On the 26th of June 2003 an agreement was reached by farm ministers to reform the Common Agricultural Policy of the EU. Decoupling direct payments from farm output and the reduction of administrative prices are core elements of this reform. The goals of the reform are less output of cereals,...

We analyse whether the 2003 CAP reform and the anticipated new program of rural development will lead to an expansion or a reduction of organic farming. An extended version of the Positive Mathematical Programming (PMP) method is developed in order to differentiate organic farming from...

Austria's exposure to natural hazards is particularly high. Due to inadequate spatial planning, 12 percent of the building stock in Austria is potentially at risk and almost 9 percent is classified as highly at risk from flooding. A greater emphasis on preventive efforts is an essential...

Agriculture and forestry produce biomass which is increasingly utilised for energy generation, because its use, through substituting for fossil fuels, improves supply security and reduces greenhouse gas emissions. At present, the prevailing use for timber is to generate heat in private...

The Waldviertel is a structurally challenged region in the north-west of Lower Austria. Located in the north-east of Austria and extending from a long border with the Czech Republic as an incipient EU member in the north and the Danube river in the south, its population had been declining for...

The Farm Bill adopted in 1996 was widely seen to be the beginning of the end of agricultural market policy in the USA. Transfer payments to agricultural producers, entirely decoupled from production, replaced the earlier system of subsidies depending on market conditions. The underlying idea was...

The expansion of renewable energy sources is an EU strategy to reduce the dependency on fossil fuels and to curb carbon dioxide emission. According to studies estimating technical potentials, significant land resources can be mobilised for the production of energy crops. We estimate the costs of...

In 2003, the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) has been reformed and decoupling direct payments from farm output is one of its core elements. We estimate the likely responses in organic product supply due to the reform at regional and sectoral levels. In addition, we analyse how the new programme...

Prices for major farm commodities have undergone a substantial rise since 2002, driven up by growing demand as well as increasing energy prices. For the next years, prices for agricultural produce are expected to remain substantially above the level they had attained the start of the decade.