Time lags in biodiversity response to farming practice

Abstract:
Agri-environmental schemes have been applied with the goal to mitigate negative effects of agriculture on biodiversity and ecosystem functioning. However, on evaluating the schemes the results have been variable and shown both positive and neutral effects. These variable effects can be attributed to not taking into account important factors affecting the variables at test, such as biodiversity. These factors include no exact definition of the farming practice, landscape complexity and the scale of study. Here we introduce a fourth factor not considered, the time scale of study. The implications and effects are discussed shortly.