Journal of

F O R U M : BIODIVERSITY & H I G H - N A T U R E - V A L U E F A R M I N G
Applied Ecology
1998, 35,
979-982
Ecological and socio-economic implications of livestock=
keeping systems on extensive grasslands in south-western
Germany
RAINER L U I C K
Fachhochschule RottenburglHochschule fur Forstwirtschaft, Schadenweilerhof, 72108 Rottenburg, Germany
(e-mail: ILN.Singen@ t-online.de)

Summary
When considering low-intensity farming systems in Europe, one would not normally
think of Germany because the farmland in most of its regions is characterized by
intensive agriculture. However, there is currently great concern about the situation of
extensively used meadows and pastures in mountainous areas. Among the most
attractive regions are the common grazings in the southern part of the Black Forest
and limestone grassland grazed by sheep on the Swabian Jura. Both regions are
located in the Federal State of Baden-Wuerttemberg. Details of the current agri-
cultural situation, developments to be expected in the years to come, policy measures
needed to preserve the cultural and ecological richness of the regions, and options for
land-use-systems are discussed in relation to one another, for Less Favoured Areas
(LFAs) in the Federal State of Baden-Wuerttemberg.
Key-words: Common Agricultural Policy, extensive grassland, grazing systems, low-
intensity farming, nature conservation.
Journal of Applied Ecology (1998) 35,979-982

Introduction 0 a basis for the maintenance of infrastructure for

The ecological richness of most central European
mountainous regions largely depends on low-intensity
farming systems (e.g. Poole et al. 1998). Their biggest
threat is that they may not survive the present dis-
cussion of how competitive European agriculture
should be. They simply cannot compete under the
present market schemes, in which prices do not
account for the negative environmental impacts of
most agricultural systems. Some LFAs, such as the
Black Forest and the Swabian Jura in the Federal
State of Baden-Wuerttemberg in Germany, are the
only regions where extensive grassland can still be
found on a large scale.
Agriculture and viable rural communities in LFAs
are necessary because they result in:
0 the preservation of landscapes with cultural values
having long traditions;
0 the production of high-quality food;
0 the rearing of rare livestock species;
0 an economic basis for tourism;
0 1998 British 0 the provision of recreation areas for urban popu-
Ecological Society lations;
settlements (schools, medical care, etc.).
The following case studies of the agricultural and the
ecological situation given for the Black Forest region
and the Swabian Jura are comparable to many other
areas in Central Europe.
Agriculture in the Black Forest Region, Baden-
Wuerttemberg
In Freiburg County (Regierungsbezirk Freiburg),
which comprises the southern and most of the central
part of the Black Forest, the number of part-time and
full-time farmers has almost halved since 1974. Of
even greater importance, because it threatens the basic
economic structure of the region, is the dramatic num-
ber of closures of dairy farms. Despite the effects of
intensification there has been a loss of about 80 000
dairy cows since 1974. This can also be expressed as a
loss of zz 60 000 ha of meadows and pastures in Frei-
burg County over the same period of time (data com-
piled from official sources).
A look at the landscape shows that the changes
are visible. There are examples of communities in the

