Perspectives for action in a nature-inclusive society

This study examines the conditions under which nature-inclusive agriculture and fisheries can grow from a niche to the most common mode of production in the medium term and how behavior plays a role in this. It examines the relationship between different forms of biodiversity and entrepreneurial behavior.

Plastic waste in the sea

Large quantities of plastic waste end up in the sea every day. Globally, but also within the Netherlands, fishing is an important source of plastic (macro) waste at sea; an undesirable situation that is receiving more and more attention due to the need for more sustainable food production and circularity. In the Netherlands, an important example of such an approach is the Green Deal Fisheries for a Clean Sea, in which all stakeholders involved in waste in fisheries and their processing have agreed on all kinds of measures to solve this problem. Other initiatives that have a lot of support within the fishery are Fishing for Litter, VisPluisVrij and recently the clean-up campaign with ships over the Wadden Islands to fish the plastic waste from the sea that came from the container ship MSC Zoe. These show that the sector wants to do its best on this subject.

Individual behaviour central

This project focuses on the individual behaviour of entrepreneurs (farmers and fishermen and others) with the analysis focusing on behaviour that promotes biodiversity at landscape and sea level. This research focuses on the question of how (relatively small-scale) measures can contribute to nature development and biodiversity restoration: what can each individual or organisation do to increase biodiversity in their working environment? From a scientific point of view, we look at how individuals can be influenced to change their behavior, and on what scale and in what quantities measures for biodiversity will be taken to create a robust and resilient biodiversity. The project consists of two parts: modeling behavioral changes in agriculture to work more nature-inclusive and promote biodiversity, and a behavioral change in fisheries to reduce plastic (prevention).

Approach

Work is underway to strengthen behavior in micro-economic models to promote biodiversity and support transitions. The case study focuses on nature-inclusive agriculture in the Netherlands. In addition, understanding how entrepreneurs make decisions, including strategies that anticipate future issues, adaptive behavior and social interactions, is crucial for the development of economic models and their use within earning models. It also looks at how behavior and different forms of biodiversity are interrelated. To this end, it is important to visualize different forms of biodiversity and to determine the relationship with the behavior of entrepreneurs. The WEcR and WEnR will work out the working method together.

In addition, this project is working with an approach that is applied and tested, linking social, economic and ecological knowledge and research methods in fisheries. It is the ambition of this project on the one hand to develop a practically applicable working method that is described in a manual and can be applied as a product by WUR worldwide, starting in the Netherlands. This requires first a good understanding of the causers and the causes and then insight in ways to solve this (changes in behavior or processes). However, this essential information is still often lacking. Within this project, therefore, a new working method will be developed to, on the one hand, in interaction with (fishing) stakeholders, chart the nature, scope, sources, causes, effects and solutions of beach waste in an integrated manner at a much more detailed level than before. On the other hand, on the basis of that information, to support the stakeholders in taking measures or changing undesirable behaviour. The focus of the work in 2019 will be on the first part, the focus in 2020 and further on the second part (part 1 is conditional for part 2).

The ambition is to apply the working method developed in this project directly in current and future projects and thus to place a consistent, scientific foundation under these projects.