Volume 52, March 2016, Pages 382–391
- a Department of Sociology, Mountain Agriculture Research Centre, University Innsbruck, Universitätsstrasse 15, 6020 Innsbruck, Austria
- b Institute of Agricultural and Forestry Economics, Department of Economic and Social Sciences, BOKU—Univ. of Natural Resources and Life Sciences, Feistmantelstr. 4, 1180 Vienna, Austria
- c Department of Geography, Norwegian University of Science and Technology, NTNU NO-7491 Trondheim, Norway
- d Laboratoire d'Ecologie Alpine, Université Joseph Fourier, BP 53, 38041 Grenoble Cedex 9, France
- Received 12 October 2015, Revised 30 November 2015, Accepted 11 December 2015, Available online 21 January 2016
Abstract
Over
the centuries, specific farming practices shaped permanent grasslands
in mountains. With socio-economic change, farming practices have changed
and with them the landscape. Over time, food production has been
increasingly decoupled from the preservation of permanent grassland,
endangering the delivery of crucial ecosystem services. This
contribution looks into the role of institutions – including normative,
regulative and cultural-cognitive elements – in preserving current
bundles of ecosystem services provided by mountain grasslands. In
particular, we investigate how such institutions affect farmers’
management choices. Based on a review of scientific literature and
empirical data from three case studies, we compare institutions in
Austria, France and Norway. The cases represent different modes of
multi-level governance (EU and non-EU), different grassland management
practices, linked to different farming systems (dairy, breeding, rearing
of heifers, suckler cow and sheep production) and different
socio-economic conditions. The results underpin that ecological insights
into the impact of farming practices on the ecology of grassland need
to be combined with an understanding of the complex institutional
interactions that affect farming practices, to ensure the resilience of
mountain grasslands. If the design of regulatory measures considers both
changing dynamics, it may enable farms to adapt and transform while
maintaining traditional grassland management practices
Keywords
- Marginal mountain grasslands;
- Socio-ecological resilience;
- Institutions;
- Farm management practices
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