979

980 Black Forest where the wooded area has doubled in
Liiwtock on the last 40years. Because most of the afforestation
ertcnsit‘c. takes place in ecologically valuable locations, locally
grusslunds threatened biotopes such as extensive grassland listed
in the Habitats Directive have already disappeared
entirely (Schwabe-Braun 1980; Kersting 1991).
One development of great concern (in terms of its
future impact) is the level of training for the agri-
cultural sector in the area. Because of the pessimistic
outlook for farming, it is understandable that agri-
culture is not regarded as secure employment. In 1994,
there were only 26 trainee farmers (in their first year)
in Freiburg County in comparison to the 250 trainees
per year needed to secure the future of about 8000
full-time farms (current status) in the area. (This is
without even including the future of the part-time
farms, which constitute about 80% of all farms.) We
are already at the point where traditional skills and
knowledge are being lost (Luick 1996).
To summarize the agricultural and ecological situ-
ation in the Black Forest, some specific issues are now
briefly discussed.
1. Dairy farms are caught in a vicious circle. The
constraints of the Black Forest dairy complex are as
follows. Falling milk prices cause a decline in dairy
farming. The combination of fewer dairy farms and
increasing collection costs results in milk companies
suspending their services in remote parts of the Black
Forest. If the remaining dairy farms want to stay in
business with direct marketing, they are hindered by
EU regulations governing the manufacture and mar-
keting of pure, natural products.
2. One initiative to challenge the agricultural market
is the use of premium labels. There are labels on a
national, federal, regional and even communal level
for various products and quality standards. As the
labelling of agricultural products has spiralled, con-
cerns have developed that the use of labels is being
abused and that they may give consumers misleading
impressions.
3. One crucial problem is the fact that a variety of
programmes exists to support extensive agricultural
production but there are few initiatives to promote
the marketing of the resulting products. A number of
measures have been implemented under agri-environ-
ment Regulation 2078/92, for example the MEKA
programme (Marktentlastungs- und Kulturland-
schaftsausgleich) in the Federal State of Baden-
Wuerttemberg. MEKA and the suckler cow premium
scheme (SCP) may have ecologically positive effects
on nature and the environment. The MEKA scheme
supports rearing of rare livestock breeds such as Black
Forest cattle, a breed which is especially well-adapted
to hard mountainous conditions. However, when sell-
(01998 British
Ecological Society,
ing meat from this rare breed on the normal market,
Journcrlo~Ano~ie~
I 1 .
which is subject to the conditions of the E U meat
Ecologj, 35, classification system, farmers receive only low prices
979-982 although the meat is considered to be of high quality.
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Sheep keeping on the Swabian Jura
A well known area in Germany for sheep keeping
is the Swabian Jura in the Federal State of Baden-
Wuerttemberg. The Swabian Jura, and with it the
Franconian Jura, are the only regions in central Eur-
ope where a unique form of a transhumance system
had developed in the past (see Fischer, Poschlod &
Beinlich 1996). Traditionally, the Swabian trans-
humance worked in the following way. From late
spring until autumn, shepherds grazed extended
downland areas in the Jura mountains. During winter
the flocks moved to the lowland areas, such as the
valleys of the Rhine and Danube and the Lake of
Constance basin (Hornberger 1959). Sheep keeping as
the main use of grassland led to the development of
large areas of extensive chalk grassland (Meso-
bronzelum and Xerobrornrtut~).In the heyday of sheep
keeping, in the first half of the 19th century, the num-
ber of sheep in the grazing season during summer was
up to one million head in the dukedom of Wuert-
temberg. Today, it is estimated that just 100 000 sheep
graze on the Swabian Jura during summer, and trans-
humance in the Swabian Jura exists only on a very
small scale; as the sheep disappear, so too do the
extensive grasslands (Beinlich 1995). The reason for
this development is not only the substitution of wool
by cotton and by cheaper wool imported from abroad.
Modern sheep keeping is confronted by many
obstacles. The following list briefly discusses the most
severe aspects.
1. Until recently, the most important product of the
sheep-keeping systems in Germany was wool. Today,
wool has no economic importance a t all. In fact, the
shearing costs are often higher than the revenues gen-
erated by selling the wool.
2. The revenue from sheep keeping is earned (i) from
the sale of the meat lambs, and (ii) from subsidies that
derive from several sources (e.g. ewe premium scheme,
MEKA-payment scheme). But meat prices that can
be obtained on the normal market are just enough to
compensate for the production costs.
3. The survival of sheep keeping lies only in the pro-
duction of high quality and highly priced meat lambs.
In comparison with past methods of sheep keeping,
when the wool was of major importance, this required
a complete change in the production system. The large
flocks of previous times needed ‘something’ to eat
throughout the year, and the poor diet that grew on
the downs of the Jura mountains was just enough for
their maintenance. The growth rate of the lambs was,
of course, very limited. In contrast, a modern and
profitable working shepherd cannot make a living
(only) on the downlands with their high nature value,
because the production of marketable lambs requires
better quality grazing. This leads to the limiting point
of modern sheep keeping, which is the difficulty of
finding the necessary good grazing a t low cost.
4. Today, extensive grazing with sheep occurs on only

