Source of funding: National Science Centre, Poland
Funding Scheme: PRELUDIUM 15
Start date: 15.01.2019
Finish date: 14.01.2022
Amount of funding: 123 900zł
General description:
Agricultural production methods differ from region to region in the European Union. It is not
organised in the same way in East and West Germany. It is different in north-eastern and south-western
Poland. Agriculture in the Czech Republic and Slovakia, where large, commercial farms grow cereals
and breed animals is different from the one in south Italy, where small, family farms cultivate olives and
vines. If we want to describe this structural diversity in three words, we can say that in the regions of
the European Union different is the level of concentration, namely the extent to which resources
necessary for production are possessed by the largest farms; specialisation, namely the extent to which
number of products produced on farms is limited; and orientation, namely focus on a specific type of
production, e.g. sheep grazing
However, at the same time, exists a common objective for farmers across the European Union -
improving production efficiency without placing an excessive burden on the environment. This
objective can be described in other words as the sustainable intensification of production. This project
will measure how close farmers in different regions have been to this objective and whether the way
agricultural production has been organised has made it easier or more difficult to achieve it. This impact
may also be of an indirect nature, therefore we will divide the EU regions into groups similar in terms
of structural conditions, and then check whether in these groups the same factors, such as technological
progress, human capital, agricultural policy, etc., determine the achievement of the objective of
sustainable intensification. It is possible that in regions, where production is less concentrated, mainly
on small, family farms, the more important factor is human capital, while in regions where large,
commercial farms dominate, the success of sustainable intensification strategies depends to a greater
extent on investment in modern technologies.
Conclusions of this kind provide valuable guidance for politicians implementing the common
agricultural policy in the European Union. They allow for the construction of support tools better suited
to the specific needs of farmers in individual regions. In this way, the countries and regions of the
European Union will contribute even more to the global objectives of increasing food production and
reducing environmental pressures. Such a strategy of agricultural development is forced by the growing
population of the world, whose nutrition is one of the greatest challenges of the 21st century. Just like,
reducing the pressure on the environment from agricultural production. This project is therefore also a
response to these problems.
