Zusammenfassung
The intensity of agricultural production was assessed in 25 landscape
test sites across temperate Europe using a standardised farmer questionnaire.
The intensity indicators, nitrogen input (to arable crops and to
permanent grassland), density of livestock units and number of pesticide
applications (herbicides, insecticides, fungicides and retardants),
were recorded and integrated into an overall intensity index. All
three components were needed to appropriately characterise the intensity
of agricultural management. Four hypotheses were tested. (i) A low
diversity of crops is related to higher intensity. The contrary was
observed, namely because diverse crop rotations contained a higher
share of crops which are more demanding in terms of nitrogen and
of plant protection. (ii) Intensity decreases when there is more
permanent grassland. This was confirmed by our study. (iii) Large
farms are managed more intensively. There was no relation between
farm size and intensity. (iv) Large fields are managed more intensively.
There was a tendency towards higher nitrogen input and livestock
density in landscapes with larger fields but only a few of the results
were statistically significant. The aggregated overall intensity
index was of limited usefulness mainly because of limitations in
interpretability. (c) 2005 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
Nutzer