Elsevier

Landscape and Urban Planning

Volume 133, January 2015, Pages 67-77
Landscape and Urban Planning

Research paper
Aesthetic quality of agricultural landscape elements in different seasonal stages in Switzerland

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.landurbplan.2014.09.010Get rights and content

Highlights

  • Species, spatial, and seasonal diversity increase aesthetic landscape quality.

  • Conservation elements as being more diverse are preferred to monotonous elements.

  • Seasonal stages strongly influence preference ratings of landscape elements.

  • Flowering stages are preferred; however, especially those of conservation elements.

  • Physical and seasonal features of landscape elements are strong preference predictors.

Abstract

Maintenance of the agricultural landscape, preservation of biodiversity and landscape aesthetics are part of a multifunctional agriculture. However, little is known about the influence of single agricultural landscape elements in different seasonal stages on landscape aesthetics. In a Swisswide photo survey, the aesthetic preferences of Swiss residents for typical agricultural landscape elements in the Swiss lowlands were investigated. Photographs of seven ecological compensation areas (ECAs) and seven other elements (crops, high-intensity meadows and pastures) were selected. Each element was presented in four to six different seasonal stages, each on single paper-based questionnaire pages to allow a random selection of elements and seasonal stages. In addition, each element was replicated in each seasonal stage. Four randomly selected elements were sent to each study participant for aesthetic valuation (preference rating scores). Overall, ECAs received higher preference ratings than crops or high-intensity grassland. Most preferred were ECAs with a vertical structure, i.e. trees and bushes, and species-rich elements. In addition, the seasonal stage of a landscape element strongly influenced preference ratings. Flowering stages were clearly liked most. Moreover, perceived diversity and naturalness of an element had a strong positive effect on its rating. The results indicate that ECAs, besides their ecological function, are powerful elements to enhance the public's preference for agricultural landscapes. Moreover, the results might be useful for the development and adaptation of quantitative methods to capture the aesthetic value of agricultural regions and might provide a basis for political decisions concerning direct payments for aesthetic services of agriculture.

Introduction

Agricultural landscapes provide beneficial functions and services to humans that go far beyond agricultural production. Modern agriculture is defined as multifunctional, comprising food production, ecological functions and recreational and aesthetic values (e.g. Jongeneel, Polman, & Slangen, 2008) and landscape aesthetics are now widely recognised as an ecosystem service (Butler and Oluoch-Kosura, 2006, Gobster et al., 2007). Although many scholars have stressed the importance of including aesthetic aspects in landscape management, planning and policy (e.g. Dramstad et al., 2006, Tress et al., 2001), such aspects are often neglected due to a lack of quantitative indicators of visual quality (Dramstad et al., 2006).

Current agricultural policy, in Switzerland and elsewhere, can have visible effects on landscape aesthetics (e.g. Schüpbach et al., 2008, Junge et al., 2011). In the past years, the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) of the EU was substantially reformed by decoupling area-related direct payments from production payments (Brady, Kellermann, Sahrbacher, & Jelinek, 2009). Benefits of agriculture to rural development, agro-ecology and biodiversity are now rewarded with an increasing share of agricultural subsidies (Kleijn & Sutherland, 2003). Farmers in Switzerland have since 1999 to prove that they meet a number of environmental standards in order to qualify for area-related direct payments (Aviron et al., 2009, FOAG, 2012). One of these standards in the Swiss agri-environmental programme demands that each participating farmer has to manage at least 7% of his or her farmland as so-called ecological compensation areas (ECAs). For establishing these areas, farmers are financially compensated. The catalogue of ECAs encompasses traditional landscape elements as well as new types of biotopes, which are designed for the purpose of biodiversity conservation and of enriching the agricultural landscape (FOAG, 2012; see also Jeanneret, Schüpbach, Pfiffner, Herzog, & Walter, 2003). Major types of ECAs are low-intensity grasslands, traditional orchards, hedges, and wild flower strips. Fertilisation and pesticide use is restricted in ECAs, and dates for mowing of meadows are prescribed (FOAG, 2012).

