Farmers and Nature Together: High Nature Value Farming and Agri-Environment Payments for the Republic of Macedonia

Summary

This publication presents many of the key outputs and recommendations from the project ”Promoting High Nature Value Farming and Agri-environment Payments through Civil Society Organisations in the Republic of Macedonia” that was undertaken jointly by the Avalon Foundation (the Netherlands), DEM (Republic of Macedonia), CCI (Republic of Macedonia) and IEEP (UK), with the financial support of the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs through the MATRA Social Transformation Programme.
Although the main aim of the project was to build the capacity of civil society organizations in the Republic of Macedonia on the importance of HNV farming, it also has involved carrying out case studies on the occurrence of and issues facing HNV farming systems in three different regions in the country - Lacavica, Mariovo and Rekanski. The main findings of the case studies have been presented to the farmers and responsible institutions and are also presented in this handbook.
The publication is intended to serve different stakeholders in the agricultural and rural development sector including policy and decision makers, regional authorities and services, non-governmental and scientific organizations addressing social, environmental and agricultural issues and the inter-linkages between them. The book is therefore produced in both the Macedonian and English language and can be used as a reference for future programming in the rural development sector in the country.
Chapter 1 of the publication examines the impact of current agricultural practices on the environment in the country.
Chapter 2 then outlines the concept of HNV farming in the EU and its development over the time.
A first attempt to develop a typology of HNV farming systems in the Republic of Macedonia and the case study areas, along with indicative maps of their distribution are found in Chapter 3.
The needs of the HNV farmers and the main problems they face, as identified through the workshops, discussions and face to face meetings with them are presented in Chapter 4 and the link between HNV farming and social capital is further elaborated in Chapter 5.
The hidden values of HNV farming systems are also presented in Chapter 6.
In order make the project results as useful as possible, proposals for agri-environmental type measures that could support HNV farming in the Republic of Macedonia were developed. The measures proposed are intended to complement the existing proposal for the NAEP of the Republic of Macedonia and to respond to the needs of the farmers in rural areas as a whole, and the case studies areas in particular. These proposals are presented in Chapter 5.