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56. Jahrestagung der Gesellschaft für Wirtschafts- und Sozialwissenschaften des Landbaues e.V. vom 28. bis 30. September 2016

A rational negotiation strategy for coming multilateral negotiations regarding climate change requires knowledge about possible social, economic and environmental effects of policy instruments for the abatement of greenhouse gas emissions. With this purpose, an agricultural sector model is expanded to cover greenhouse gas emissions from agricultural sources in Europe and policy instruments for their reduction. This modelling approach concentrates on the application of a permit trade scheme for emission abatement within the Kyoto Protocol first commitment' baseline. The effects derived of three alternative schemes are described in detail : the EU 'burden sharing' agreement option defined as regional emission standards, emission trading between regions inside each Member State, and finally, emission trading between all European regions. The analysis shows the importance of selecting an adequate combination of instruments of emission abatement for the design of efficient emission reduction policies., Systèmes d'échange de droits d'émissions de gaz à effet de serre d'origine agricole en Europe : une analyse comparative de différentes options Une stratégie rationnelle pour les négociations multilatérales à venir sur le changement climatique requiert la connaissance des effets possibles des instruments politiques pour la réduction des émissions des gaz à effet de serre sur le plan social, économique et environnemental. A cet effet, un modèle sectoriel agricole est développé afin de couvrir les émissions de gaz à effet de serre d'origine agricole en Europe et les instruments politiques visant à leur réduction. Cette approche de modélisation est basée sur l'application d'un système d'échange de droits des émissions comparé au scénario de référence de la première période d'engagement du Protocole de Kyoto. Les effets dérivés de trois systèmes alternatifs sont décrits en détail : l'option EU d'accord de partage de la charge (définie comme standards régionaux), les crédits d'échange entre les régions à l'intérieur de chaque État-membre et, finalement, les crédits d'échange entre toutes les régions européennes. L'analyse montre l'importance de sélectionner une combinaison adéquate d'instruments de réduction des émissions pour définir une politique environnementale efficace., Pérez Dominguez Ignacio, Britz Wolfgang, Holm-Müller Karin. Trading schemes for greenhouse gas emissions from European agriculture : A comparative analysis based on different implementation options. In: Revue d’études en Agriculture et Environnement, Vol. 90, N°3, 2009. pp. 287-308.

As a means to adapt to climate change, the Mexican government grants, since 2003, payments as an incentive for landholders to conserve, maintain and increase the provision of environmental services through the promotion of a forestry strategy. This paper contributes to the literature with an empirical analysis of the impact of payments for reforestation in one of the states with the highest rates of deforestation, Michoac n. The impact is estimated by means of panel data regressions and propensity score matching. Our results suggest that the payments are not contributing to the overall reforestation in Michoac n because of the existence of leakage in areas that are not participating in the program. Our analysis underlines the challenges faced when implementing financial incentive based programs and provides policy makers with evidence for improving the design of such programs.

The United Nations' Convention on Biological Diversity raised expectations of high benefits in genetic resource trade with megadiverse countries. As a reaction the Andean Community (CAN) passed strict community access legislation. Against this background the main objective of this paper is to investigate whether public eco-regional cartels of megadiverse countries on the genetic resource market can increase the appropriable benefits from biodiversity. We analyse how cartel design affects cartel benefits and discuss the benefit distribution among cartel members. As a case study we examine the CAN community access legislation (Decision 391) in the light of biodiversity collusion. Our main finding is that cartels-contrary to their negative connotation-are potentially able to stimulate genetic resource trade, increase the providers' appropriable benefits from biodiversity, and reduce the costs for customers. This depends largely on the cartel design and the ability to attract bioprospecting agents. A member's benefit share rises in the member's relative biodiversity richness and even more in the quality of the institutional environment. The CAN collusion nullifies its market power by a deterringly overly strict access regulation and a lack of internal cooperation.

There is a broad discussion about the inclusion of agriculture into greenhouse gas reduction efforts, such as the Kyoto mechanism. As most agricultural GHG emissions stem from non-point sources, they cannot be directly measured and therefore have to be derived by calculation schemes (indicators). We designed five such GHG indicators for dairy farms and analysed trade-offs between these indicators´ feasibility, measurement accuracy and abatement costs based on emission reduction simulations with a highly detailed single farm optimization model. Results indicate that the trade-offs depend both on farm characteristics and on the targeted reduction level. In particular, advantages of detailed indicators decrease for higher abatement levels.

