What practices constitute ‘biodiversity-friendly’ dairy farming? Farmers’ perspectives and local context matter

Abstract

Farmers vary greatly in how they see themselves and their profession in relation to biodiversity. However, despite its relevance for conservation, little is known about how this informs their ideas of what constitutes ‘biodiversity-friendly’ farming. With this study, we aimed to explore this interplay. We interviewed dairy farmers in two areas in the Netherlands and two in the French Massif Central. In these interviews, we asked farmers general questions about their relationship with biodiversity, as well as which farming practices they consider biodiversity-friendly. Earlier analysis of the interviews revealed six narratives on the farming-biodiversity relationship: ‘farming WITH biodiversity’, ‘farming FROM biodiversity - valorising what is there’, ‘farming FROM biodiversity - innovating for sustainability’, ‘farming FOR biodiversity’, ‘farming SEPARATE from biodiversity - out of necessity’, and ‘farming SEPARATE from biodiversity - out of conviction’. Here, we analysed patterns in the practices identified across these six interview sets. We found a spectrum of perspectives, from farmers emphasising overall moderation of production intensity and local knowledge (‘WITH’, ‘FROM - valorising what is there’, ‘SEPARATE - out of necessity’) to those emphasising eco-efficient production and/or conservation on spared land, with a stronger focus on exogenous knowledge (‘FROM - innovating for sustainability, ‘FOR’, ‘SEPARATE - out of conviction’). We argue that this diversity in ideas about what biodiversity-friendly farming entails can be an asset in achieving biodiversity goals, and that to allow for such diversity, conservation initiatives should avoid catering to only a narrow subset of conceptualisations of biodiversity-friendliness.