Theme headline
This theme focuses on NbS that aim at transforming our current agricultural and food systems into a sustainable food system to address a series of societal challenges: adapting to climate change, ensuring food security, maintaining farmer livelihoods, ensuring vibrant rural communities, and the ecosystem services and natural resources we get from agricultural land, such as water, biomass, and rural landscapes.
The target audience for this topic are farmers, policy-makers, environmental organisations, businesses, researchers and the wider public interested in sustainable farming practices.
Theme introduction
NbS in the theme of sustainable food systems designate a wide range of practices. Concepts that are widely understood to be either part of this transformation or as the final desired sustainable farm system include :
- Extensification (for example, reducing livestock numbers and moving livestock from housing to open field production systems)
- Diversification (for example, more diverse crop rotations and crop diversity on farm, with associated diversification of farm outputs and markets; returning to more mixed crop and livestock farming system)
- Agroforestry (for example, introducing trees into arable fields – silvo-arable – or introducing trees on pasture – silvo-pastoral)
- Agroecology
- Regenerative agriculture or conservation agriculture
- Organic farming
Agriculture in the EU is currently one of the main driver of biodiversity loss and one of the main contributor of soil and water pollution. Even though the concept of NbS is not embedded in the current agricultural policy framework, there are many sustainable agricultural practices that can be qualified as such and that could benefit from wider uptake by the actors of the food system. NbS provide opportunities for a transformation of our food system, which could help tackle some of the our main societal environmental challenges.
Network Nature has different objectives in relation to mainstreaming the uptake of sustainable farming practices. Our work will aim at:
- providing evidence on cost effectiveness of NbS for sustainable food systems to practitioners and policy-makers (national, local and regional governments and authorities) and boost the attractiveness of NbS for investors in the field of food systems
- breaking down silos and connect communities of practice
- Providing context specific and tailored resources to our target audiences
For more information:
- IEEP publications on the CAP and agricultural policy
- News and analysis on EU agricultural policy
- Agrafacts newsletter (paywall) – comprehensive and detailed news on EU agriculture, environment and trade policy
- Forum for agriculture – annual meeting place in Brussels to debate sustainable agriculture and environmental challenges, organised by the European Landowners Organisation (ELO)
Vision for Agriculture and Food
The Common Agricultural Policy is the main policy instrument regarding the regulation of food systems in the EU, and presents the most potential for leveraging NbS uptake in agricultural ecosystems, regarding the eco-schemes and agri-environmental measures in particular.
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Directive on Soil Monitoring and Resilience
As the extreme weather and climate-related hazards intensify, the risk of wildfires is increasing across Europe. The conditions that heighten the fire risk are set to increase with climate change, notably heat and humidity of ecosystems, including soils. Healthy soils with functional water retention capacity also support healthy forest ecosystems that are more resilient to wildfires. At the same time, wildfires can cause soil degradation, leading to increased risks of soil erosion, landslides and floods. Strengthening the knowledge base on soils can contribute to improving disaster risk assessments that recognise the multi-faceted roles that soils play in mitigating disasters. Measures to strengthen soil health build resilience to future stress brought on by climate change.
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A Farm to Fork Strategy
The European Green Deal sets out how to make Europe the first climate-neutral continent by 2050. It maps a new, sustainable and inclusive growth strategy to boost the economy, improve people's health and quality of life, care for nature, and leave no one behind.
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Theme leader
