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The former Iron Curtain still drives biodiversity–profit trade-offs in German agriculture

Nature Ecology & Evolution volume 1, pages 1279–1284 (2017)Cite this article

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Abstract

Agricultural intensification drives biodiversity loss and shapes farmers’ profit, but the role of legacy effects and detailed quantification of ecological–economic trade-offs are largely unknown. In Europe during the 1950s, the Eastern communist bloc switched to large-scale farming by forced collectivization of small farms, while the West kept small-scale private farming. Here we show that large-scale agriculture in East Germany reduced biodiversity, which has been maintained in West Germany due to >70% longer field edges than those in the East. In contrast, profit per farmland area in the East was 50% higher than that in the West, despite similar yield levels. In both regions, switching from conventional to organic farming increased biodiversity and halved yield levels, but doubled farmers’ profits. In conclusion, European Union policy should acknowledge the surprisingly high biodiversity benefits of small-scale agriculture, which are on a par with conversion to organic agriculture.

The historical East–West division enabled us to test the effectiveness of organic cereal management for biodiversity in large-scale versus small-scale agriculture. We measured the diversity of plants and arthropods (Methods) and hypothesized that (1) biodiversity is higher in small-scale cropland1 and (2) the effect of field size is more important for biodiversity than conversion to organic management. In 2013, we selected nine pairs of organic and conventional winter wheat fields in small-scale agricultural landscapes in former West Germany and in large-scale agricultural landscapes in former East Germany, respectively, all along the former inner German border (2 regions × 9 field pairs = 36 study fields; Supplementary Fig. 2). These two neighbouring study regions are representative of the farmland areas of the former East and West Germany22,23. We aimed to explore how biodiversity patterns change from field edges to field centres with the following within-field sampling design. We designated transects at field edges (directly next to narrow grassy field margins bordering dirt roads), field interiors (15 m from field edge) and field centres (120 m and 75 m from field edge in East and West, respectively). We performed our study in the agricultural matrix, minimizing the area and potential effect of non-agricultural habitats (Table 1)24. Landscape structure was very different between the two neighbouring regions, with fields more than six times larger in the East, and >70% longer field edges in the West. Conventional farmers in both regions used about five times the amount of nitrogen fertilizer compared with organic farmers, applied synthetic pesticides about five times per year (versus never) and had approximately two times higher yields than organic farmers25,26. This large difference in winter wheat yield between organic and conventional farmers is typical for the rich soils farmed in the study region27.

Table 1 Landscape structure (in 500 m buffer) around and local management intensity of study fields in small- (West) versus large- (East) scale agricultural systems with organic versus conventional management (mean ± standard error of the mean) during 2013 (n = 36 fields)
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Fig. 1 |: Illustrative map of West and East Germany (scale 1:30,000) at 25 May 2012.
Fig. 2: Effects of region and management on profit, revenue, cost and farm size.
Fig. 3: Effects of region and management, their interaction and edge effect on plant and arthropod species richness.
Fig. 4: Effects of region and management on overall species richness.

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Acknowledgements

This paper is the product of the project ‘Biodiversity and associated ecosystem services in small- vs. large-scale agriculture’ by the German Research Foundation (DFG BA 4438/1-1). We are grateful to L. Ádám for the identification of rove beetles, and to D.W. Crowder, A. Iverson and D. Kleijn for valuable comments on the manuscript. P.B. was supported by the Economic Development and Innovation Operational Programme of Hungary (GINOP–2.3.2–15–2016–00019).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Agroecology, University of Goettingen, Grisebachstraße 6, 37077, Göttingen, Germany

    Péter Batáry, Róbert Gallé, Friederike Riesch, Silvia Fusaro, Christoph Gayer, Anne-Kathrin Happe, Kornélia Kurucz, Dorottya Molnár, Verena Rösch & Teja Tscharntke

  2. GINOP Sustainable Ecosystems Group, MTA Centre for Ecological Research, Klebelsberg Kuno utca 3, 8237, Tihany, Hungary

    Péter Batáry

  3. Department of Ecology, University of Szeged, Közép fasor 52, 6726, Szeged, Hungary

    Róbert Gallé & Péter Császár

  4. Institute of Grassland Science, University of Goettingen, von-Siebold-Straße 8, 37075, Göttingen, Germany

    Friederike Riesch

  5. Restoration Ecology, Department of Ecology and Ecosystem Management, Technische Universität München, Emil-Ramann-Straße 6, 85354, Freising, Germany

    Christina Fischer

  6. Biometry and Environmental System Analysis, University of Freiburg, Tennenbacher Straße 4, 79106, Freiburg, Germany

    Carsten F. Dormann

  7. Department of Agricultural Economics and Rural Development, University of Goettingen, Platz der Göttinger Sieben 5, 37073, Göttingen, Germany

    Oliver Mußhoff

  8. Department of Biology, Padua University, via Ugo Bassi 58, 35121, Padua, Italy

    Silvia Fusaro

  9. Environment and Urban Planning, University of Applied Science Nürtingen-Geislingen, Schelmenwasen 4-8, 72622, Nürtingen, Germany

    Christoph Gayer

  10. Ecological Networks, Technical University Darmstadt, Schnittspahnstraße 3, 64287, Darmstadt, Germany

    Anne-Kathrin Happe

  11. Szentágothai Research Centre, University of Pécs, Ifjúság útja 20, 7624, Pécs, Hungary

    Kornélia Kurucz

  12. Institute for Environmental Science, University of Koblenz-Landau, Fortstraße 7, 76829, Landau, Germany

    Verena Rösch

  13. Plant Ecology and Ecosystem Research, University of Goettingen, Untere Karspüle 2, 37073, Göttingen, Germany

    Alexander Wietzke

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Contributions

P.B. and T.T. conceived the study; P.B., C.F., O.M. and T.T. developed the study; P.B., R.G., F.R., S.F., C.G., A.-K.H., K.K., D.M., V.R. and A.W. collected data; R.G. and P.C. identified arthropods; P.B. analysed data with substantial input from C.F.D.; and P.B. wrote the paper with substantial input from all authors.

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Correspondence to Péter Batáry.

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Batáry, P., Gallé, R., Riesch, F. et al. The former Iron Curtain still drives biodiversity–profit trade-offs in German agriculture. Nat Ecol Evol 1, 1279–1284 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41559-017-0272-x

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