No. 34 The future of the Common Agricultural Policy 96 ANALYSIS AND PROSPECTIVE STUDIES CULTIVAR In this scenario of mergers and closures, the void left by LIFE in the area of environmental conservation would be profound and, as a result, the CAP 2028-2034, especially in its biodiversity component, should take on the mission of supporting the preservation of the latter. Furthermore, LIFE has been an important Community instrument for financing small-scale, high-risk but potentially transformative pilot projects. If LIFE is abolished, the CAP could in a sense lose its incubator for biodiversity solutions, as illustrated in the table below. LIFE function lost Direct consequence Innovation and Testing New agricultural practices beneficial to biodiversity (e.g. pasture management techniques) would no longer be tested and validated in real contexts before being proposed on a large scale. Demonstration and Transfer Loss of projects that demonstrate 'best practices' in situ and serve as learning centres for farmers and technicians. Protection of Species and Habitats Loss of the main source of funding for specific and complex conservation actions in Protected Areas and the Natura 2000 Network that do not directly fit into everyday agricultural activities. To compensate for the possible extinction of the LIFE programme, the Portuguese proposal for the CAP 2028-2034 should, in the LPN's opinion, incorporate some of its elements, particularly through its pillars of innovation and rural development. The CAP could thus take on the financing of demonstration projects (the former focus of LIFE) through its measures under the Agricultural Knowledge and Innovation System (AKIS) and the Farm and Forestry Advisory System (SAAF), such as: • Funding for Ambitious Pilot Projects: Create a funding line within the EAFRD (European Agricultural Fund for Rural Development or the fund that may eventually replace it) specifically dedicated to 'Environmental Demonstration Projects'. These projects would have to test new practices (e.g. biological pest control techniques) on pilot farms, with rigorous scientific monitoring, mimicking the LIFE approach. • Enhanced Advisory: Fund the SAAF to integrate biodiversity and ecology experts into technical support teams in order to directly transfer the latest scientific knowledge to farmers. In turn, Eco-schemes should be more elaborate and better funded, moving from a logic of 'support for practice' to one of 'support for ecosystem management', as would be the case thanks to: • Performance-Based Payments: Instead of paying solely for the adoption of a practice (e.g., leaving a strip of fallow land), the CAP would have to evolve to reward farmers based on concrete ecological indicators (e.g., increase in the population of pollinators or specific birds on the farm). This approach, tested on a small scale in several countries, would put LIFE's conservation philosophy into practice. • ‘Ecoregimes Plus’ for Critical Habitats: Create higher-level Ecoregimes (with higher remuneration), exclusively for the management of Natura 2000 areas or for the protection of endangered species, intervening in areas that are not directly productive — a function currently performed by LIFE. Finally, whether the second pillar of the CAP is maintained or subsumed into some other fund while maintaining the same objectives, it could take on ecological restoration interventions, which have so far been under LIFE. This would make it possible to implement measures such as:
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