The European Union’s Water Framework Directive (WFD) has “the purpose to protect and preserve water resources across the European Union to ensure future sustainable use” but is likely to add to agricultural land losses, e.g. to infrastructure, industrial estates and housing. While the...

Within a context of global trade liberalisation and constrained national budgets, agriculture in many countries has proved incapable of sustaining household livelihoods an d socio-economic development in rural areas. The post-war industrial success of several Asian countries has suggested...

Since 1999, Scotland has (re)gained a considerable degree of political independence from the rest of the UK, and a minority nationalist government since 2007 has determined a strong general policy agenda, including ambitious climate change commitments. This new political framework is being...

CAP Pillar 2 policies and Rural Development Programmes (RDPs) reflect a broad range of governance styles and policy priorities, as well as significant devolution to regions and/or provinces within Member States. The processes supporting this new style of policymaking have become increasingly...

With the latest reform of EU Structural Policy, the Highlands and Islands have been excluded from further support by Structural Funds beyond 2013, but the new Scottish Rural Development Programme has increased CAP Pillar 2 expenditures in Scotland. A modified version of a system dynamics model...

Small and medium-sized farms all over Europe guarantee their survival by a broad range of strategies and different income sources. In remoter areas of highly developed countries such as the UK, such strategies may be expected to have their own characteristics, both legislative and...

A modified version of a system dynamics model constructed for an EU-wide case-study project (TOPMARD) using STELLA software was used to simulate the effects of a number of development scenarios for a remote rural area in Northern Scotland, i.e. Caithness & Sutherland, which is characterised by...

The European Union’s Water Framework Directive (WFD) has “the purpose to protect and preserve water resources across the European Union to ensure future sustainable use” but is likely to add to agricultural land losses, e.g. to infrastructure, industrial estates and housing. While the...