Workshop 1 : Identification of types of livestock system.

Workshop 1 objectives

Within the European Community there is a large number of different livestock production systems based upon a great diversity of natural and human resources. Livestock production often has a profound impact on the regions within which it is situated, both economically, socially and environmentally. In many rural areas livestock production has historically been the mainstay of economic and social activity, supporting large numbers of rural communities. Livestock production has also been responsible, over centuries, for creating the landscapes and habitats valued by so many. In many marginal areas of the Community this is still the case, although recent years have seen severe rural depopulation and the intensification of livestock production in fertile lowland areas well served by major infrastructure. In these areas livestock production is increasingly associated with deleterious effects on environmental quality. One of the challenges facing policy-makers today is how to achieve a balance between the negative and positive economic, social and environmental impacts of livestock production.

There is a continuing need for livestock production systems to adapt to changing circumstances, for example as a result of the Common Agricultural Policy, the World Trade Organisation and changing social and cultural traditions. Considerable effort on the part of farmers' representatives, researchers and policy-makers is devoted to trying to evaluate the impacts of these changes and in particular any proposed changes in policy. However, evaluation is often constrained by current research methods, available data and lack of appropriate models. This is especially true when trying to evaluate impacts on a regional basis.

Some progress has already been made in developing spatially explicit descriptions of arable farming systems, but no attempt has yet been made to do this for livestock systems across the EU. However, some national initiatives are emerging and it is one of ELPEN's aims to try and ensure that these initiatives are co-ordinated.

ELPEN aims to do this by establishing a network of researchers within the EU, to assess whether a common framework can be devised within which it is possible to appraise and evaluate the economic, environmental and social effects of policies on livestock systems on a regional basis throughout the EU. This will require a consideration of the way in which livestock systems can be classified for different purposes, the indicators which need to be measured and recorded and the way in which data is stored, including an assessment of the problems of geographic scale.

The ELPEN project will produce and refine a protocol for creating a common framework within which policy appraisal and evaluation can be carried out. This protocol will be based on a classification system containing sets of characteristics, which enable livestock systems to be distinguished one from the other, and indicators which enable the impacts of policies on these systems, the environment and the rural economy to be determined. The protocol will also take into account the needs of policy-makers in better appraising the impacts of policy. These needs were determined through a series of discreet interviews with policy makers in both the European Commission and selected national administrations.

The aim of this workshop was to submit the first draft of the classification system to expert scrutiny and to use the expert knowledge of participants to complete and refine the sets of characteristics and indicators contained in it. It also gave an opportunity for experts from throughout the EU to consider whether the classification system contains enough information to adequately describe the livestock systems of their own countries and to discuss the form of the final protocol itself.

The workshop was structured around the following four sets of characteristics / indicators: economic and technical; environmental and landscape for low intensity livestock production systems; environmental and landscape for high intensity livestock production systems and socio-economic. Papers drawing on existing work were presented and provided the basis for subsequent discussion groups aimed at elaborating appropriate sets of indicators.

S.M. Williams, ELPEN Network

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