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  • From: "TradingPostPaul" <tradingpost@riseup.net>
  • To: livingontheland@lists.ibiblio.org
  • Subject: [Livingontheland] State of the Environment - Europe and Central Asia
  • Date: Sat, 06 Jan 2007 15:38:18 -0700

Chapter Two: The State of the Environment - Europe and Central Asia
http://www.grida.no/geo2000/english/0075.htm
Land and food

Western and Central Europe today contain virtually no untouched natural
areas. In these sub-regions, about one-third of the land is forested,
coverage ranging from about 6 per cent in Ireland to 66 per cent in Finland
(EEA 1995). During this century, agricultural yields in Western Europe have
increased substantially as a result of intensification, decreasing the
total area needed for agricultural purposes. As a result, the total forest
area is now slightly larger than it was a hundred years ago. In many
countries subsidies for afforestation, which are aimed primarily at
increasing timber production, also have environmental and social aims. Most
forest expansion, however, has been on poorer land.

In Central and Eastern Europe and in Central Asia, agriculture was
dominated by large-scale collective farming for much of the century. There
has also been a decline in the area of agricultural land in Central Europe
since around 1990. Significant changes in land use may be taking place on
marginal land where many areas, small and large, are being abandoned (Bouma
and others 1998).

In Eastern Europe, almost half the land area is still covered by forests -
and, with about a further 20 per cent covered by natural grasslands, about
70 per cent of the total can be regarded as non-domesticated. However, over
the century almost 10 per cent of this area has been converted into
cropland or pasture land (Klein Goldewijk and Battjes 1997).

Throughout most of the region, the dominant pressures on land use are from
agriculture and forestry, although urbanization, transport and tourism,
with their associated infrastructures, are becoming increasingly important.

During the first half of the century, Central Europe and the former Soviet
Union were major food exporters while most Western European countries were
importers. The practice of subsidizing agricultural prices in Western
Europe began after World War II. The CAP of the EEC was aimed mainly at
increasing agricultural productivity in order to achieve self-sufficiency
in food, providing a fair and stable income for farmers, and reasonable
prices for consumers. While achieving these objectives, however, the CAP
increased pressure on land resources and produced large food surpluses.
Intensive agriculture, with its high input of fertilizers and pesticides,
jeopardized soil and water resources as well as natural and semi-natural
habitats (Mannion 1995).

In Eastern Europe and Central Asia, collective agriculture was also heavily
subsidized but was unable to provide adequate supplies of food. Climatic
variations led to large fluctuations in yields. Poor facilities for food
storage and distribution led to large losses. Many attempts to extend the
area under cultivation caused extensive ecological destruction. For
example, in the mid-1950s, vast areas of natural grassland (dry steppes) in
northern Kazakhstan were ploughed up and later suffered from severe wind
erosion (State Committee of Kazakhstan 1993).

In Central Europe, per capita food production was higher than in the former
Soviet Union but the impact of heavy machinery and the widespread use of
chemicals and fertilizers contributed to the degradation of soil structure,
soil erosion and acidification. By the mid-1980s in Hungary, for example,
about 50 per cent of farmland was affected by acidification and 17 per cent
by severe soil erosion (Government of the Hungarian Republic 1991).

There have been major developments in agriculture throughout the region
during the past few years. Major reform of the CAP started in 1992, with
measures designed to compensate farmers for using less intensive farming
methods (converting arable land to meadows and pastures, preserving
habitats and biodiversity, afforestation and long-term set-aside) and to
promote organic agriculture (EEA 1995). Increasing production is no longer
the prime requirement, and subsidies are gradually being replaced by direct
payments for the implementation of the new policies. However, environmental
considerations are still only a small part of the CAP (EEA 1998a).

The pressure on land resources in Central and Eastern Europe and Central
Asia has also started to decrease but for different reasons. The collapse
of centrally-planned economies and the ending of state subsidies to large
collective farms were among the major reasons for a sharp decrease in the
use of agricultural chemicals, the abandonment of large irrigation
projects, falling livestock numbers and a general reduction in agricultural
land, all of which resulted in a sharp decline in agricultural production.

While some of these developments are encouraging from the point of view of
a shift to more sustainable patterns of land use, there are a number of
other areas of concern.

Soil erosion has always been a serious problem, particularly in the
Mediterranean region, including Turkey. Of Europe's total land area (from
the Atlantic to the Urals), 12 per cent is affected by water erosion and 4
per cent by wind erosion, generally as a result of unsustainable
agricultural practices (UNEP/ISRIC 1991).

