Knowledge sharing and innovation in agriculture and rural areas

Along with multifunctional agriculture associated with the existence of non-commodity
functions of agriculture, there is the development of an approach that is trying to find and
elucidate the relationships between agriculture and the countryside. This approach is primarily
based on the assumption that multifunctional agriculture can be a source of rural development
(Van der Ploeg and Roep 2003) or that it even plays the central role in rural development
(Van der Ploeg et al. 2000).
There is a variety of concepts and approaches to multifunctional agriculture which are more
or less connected with the Common Agricultural Policy. The adoption of multifunctional
agriculture by agricultural policy has been called by some authors ‘an institutionalisation of
multifunctionality’ (McCarthy 2005). One can find two main directions among the
approaches that were later used within the framework of the CAP. The article will inspect
them in detail. The first can be called multifunctional agriculture as commodity and noncommodity
production and the second can be called multifunctional agriculture as an integral
part of rural development.
The paper discusses and subsequently evaluates these approaches to multifunctional
agriculture in Czechia’s conditions by means of a quantitative assessment arising from
statistically available indicators. Emphasis is also laid on regional differentiation of
multifunctional agriculture indicators.
Given the nature of public goods (OECD 2001), an assessment of multifunctionality based on
the production of non-commodity products is very difficult to measure. Nevertheless, noncommodity
functions of agriculture are associated with the landscape management that can be
best implemented by extensive grassland farming which occurs by cattle grazing. For this
reason, a use was made of the indicators describing the development of permanent grassland
and suckler cows breeding as a representative of extensive livestock farming. In addition,
non-commodity functions are also fulfilled by means of organic agriculture whose substance
is based on a care for the landscape, soil and biodiversity.
In the case of an evaluation of multifunctional agriculture, conceptualised as activities
combining agriculture with rural development, we face again the limited availability of the
data. This is why a choice was made of the activities that are available within the framework
of agricultural statistics. In this way, the activities associated with tourism were selected. On
the farms they are considered agritourism. It offers the spending of leisure time on a farm,
allowing a farmer along with a diversification of incomes to introduce his holding to a visitor,
who is a potential consumer of farming products. There is another selected indicator, the
production of energy from renewable energy sources, thanks to which farms can diversify their
activities by means of generation of electrical energy from agricultural commodities and waste.
Since multifunctional agriculture conceived as non-commodity production is primarily
concentrated in the mountains and foothills, one can speak about an interrelated farming
system. In addition, the approach was encouraged sooner and has a larger proportion of the
farmers involved. By contrast, based on the evaluated indicators, the conceptualisation of
multifunctional agriculture as integral part of rural development can be denoted as less
important from the viewpoint of farmers’ involvement. Nevertheless, one has to point out that
from the whole spectrum of possible activities interconnecting agriculture and rural
development a choice was only made of two activities that are accessible within the
framework of agricultural statistics.
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