Geo-information requirement for agri-environmental policy

This project aims to elaborate methods for determining the geo-information requirement in an area of tension between different groups of decision makers. A concrete case in the northeast of the province of Friesland addresses the fitness of geo-information for both, decision making by farmers, and monitoring of environmental achievements at a regional level. The Australian partner studies the methods in a non agri-environmental domain.

Penvoerder:

Projectconsortium

Problem Statement
In a densely populated country such as the Netherlands, decisions concerning land use and environment will inevitably affect several persons or social groups. On the one side, the people involved have different views on what is to be achieved by their decisions. On the other, their decision making depends on the availability and quality of information; in the case of land-related decisions particularly geographical information. Our project aims to elaborate methods for determining the geo-information requirement in the area of tension between different groups of decision makers, who act within the constraints of existing legislation. These methods are needed to help answer the question: “Which demands do current and future social issues make on the NGII and what knowledge impulse is needed to bridge the gap between supply and demand of geo-information?”
As this research objective is too vague to be practicable within the current  PhD project, we will mainly focus on the agri-environmental setting of the cooperation “Noardlike Fryske Wâlden” (NFW). This cooperation and its mainly agricultural members aim for a strong regional economy, an attractive environment for living and working, and conservation of the unique cultural landscape and its associated biodiversity. The farmers are bound by national and European legislation which is implemented by the Government and public services. These entities also have the obligation to verify the farmers’ compliance with legislation. This is mainly accomplished by requiring the farmers to maintain and hand over detailed records of spatially explicit farming practices.
Sorgdrager (2002) questioned the detail of information required by the Dutch Manure regulations (MINAS, etc.) and criticised the multiple specification of similar data as requested by different regulations. Apart from that, the report also recognized a high potential of using ICT, especially by linking farm management systems and government systems for streamlining the information exchange and information usage in the agricultural sector. The use of Geo-information was envisaged as particularly promising, because field maps have multiple application in farm management and regulations.

Objectives and scope
In the above context, the central research question of the current project is: Which geo-information linked to environmental processes is needed, both to facilitate local decision making by farmers, and to provide indicators for agro-environmental policy aiming at environmental and biodiversity goals at regional level? To answer this question, we will study the required accuracy of geographic data and the possibilities/desirability of:

• multiple application of existing data (among which core spatial data sets of the NGII);
• single data entry for multiple purposes;
• data acquisition, e.g. by remote sensing and the 3MG  measurement system (= mobile regional environmental monitor);
• data exchange at aggregate level in case of regional goals (e.g. landscape restoration, surface water quality).

Figure 1 gives a schematic representation of the problem field. Our premise is that on the one hand information affects the farmers’ decisions and, hence, nutrient application and cultivation measures, which eventually will have an impact on the environment. On the other, the Government and public services acquire information from farmers and monitoring networks to implement policy and monitor the achievement of environmental goals. The project concerns the flows of geo-information (indicated by dashed grey arrows), and more particularly, methods to assess the optimal flow of geo-information. This scope excludes development of domain knowledge on environmental (soil) processes, farming practices and the policy cycle. The policy cycle is considered as an external process, while the other domain knowledge is either available via the participating institutes or will be developed in a related programme  (i.e. bsik Transforum Agro en Groen, in which NFW and the Soil Science group of Wageningen University participate).

Furthermore, the technical aspects of data exchange and access to data are not part of our project. They are covered in other projects, such as Geoboer and Geoloketten. The Centre for Geo-information of Wageningen UR participates in the three projects (RGI-017, Geoboer and Geoloketten). Mutual tuning of thematic contents (e.g. the data availability model in Geoloktten) is achieved via the Centre’s thematic group “Spatial Data Quality/Geo Information Infrastructure”.

Our Australian partner will extend the approach to the non agricultural domain, by conducting and supervising related MSc research.

 
Figure 1.  Schematic representation of the problem field of the project. The research concerns the geo-information flows represented by grey dashed arrows.