The declining use of fertilizers


Kazakhstan is a good example of how changes in agricultural organization
have led to declining use of agricultural inputs in Central Asia. In 1995
only 386 state farms remained out of an original 764, while use of mineral
fertilizers was only 16 per cent of the 1993 level, and the area to which
mineral fertilizers were applied diminished to just 9 per cent of 1993
levels (Ministry of Ecology and Bioresources of Kazakhstan 1996).

Similar changes are taking place in Central Europe. Fertilizer use in
Albania fell from 176 to just 26 kg/ha between 1990 and 1994. In Poland the
figures were 235 kg/ha in 1985 and 100 kg/ha in 1994. In the Czech Republic
(perhaps one of the most successful transition economies) fertilizer use
fell from 346 kg/ha in 1985 to 107 in 1994 (FAOSTAT 1997).


Salinization and waterlogging are serious problems, especially in areas
where large but poorly-managed irrigation systems were constructed.
Large-scale irrigation projects in Eastern Europe and Central Asia have
resulted in soil pollution from excessive fertilizer and pesticide use,
salinization, and especially waterlogging due to high percolation of water
from unprotected channel beds (State Committee of Turkmenistan on
Statistics, 1994). Land in the Aral Sea basin has suffered particularly
severe degradation as a result of such unsustainable projects.

Pollution of land by excessive use of fertilizers and pesticides and by
contaminants such as heavy metals, persistent organic pollutants and
artificial radionuclides is widespread. Many of these pollutants end up in
surface and groundwater but they can also be taken up directly by crops and
affect soil structure. Heavy metal pollution of soils around urban centres
also poses health problems for city dwellers who may have their
recreational activities and gardens near those sites, often even growing
their own food in suburban vegetable gardens.

Soil acidification has been a problem mainly in -Western and Central
Europe. Emissions of acidifying compounds have been reduced significantly
in recent years but critical loads for acidification are still being
exceeded in more than 10 per cent of the land area of Western and Central
Europe (RIVM/CCE 1998). In Eastern Europe, acidification is concentrated in
specific areas. For example, emissions from power plants and metallurgical
plants in Norilsk (Central Siberia) affect taiga and tundra ecosystems for
many kilometres around the plants. The sensitivity of terrestrial
ecosystems to acidifying deposition is relatively high in most of Siberia,
especially in the western part. Specific areas with high deposition of
acidifying compounds can also be found in Central Asia but in general the
soil there is much less vulnerable to acidification.

More than 300 000 contaminated sites have been identified in Western Europe
(EEA 1998a). It is generally assumed that there are numerous contaminated
sites in Central and Eastern Europe and Central Asia, including many
hundreds of abandoned military bases with high levels of soil
contamination, mainly with oil products, heavy metals and sometimes
radioactive compounds, but a comprehensive survey is still lacking. Large
areas of land in the Russian federation, Ukraine and especially Belarus
were affected by radioactive fallout from the Chernobyl nuclear disaster in
1986, with serious consequences for food production as well as health, and
there are continuing restrictions on access in some areas around the plant.

Oil pollution has affected large areas in West Siberia, mainly because of
oil and gas extraction, and along the Caspian shores in Azerbaijan and
Kazakhstan. Oil leaks are a major problem with more than 23 000 leakages
from pipelines alone in 1996, mainly as a result of corrosion (State
Committee of the Russian Federation on Environmental Protection 1997).
Ageing of the oil pipeline infrastructure linking Siberia with Europe poses
a threat of further soil pollution and the frequency of accidents can be
expected to increase.

Over the next ten years, implementation of the new CAP in Western Europe
and falling subsidies in Central and Eastern Europe and Central Asia are
likely to reduce pressure on agricultural land. In the West, the arable
area will probably continue to decrease, with remaining fields becoming
increasingly productive, a gradual restoration and interlinking of the
small remaining areas of natural habitat, and further reforestation.

Agriculture in the Central European countries seeking to join the European
Union will face intense competition which may result in a decrease in the
number of farms and thus reduce pressure on land resources. At the same
time, as the economic situation improves, with more use of private cars and
demand for one-family houses on individual plots, growing suburbanization
may result in an increase in demand for land and a decrease in prime
agricultural land.

In Eastern Europe and Central Asia, long-lasting environmental disasters
will continue to affect land use, and the Aral Sea will probably continue
to shrink, with serious consequences for agricultural production in the
basin.





  • [Livingontheland] State of the Environment - Europe and Central Asia, TradingPostPaul, 01/06/2007

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