High Value Nature and Culture Landscapes in Europe

The AgriEnv Core Information Service of the EU project Geoland2 aims at evaluating the utility of the Core Monitoring Service products for the supply of EO-based indicators assessing the impact of agriculture on the environment and the effectiveness of Agri-Environmental Measures (AEM). These services are related to:
1. The agriculture state and trends
2. The farming pressure on water and soil resources
3. The contribution of agricultural land use changes
in terms of impacts on biodiversity and landscapes.

The source of information relies on HR EO data and derived indicators from Euroland, BioPar and SATChMo. These EO data set and products are available for 4 demonstration and local sites in European countries. In order to improve the interpretation, an effort of standardization in the production of environmental indicators is done.

The focus of this presentation will be on the methodological approaches for the indicators in the third category, biodiversity and landscapes. In the service category on ‘Agricultural land use changes as driving forces for sustainability – Biodiversity’, the assessments of two High Nature Farmland indicators (percentage & land use change) it is proposed to use the Normalised Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) to measure and monitor plant growth and vegetation. Also already existing reference maps such as national and European HNV assessments as well as the landscape typology LANMAP2 will be taken into account to ensure adequate integration into European assessments. The indicator ‘Landscape Coherence’ is being developed to assess migration corridors between intensively used lands for specific target species, making use of data on the Natura 2000 network as well as of national data.

The last service on Landscapes comprises the indicators ‘Openness./Closedness’, ‘Landscape Diversity’ and ‘Cultural Heritage’. For all three landscape indicators, LANAMP2 will serve as a basic spatial reference in combination with land use change data deriving from SatchMo-03 in combination with expert advice. During the last years, the exploration of landscape indicators as a key to measuring socio-economic transitions that affect the direct perception and sense of regional identity of people have received increasing attention. With the signing of the European Landscape Convention by most EU Member States, a new commitment towards landscape related objectives have become more concrete.