Can the CAP save Spanish farmland birds?

Spain is a vital stronghold for Europe’s farmland birds, hosting diverse species across its rich agrosystems. Yet, these populations face serious declines due to agricultural intensification and habitat loss. The Spanish Strategic Plan (PEPAC) of the Common Agricultural Policy 2023-2027 aims to curb farmland bird decline among other environmental and social goals. However, there are potential limitations to its effectiveness. Our work evaluates challenges, highlights and key findings, and proposes recommendations to strengthen conservation effectiveness.

Challenges and current conservation measures

Farmland bird populations in Europe have been declining for decades, driven by intensive agricultural practices that degrade habitats and reduce biodiversity. In Spain, the PEPAC Green Architecture interventions seek to address these issues. Interventions under Green Architecture are categorized as:

• Enhanced conditionality: these are mandatory measures for farmers under the CAP, such as maintaining permanent grasslands or buffer strips along watercourses.
• Eco-schemes: voluntary practices designed to encourage sustainable agriculture, including the establishment of biodiversity areas.
• Rural development interventions: region-specific initiatives aimed at complementing broader strategies with localized actions.

Figure 1. Heat map summarising the evaluation of knowledge transfer to direct payment interventions. The evaluation has been made for each of the PEPAC interventions explicitly targeting need 06.02 (farmland bird conservation) and considering the eight main categories of desirable actions (needed to meet farmland bird requirements) that interventions should contemplate (Díaz et al., 2021). Red: interventions that have not considered any known bird requirement (partial score 0.0); yellow: partial consideration of requirements (partial score 0.5); blue: full consideration (partial score 1.0); empty cells: desirable actions not targeted by direct payment interventions.

An evaluation of 204 interventions within these categories revealed several shortcomings to reach the farmland bird goal:

• Partial consideration of bird requirements: enhanced conditionality interventions addressed 60% of known bird requirements, eco-schemes 50%, and rural development interventions just 17% on average. Many essential actions, such as regulating irrigation and maintaining landscape mosaics, were overlooked.
• Insufficient habitat complexity: a minimum of 10% uncultivated hábitats at both farm and landscape levels is necessary for sustaining farmland bird populations. However, the PEPAC interventions failed to ensure this threshold.
• Regional disparities: while some regions performed better by focusing on agrosystems like extensive grazing systems and rice fields, others, particularly those dominated by permanent crops, showed lower incorporation of scientific knowledge into intervention design.
• Lack of integration: coordination between national and regional governance levels was weak, leading to fragmented and inconsistent implementation of interventions.

Figure 2. Heat map summarising the evaluation of average knowledge transfer (figures in cells are percentages) to rural development interventions. Red: average score = 0; orange: average score < 25%; yellow: 25% < average score < 50%; blue: average score > 50%; empty cells: agrosystems not present in the Autonomous Region.

Recommendations for improvement

To curb farmland bird declines, Spain must take decisive action to enhance the effectiveness of its conservation measures. Key recommendations include:

• Increase the use of available knowledge on bird requirements for the design of interventions.
• Expand non-productive areas: increase the proportion of semi-natural elements as covered fallow, field margins, and permanent grasslands to at least 10% at both field, farm and landscape scales. These areas are critical for maintaining habitat heterogeneity and for supporting bird populations.
• Enhance coordination: establish stronger integration between national and regional measures to ensure cohesive implementation. Common guidelines can help standardize conservation efforts across regions.
• Develop the potential positive effects of several interventions: as some of the interventions with greater potential effectiveness have not been used to target farmland bird declines.
• Use adaptive management: implement a continuous cycle of monitoring, evaluation, and improvement. This approach allows interventions to be refined based on real-world outcomes and emerging scientific evidence.

A path forward

The challenges facing farmland bird conservation in Spain entail the need for a more ambitious and scientifically based approach. While the PEPAC provides a framework for addressing biodiversity loss, its current implementation falls short of the ambition needed to reverse bird population declines. Strengthening interventions to ensure habitat complexity, integrating governance levels, and focusing on high-impact agrosystems are critical steps toward achieving meaningful progress.

Spain’s experience offers valuable lessons on aligning agricultural policies with biodiversity objectives. Spain has the potential to lead Europe in reversing farmland bird declines, but this requires a larger effort to address policy gaps and consider scientific insights. By doing so, the country can not only safeguard its avian biodiversity but also serve as a model for integrating conservation into agricultural landscapes worldwide.