Farms from Areas of High Nature Value (HNV) against the Background of Other Farms

The study shows a comparative analysis of areas (communes) with a varying level of saturation with high nature value utilised agricultural area (HNV UAA) and assessed the functioning of farms from these areas in Poland. Firstly, three groups of communes differing in terms of the share of HNV UAA in the total area were identified. The first group were communes with the share of HNV UAA in the total area amounting to less than 10% (1st group communes), the second – communes with the share of HNV UAA equal to or higher than 10% and lower than 40% (2nd group communes), and the third – communes with the share of HNV UAA of at least 40% (3rd group communes). In these communes, the assessment covered the average number of farms along with their average UAA, percentage (%) of communes with farms having the average UAA equal to or higher than the Polish average, as well as the change in % in the population and the share in % in the communes where the population decreased by at least 5% in 2004-2017 and their average agricultural production area valorisation index (APAV). Then, the assessment of functioning covered 2878 farms with crop, livestock and mixed (crop and livestock) production from those communes which have continuously kept accounts for the Polish FADN system in 2014-2016. This assessment took account of their production potential, production organisation, land and labour productivity and income per 1 FWU. The study used the data from the Agency for Restructuring and Modernisation of Agriculture (ARiMR), the Institute of Soil Science and Plant Cultivation State Research Institute (IUNG-PIB), data from farms keeping accounts for the Polish FADN in 2014-2016 as well as literature data