Identifying vulnerable farmland: An index to capture high urbanisation risk areas

Identifying and protecting vulnerable agricultural areas is a major priority, especially in Europe, in the context of the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) and zero net land degradation target. Although it has generated serious public attention for its implications for rural development, bio-economy and land use development and change, the vulnerability of farmland in the face of competing land uses has been an issue that few studies have considered in a holistic way. On the one hand, effective planning tools are lacking, especially in terms of tools to identify urbanisation risk areas. On the other hand, in some cases, there are not even comprehensive government procedures to support the protection of vulnerable farmland and encourage sustainable development of farm activities. In this paper, the author shows how integrated planning tools and methods are probably the most promising solutions to protect farmland and strengthen its cultural and socio-ecological values. The paper focuses on an index to identify Risk areas (particularly by using an Italian case study), in order to respond to the current operational gap, as well as to support the difficult decision process oriented to overcome land related conflicts. The index could be used at several decision-making levels and in many sectoral plans, especially in the frame of European spatial planning and rural policies.