eg4–cerealsforwholecropsilagefollowedbyover-winteredstubble.doc

APPENDIX 2 REVIEW OF THE EFFECTS OF ENTRY LEVEL STEWARDSHIP AGRI-ENVIRONMENT OPTIONS ON FARMLAND BIRDS INTRODUCTION Agriculture in Britain, and more widely in Europe, witnessed profound changes in the latter half of the 20th century, characterised by the adoption of increasingly intensive management practices. Coincident with, and precipitated by, this period of agricultural intensification, biodiversity associated with farmland has experienced widespread decreases and impoverishment. In particular, the decline of farmland birds is well documented. For example, Siriwardena et al. (1998) demonstrated that of 13 farmland specialists in Britain, 11 declined between 1968-1995, whereas only two species increased in abundance during this same period. Broadly similar patterns of decline have been confirmed in other taxa associated with farmland, including mammals (Flowerdew 1997), arthropods, and flowering plants (Sotherton et al. 2000). The primary policy instrument that European governments have to combat the erosion of biodiversity in agricultural regions are agri-environment schemes. In these, farmers receive payments, reimbursing profits forgone, to follow prescribed management practices that were developed with environmental and ecological benefits at their core (Evans et al. 2002). Following on from the Environmentally Sensitive Areas (ESA) and Countryside Stewardship (CS) schemes, the principal agri-environment programmes in England are the Entry Level Stewardship (ELS) and Higher Level Stewardship (HLS) schemes (reviewed in Grice et al. 2007). These new schemes, initially launched in 2005, adopt a two-tier approach to the preservation of farmland biodiversity (Grice et al. 2007). ELS is targeted at a wide audience, with the objective of implementing simple, practical management prescriptions that fit with conventional farming systems, yet that deliver measurable environmental and biodiversity benefits (Grice et al. 2007). HLS, on the other hand, involves t