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Participatory approaches to assessing the environmental impacts of MEPL III and EULLE


To what extent do the rural development programmes MEPL III in Baden-Württemberg and EULLE in Rhineland-Palatinate contribute to biodiversity, water, soil and climate protection?

Under the auspices of the IfLS, this issue was discussed during the evaluations of the two programmes in a total of four expert workshops in March and April. The methodological framework was the so-called MAPP approach ("Method of Impact Assessment of Programmes and Projects"), a predominantly qualitative method with participatory evaluation steps.

The key points of the procedure are a joint trend analysis - an assessment of the environmental status and past trends using indicators - and the creation of an impact matrix in order to assess the contributions of the identified instruments and groups of measures to the respective subject area. This also made it possible to compare the programme impacts with other instruments and groups of measures.

The IfLS applied the method for the first time and carried out the workshops with the support of those responsible for the programme in Baden-Württemberg and Rhineland-Palatinate. Up to 25 experts from state authorities and institutions, associations and the scientific community took part in this "experiment". The intention was to supplement the evaluation of the development programmes based on quantitative indicators, surveys and literature analyses and to place these programmes in a broader context.

Particularly interesting were the contributions from various disciplines and organisations and the "outside the box" view of rural development programmes. However, it was challenging to do justice to the thematic breadth and the multitude of instruments and measures within one workshop. Nevertheless, it became clear in which areas the funding programmes make significant contributions and where they can rather complement other instruments, such as technical legislation.

Contact persons at IfLS: Jörg Schramek (schramek[at]ifls.de) and Heike Nitsch (nitsch[at]ifls.de)