are favorable to traditional farming and rural settlements (i.e. grazing related subsidies, livestock subsidies per farm and per head, including for farmers with small livestock populations). To receive subsidy payments, farmers have to meet well-defined requirements set forth by the government (i.e. fencing criteria, quality prerequisites for the area under their ownership, as well as obligations regarding their own contribution).
36 Acreage subsidies are in line with Norway’s agricultural policy objective to stimulate active farming throughout the country.
contains a series of principles for official decision-making, such as the precautionary principle37 and the user-pays principle.38 The Act also includes a principle for species management, whereby harvesting and other removal of terrestrial invertebrates, plants and fungi occurring in the wild are permitted to the extent that they do not jeopardize the survival of the population concerned. A similar principle exists for marine organisms in the Marine Resources Act (Act of 6 June 2008 No.
37) and in the Wildlife Act for the harvesting of wildlife (Act of 29 May 1981 No.38) and of salmonids and freshwater fish (Act of 15 May 1992 No.47).
Recently, the Nature Diversity Act introduced two tools to protect vulnerable habitats and species.
Threatened species can be designated a 'priority species', giving them particular protection along with the habitat they live in; and endangered and vulnerable habitats can be designated as 'selected', to safeguard them through protection and sustainable use. The tools enable the central government, the local authorities and the private sector to prioritize, regulate and coordinate what can and what cannot be done within these selected habitat types. In each municipality, surveys are being carried out to establish the areas that are of most importance for preserving natural diversity.
In Norwegian forests, a significant number of measures are in place to reduce possible adverse effects on associated biodiversity, ecosystem services and wild foods. About 34% of the country's total forest area and 22% of its productive forest area are classified as protective forest under the Forestry Act. Protective forests are selected forest areas that are treated with special care due to their location and characteristics. They may serve as protection against avalanches and landslides, flooding rivers, flood damage, sand drift or as special protection for other forests, cultivated land or settlement. The term protective forest can also apply to forests that due to their location near the mountains, near the ocean or far up north have such difficult regeneration conditions or such slow growth that they could be destroyed by mismanagement or wrong harvesting procedures. In protective forest areas, timber harvesting is allowed, although with some restrictions.
Protected forest areas have been established as national parks, nature reserves and landscape protected areas. Approximately 6.1% of Norway’s total forest area, or 4.3% of its productive forest area, is classified as protected forest with forestry activities being more limited in landscape protected areas. When excluding landscape protected areas, these percentages are 4.1% and 2.8%, respectively (Tomter & Dalen, 2014; Miljødirektoratet, 2014; Skjeggedal et al., 2010). Under the so-called voluntary protection scheme (frivillig vern) a share of the 4.3% of Norway’s productive forest area that is classified as protected forest area is voluntarily proposed for protection by forest
owners as a contribution to the conservation of biodiversity in Norwegian forests.
Environmental considerations have been part of Norwegian forest policies for many years through rules and regulations in the Forestry Act, subsidy programmes, environmental registration
schemes and capacity building measures to build up environmental knowledge in the forestry sector.
37 If there is a risk of serious damage to biological, geological or landscape diversity, lack of knowledge shall not be used as a reason for postponing or not introducing management measures.
38 The costs associated with preventing or limiting any damage caused by a project to biological, geological and landscape diversity shall be borne by the project owner.
Norway also uses a national standard for sustainable forest management. This so-called Living Forests Standard provides specific environmental requirements and actions that are of importance for sustainable forest management. It is part of the country’s Programme for the Endorsement of Forest Certification scheme (PEFC).
In 2008, the Norwegian government opened the Svalbard Global Seed Vault. The Seed Vault aims to safeguard crops that are vital to global food security. There are many national, regional and international plant seed collections and gene banks around the world whose primary function is to ensure genetic diversity in the agriculture sector. The Svalbard Seed Vault is a safety stock for these local deposits, which can be used to recreate valuable plant varieties whose seed collections in a local gene bank are lost.
The Vault also aims to secure the long term conservation of forest trees. In February 2015, the first forest tree seeds of Norway spruce (Picea abies) and Scots pine (Pinus sylvestris) were officially deposited and stored in the Seed Vault.
6.10 Key findings and remaining challenges
Key findings
a. Over the past fifty years land use changes have been the most significant threat to
associated biodiversity in agricultural landscapes. Both the abandonment of farming and farming intensification has led to alterations that have been of particular negative influence on biodiversity associated to farming.
b. Felling and the removal of trees change the structure and composition of forests and the local climatic conditions, thereby affecting the habitat of forest-associated biodiversity.
Norway's sustainable forest management approach aims to keep such effects localized and limited. Other factors with an impact on forest associated biodiversity include, changing grazing patterns, the building of roads and pollution.
c. Bottom trawling and dredging, as well as the construction of marinas, roads and leisure facilities in shore zones are known to affect the habitat of marine associated species, with some of these species being essential food sources for demersal fish.
Remaining challenges
a. Land use changes continue to affect agricultural landscapes negatively. Despite Norway’s overall soil conservation strategy, buildings, roads, etc. are increasingly replacing arable land.
b. In agricultural landscapes and forests, still little is known on the extent of the risks caused by climate change, as well as by non-native species, with respect to associated biodiversity.
c. Great uncertainty is attached to the scale and extent of the effects of climate change on marine associated species. The possible impact of the expansion of aquaculture on wild fish resources also needs to be more precisely determined.