Designing economic instruments to maintain and enhance hay meadow biodiversity in south-west European mountain areas

摘要

Hay meadows are disappearing all over Europe, and with them, areas of high biodiversity. Recently, this process has also affected significant surfaces of mesophile hay meadows in south-west European (SW-EU) mountain areas, due to changes in land management and socio-demographic decline. Specific 1agri-environmental subsidies are one of the potential instruments to favour their conservation, but they are not applied to most of these territories. This study aims to analyse how current agricultural 'payment schemes from CAP and Rural Development Programmes (hereinafter RDP) can be used to enhance biodiversity conservation by promoting the maintenance/recovery of the traditional extensive management of mesophile hay meadows in Natura 2000 sites within SW Europe. To reach this goal, in extensive review and characterisation of economic instruments applied to the conservation of these meadows in Europe has been carried out. A clustering and comparative analysis of their main features, transfer possibilities and implementation results have been also addressed. The study proposes strategic guidelines to design and put into practice future economic measures to conserve mesophile hay meadows in different SW-EU mountain protected areas.