Vor- und nachteile ausgewahlter strukturelemente in der Agrarlandschaft aus okonomischer sicht

In an economic consideration of structural elements in agriculture one has to differentiate between economic and managerial aspects. The socio-political conception is the decisive factor. Here it is a question of the balance between cost and benefit of additional structural elements. The optimal set-up of strutural elements from a socio-political viewpoint will vary regionally since cost and benefit develop differently in individual regions. As far as the implementation on the job is concerned one must follow the 'taxpayer pay principle' particularly in the area of biotic protection of resources. For this reason individual federal states foster the introduction and maintenance of structural elements in barren landscape through appropriate environmental programmes. On the other hand it will be more difficult to preserve landscapes structured on a small scale. As long as they can at least be cultivated with the usual production methodes of today, even subsidies will usually not make cultivation feasible. In these cases a moderate form of property redistribution will be necessary to keep cultivation going. If this is impossible for certain reasons there will be a tendency to natural succession for meadows as well as fields.