The current study seeks to assess the private benefits associated with integrated soil conservation practices (ISCPs) by estimating the marginal value of crop production that can be attributed to such practices. In areas where land degradation associated with soil erosion causes serious agri-environmental challenges such as loss of land fertility, siltation and eutrophication, an integrated approach to soil conservation is necessary. However, notwithstanding efforts to encourage adoption of such practices, their uptake remains generally low. Understanding this deplorable status therefore warrants keen investigations on the effect of ISCPs on crop productivity. To achieve the objective, the current study applied propensity score matching and exogenous switching regression techniques to cross-sectional data collected from a random sample of farm households located in Lake Naivasha basin, Kenya. Results indicate that there is a significant positive effect of implementing integrated soil conservation practices on crop productivity. However, we note that whether the additional benefits will cover the opportunity costs associated with the implementation of these practices will depend on farm specific attributes. In cases where marginal benefits are not substantial to over private incentives for implementation of soil conservation practices, intrinsic or external incentives could be necessary.

After a brief description of the ecological problems faced in the Lake Naivasha basin in Kenya, this paper describes shortcomings of existing environmental policy instruments employed by the Kenyan government. We argue that under certain conditions a bargaining process among commercial resource users at the lake and farmers at the upper catchments could enhance the robustness of this specific social ecological system (SES) by making use of Payments for Environmental Services (PES). The necessary conditions are: lake users’ perception of damages from permanent environmental problems like siltation and eutrophication that can be addressed by actions in the upper catchment, a minimal back up from the government that allows user groups to enforce their own rules, and a sufficient level of trust inside and between the different user groups. At the same time, the analysis identifies substantial obstacles for using PES to reduce water abstractions in the upper catchment and points out that the nature of the ecological problems and the societal situation at the lake interdependently determine the success probabilities of PES.

Biogasproduktion wird in Deutschland mit dem Ziel des Klima- und Umweltschutzes sowie der Substitution fossiler Energieträger durch das Erneuerbare-Energien-Gesetz (EEG) gefördert. Dieser Beitrag analysiert quantitativ durch Kopplung eines Agrarsektor- und eines Standortmodells die Novellierung des EEGs in 2008. Die Ergebnisse zeigen, dass die Novellierung durch einen verstärkten Ausbau der Energieerzeugung durch Biogas zur weiteren Substitution fossiler Energieträger beiträgt, allerdings auch zu höheren Kosten pro erzeugter Einheit Strom. Die Flächeneffizienz sinkt, während Transportemissionen ansteigen. Eine alternativ untersuchte Ausgestaltung einer anlageunabhängigen Vergütung im EEG zeigt die höchste Subventionseffizienz, bei allerdings niedrigerer Flächeneffizienz und höheren Transportemissionen im Vergleich zum EEG vor der Novellierung. The Renewable-Energy-Source-Act (EEG) promotes German biogas production in order to substitute fossil fuels, protect the environment and prevent climate change. In this paper we quantitatively analyse the EEG-reform in 2008. Results imply that the reform contributes to an expansion of biogas electricity generation and thus to substitution of fossil fuels. However, subsidies, land and transport emissions per unit of electricity produced increase. An alternative analysis shows that an EEG with tariffs independent from plant-types would provide the highest subsidy-efficiency, lower land requirements and higher transport emissions compared to EEG before its reformation.

In the context of energy security and climate protection, biomass is given high importance. Nevertheless, land-use conflicts resulting from the cultivation of biomass and their economy-wide effects are yet to be fully understood. To shed light on this issue we link three distinctive models; a global, multi-regional general equilibrium model (DART), a regionalised agricultural sector model for Germany (RAUMIS) and a location model for biogas plants. The DART model allows capturing international and national feedback effects of an increased use of bioenergy such as increased agricultural prices. The interaction of DART and RAUMIS links global markets and connects them to the detailed specification of agricultural land use in Germany. Finally, we link this system to the newly developed location model ReSI-M that accounts for the location choices of biogas plants in Germany and the resulting regional markets for energy crop demand. As a first application of the modelling system we analyse the effects of the German Renewable Energy Source Act on German biogas production and of the EU 10%-biofuel target on German agriculture and world agricultural prices. A main result of the simulations is that accounting for existing land-use restrictions and land-use competition has a significant effect on model results.

48. Jahrestagung der Gesellschaft für Wirtschafts- und Sozialwissenschaften des Landbaues e.V. vom 24. bis 26. September 2008