981 about 7400 hectares in the Swabian Jura (Beinlich &
R. Luick Plachter 1995). There are various reasons that can
account for this development, although the dramatic
decline of sheep numbers is of greatest importance.
An often neglected issue, but one of great concern, is
the philosophical discussion of ‘what are the subjects
and techniques of nature conservation?’ and ‘what is
sustainable agriculture?’. Until the present, it has not
been easy to match the interests of conservationists
with the demands of a shepherd. Thus, in western
parts of the Swabian Jura, up to 90% of the remaining
downs are no longer grazed by sheep, but rather are
artificially managed by means of mowing the sward
and disposing of the biomass (Beinlich 1995). Fur-
thermore, the sites with downland are very scattered
and are usually quite small.
Today, the disappearance of drove-roads and the
fragmentation of the landscape by all sorts of trans-
port networks make transhumance almost impossible.
Modern traffic and sheep flocks crossing highways do
not go well together. In addition, if a shepherd finally
makes his journey from the Swabian Jura to the val-
leys of the Rhine or Danube, he has to cope with the
fact that his traditional winter grazing lands have now
been totally converted into intensive maize and/or
cereal fields.
Conclusions
What action is needed to ensure that (extensive) farm-
ing in high-nature-value regions, such as the Black
Forest or the Swabian Jura, can be maintained for the
future? First, there is the fundamental question of
whether those regions disadvantaged for agricultural
productivity in terms of morphology, soils and climate
should be maintained as a cultivated area under the
premises of current and future (EU) agricultural
policy. Landscapes have always evolved. From a con-
servationist point of view, it will sometimes be hard
to accept that, because of demographic and social
change, future farming systems will be different from
now. In the same way, the composition of landscape
and biotopes will change.
It is probably going the wrong way to give further
support to intensive dairy production at high altitudes
in the Black Forest, encouraging them to increase
their cattle numbers yearly, and then having to pump
the resulting milk into the European milk reserve. It
might also be the wrong approach to think only of
preserving the downs of the Swabian Jurd by trans-
humance. As the current saleable products of greatest
economic interest coming out of landscapes rich in
extensive grassland are meat and milk, we first have
to think of producing high quality meat and dairy
1998 British
products. To make this possible, money has to be
Ecological Society,
Journal of. Applied spent on appropriate initiatives rather than the current
..
Ecology. 35, system of short-term solutions which are merely pro-
979-982 longing the end of the present systems. A model with
13652664, 1998, 6, Downloaded from https://besjournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1365-2664.1998.tb00018.x by Wageningen University and Research Facilitair Bedrijf, Wiley Online Library on [23/06/2023]. See the Terms and Conditions (https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/terms-and-conditions) on Wiley Online Library for rules of use; OA articles are governed by the applicable Creative Commons License
a promising perspective is the large-scale extensive
pasture system utilizing cattle kept as suckler cows.
These can be handled by the few remaining farmers
expected in LFAs (Luick 1997). There are already
positive examples in the southern part of the Black
Forest, in the western Swabian Jura region and in
the Western Lake of Constance area (Luick, Zeeb &
Fischer 1998). Experience shows that, with extensive
pasture systems, most of the desired ecological aims
can be preserved and can even be improved. Fur-
thermore, if the frame conditions are appropriate (e.g.
good marketing concept, large connected field-sizes),
extensive pasture systems can be managed in a profit-
able way. However, implementing these systems will
require changes in the agricultural policy. Improve-
ments to the infrastructure will also be needed; for
instance, new local slaughter- and cool-houses to
enable guaranteed product quality and transparent
production and processing. This is in contrast to the
EU idea for further regional specialization and global
challenges.
Finally, there is one dominant factor contributing
to the pessimistic outlook for farming in the Black
Forest. This is the unreliability of EU agricultural
policy. We should expect our policy makers to show
interest in long-term developments to make regional,
low-intensity farming possible and to take care of the
generation-orientated decisions that are necessary in
agriculture.
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