Intensification of agriculture is a major cause of habitat degradation

A Hay/RSPB Images Agricultural intensification threatens Important Bird Areas in Europe Zoom In

Agriculture is not only expanding, it is also intensifying. High-input farming practices – such as deep drainage, large-scale irrigation, heavy pesticide use and multiple cropping – are leading to the degradation of agricultural and semi-natural habitats, causing declines in biodiversity across huge areas.

Agricultural intensification is a major threat to sites and habitats

World-wide, agricultural policies have intensified farming in many countries, turning farmland into poor-quality habitat for birds and other wildlife. For example, rain-fed cereals have been replaced with irrigated, heavily fertilised and pesticide-treated crops. Pastures and rangeland have been overgrazed, leading to excessive soil erosion and compaction. Semi-natural habitat features have been lost from the farm landscape, including strips of meadow, hedgerows, groves, small wetlands and tree stands along wetlands. Vast and highly managed monoculture landscapes have replaced the diverse crop mosaics that were formerly essential in resting the soil and combating pests. As a result, 32% of Important Bird Areas (IBAs) in Europe, for instance, are threatened by agricultural intensification (see box 1).

Intensive farming is depleting bird species and other wildlife

Many common farmland birds are declining across the temperate zone. For example, almost 40% of bird species in Europe have an unfavourable conservation status, meaning their populations are small, declining or highly localised. Many of these species inhabit agricultural habitats and cannot be conserved solely within important sites such as nature reserves – indeed, around 90% of Europe lies outside such key sites. Agricultural intensification is partly to blame in causing these declines among birds and other countryside biodiversity (box 2). These losses have happened in some of the wealthiest nations in the world, indicating that European agriculture has not been developed sustainably and that its effects have not been adequately monitored.

Tropical birds are also declining due to intensive crop production

Vast areas of natural habitat in the tropics have been converted to the production of agricultural export commodities such as rice, coffee, sugar, cocoa, palm oil and soya. Cropping and production methods are intensifying, causing widespread damage to previously semi-natural agricultural ecosystems. For example, traditional shade coffee plantations are presently being converted to 'full-sun' intensive systems, with significant impacts on birds and other wildlife (box 3).

Boxes: case studies and scientific analyses

Download SOWB pp.34–35 (PDF, 709 KB) containing the following:

1. Agricultural intensification threatens IBAs in Europe
a) The percentage of IBAs per country that are threatened by agricultural intensification and expansion in Europe
b) The proportion of 132 IBAs in Turkey that are affected by high-, medium- and low-impact threats from agriculture

2. Agricultural intensification has caused the decline of many common bird species in Europe
a) Farmland bird declines between 1970 and 1990 have been greatest in EU countries
b) In Poland, Skylark densities drop as land-use intensifies

3. Intensively farmed coffee supports many fewer bird species than traditional shade plantations
Bird species diversity is much lower in intensive full-sun coffee plantations in the Dominican Republic, compared with less intensive shade-plantation systems