Project details

The analyses carried out in this desk study are concerned with the effects of the European rural development measures and accompanying CAP measures on environmental pollution. In the discussion of the effects of the different agricultural and environmental protection measures put into operation under Objectives 1, 5a and 5b, and Regulations 2078/92 and 2080/92, an attempt is made to indicate the interrelationships between individual policies and measures wherever possible. A more thorough analysis shows that the Objective 1 and 5b programmes provide an excellent opportunity for strengthening the linkages between economic growth, agricultural development and environmental improvement and that the extent to which the Laender are actually using this opportunity differs considerably. Examples for the possibility of achieving positive synergetic effects are new jobs in the field of environmental technology and services or – as for farming – farm-based processing and marketing of high-quality food products.

In the conclusions, it is stressed that environment-related objectives and projects need to be both fully integrated with the other more economic and employment related sub-programmes, and they should – in addition – have their own priority axis. In particular, more emphasis should be placed on the improvement of marketing structures and of sales by local producers, especially of products from ecological or low-input farming. In order to fully integrate environment-related objectives and projects with the other more economic and employment related sub-programmes, more emphasis also needs to be placed in order to get institutions and NGOs concerned with environmental questions more directly involved in planning, decision-making and the actual implementation of projects. Environmental authorities need to be regularly represented in the monitoring committees which are responsible for overall monitoring and steering of structural funds programmes at the Laender level.