Potential of Landscape Features for Implementation of Green Direct Payments in Czech Farmed Landscape

One of the major changes to the architecture of Pillar 1 of the CAP in the 2014-2020 period is the inclusion of three measures providing payments for agricultural practices, beneficial for the climate and the environment, known as “green direct payments” or shortly “greening”. These practices are crop diversification, the maintenance of permanent grassland, and Ecological Focus Areas (EFAs). Landscape features are included in EFAs. Ministry of Agriculture (MoA) in Czechia allows farmers to fulfil their EFAs obligations on arable land through the landscape features and choose eight from nine specified landscape features which are eligible for the EFA obligation. The study analysed the current state of landscape features in the selected territory of the Czech Republic. The aim was to identify landscape features covered by the Land Parcel Identification System (LPIS) and to identify the potential of landscape features, which are not currently registered in the LPIS, but are based on nature and express the potential for future plots and eligibility for EFAs. Investigation of the causes to implement landscape features as the EFAs by farmers was supplemented by short survey with questionnaire, where respondents were farmers