Agriculture Reference
In-Depth Information
10% of the surface of cereals and oil and protein seeds, equals the one
fixed by the Berlin agreement for the period 2000-2002. The horizon 2002
is taken as reference for the reason that CAP reform of 1999, will then be
totally applied, after two years of transition 2000-2001. Arable farms that
cultivate energy crops include a sample of 216 farms located in the cereal
production oriented region of the North-East Ile-de-France) and 465 farms
in Northern France where sugar-beet is allowed to the arable crop mix.
Profiles of the two groups are shown in Table 15.2. These farms represent
adequately the diversity of arable cropping farms in France. Weights
applied to the sample of farms available have permitted to represent the
universe of these farm types according to FADN ('weight1', Table 15.1).
Extrapolation procedures permit to approximate magnitudes of energy
crops cultivated in land set-aside at the national level ('weight2' column,
Table 15.1).
Agricultural production model takes into account agronomic
constraints applied to all individual farms. First, some crops are not
allowed to be cultivated in more than a certain percentage of the arable
surface of the farm (for instance, rape-seed, food and non-food included, is
limited to 30%). On the other hand, rotation with sugar-beet, peas, and
rape-seed limits cereal mono-culture. As a result of the above constraints,
energy crop introduction to set-aside land will make decrease surface
covered by related food crops. For instance, regional statistics confirm that
when rape for energy is cultivated in land set aside, food rape-seed
cultivated surface is going to decrease.
In Table 15.2, the original crop mix (output of the agricultural
sector model when energy crop prices are set at zero) is shown for cereal
and sugar-beet specialising regions. In the last two columns, changes in
surfaces allocated appear as a result of the creation of a market for rape-
seed for energy (price equal to 100 FF One can observe that energy
rape-seed is cultivated entirely on land set-aside whereas food crops are re-
allocated due to agronomic constraints. Food rape-seed is decreased
especially in the cereal region because of its important acreage. Wheat
mono-culture is slightly increased because a decrease of surfaces cultivated
by preceding crops.
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