While recent research indicates that people appreciate semi-natural elements and species richness in agricultural landscapes (e.g. Soini and Aakkula, 2007, Lindemann-Matthies et al., 2010b, Hasund et al., 2011), comprehensive studies on the visual qualities of single agricultural elements such as different ECAs, crops or high-intensity grasslands are missing. Not only conservation elements like ECAs, but also the choice or combination of crops and grasslands can have effects on landscape aesthetics (Junge et al., 2011). Therefore, the aesthetic value of single agricultural landscape elements is crucial for landscape planning, and might also be of importance concerning direct payments for services of agriculture for landscape management and conservation. An adaptation and differentiation of these agricultural payments towards landscape attributes that are demanded by society may lead to a more socially efficient landscape policy (Hasund et al., 2011).

The appearance of a landscape changes with the seasons (Palang, Fry, Jauhiainen, Jones, & Sooväli, 2005). This is especially the case in agricultural landscapes with time-dependent management practices like mowing and crop harvests (Coeterier, 1996, Brassley, 1998). It has been suggested that seasonal aspects are an important component of landscape perception and aesthetic valuation (Hull & McCarthy, 1988Brassley, 1998, Stobbelaar and Hendriks, 2007). However, seasonal landscape changes, e.g. in colours and texture, have rarely been investigated in landscape preference research.

How people perceive the aesthetic value of a landscape depends on both physical features of the landscape and the perceptual processes that those features evoke in the viewer (Daniel, 2001). The aesthetic valuation of a landscape is thus associated with thoughts and feelings people affiliate with a landscape (Greider & Garkovich, 1994). Therefore, socio-demographic variables like age, gender or professional background (Lyons, 1983, Strumse, 1996, Dramstad et al., 2006) as well as attitudes of people towards agriculture or nature protection might influence their aesthetic valuation of a landscape (e.g. Kaltenborn and Bjerke, 2002, Van den Berg and Koole, 2006; Stilma et al., 2009).

This paper investigates the aesthetic quality of agricultural landscape elements in different seasonal stages in Switzerland. Photographs of typical ECAs, crops, and intensively managed meadows and pastures in the Swiss lowlands were presented to a random sample of 4000 Swiss households. To account for seasonal variety of landscape appearance (Stobbelaar et al., 2004, Stobbelaar and Hendriks, 2007), elements were shown in four to six different seasonal stages. Because an objective assessment of the aesthetic value of different landscape elements is difficult (Palmer, 2000, Dramstad et al., 2006, Tveit et al., 2006), it has been suggested to use more than one photograph of the landscape element in question (Palmer & Hoffman, 2001). We therefore used two photographs per landscape element in each seasonal stage. Our study is one of the first to study the effects of seasonal aspects on the aesthetic quality of agricultural landscapes and, in addition, to study preferences for single agricultural elements. Another novelty of our research is the use of more than one photograph per element to increase objectivity and representational validity of the photographs. The main questions addressed were: (1) How do Swiss people rate the aesthetic value of different ECAs, crops, and intensively managed meadows and pastures in Switzerland? (2) Are ECAs preferred over crops and high-intensity grassland? (3) How does the seasonal stage influence the aesthetic valuation of a particular landscape element? (4) Which characteristics are attributed to the elements shown, and do these characteristics influence preference ratings? (5) Are the preference ratings influenced by socio-demographic variables such as age, gender, education, and the general attitudes of persons towards agriculture and agricultural landscapes?

Section snippets

Study material and photo editing

To conduct a photo survey among Swiss households, photographs of 14 different landscape elements typical for the agricultural landscape in the Swiss lowlands were taken (Table 1). Of these, seven were ECAs (wildflower strips, moist meadows, hedgerows, high-stem fruit trees, species-rich field margins, low-intensity meadows and low-intensity pastures) and seven other elements (grain, grass-clover ley, maize, rapeseed, beet, high-intensity meadows and high-intensity pastures). The selected ECAs

Overall valuation of the landscape elements

On average, study participants rated almost all ECAs higher than crops or high-intensity grasslands. The most preferred ECAs were high-stem fruit trees, hedgerows, low-intensity pastures and low-intensity meadows (mean rating scores per element over all seasonal stages, Fig. 3). The most preferred elements other than ECAs were high-intensity pastures, rapeseed and high-intensity meadows. In case of high intensity pastures and rapeseed, the mean rating scores per element were higher than the

Discussion

Over all seasonal stages, most crops and the high-intensity meadow received mean preference ratings around the mid-point of the 7-step scale, while almost all ECAs received higher preference ratings than crops or intensively managed meadows or pastures. The aesthetically most preferred landscape elements were high-stem fruit trees, hedgerows and low-intensity pastures with trees and bushes. This indicates a preference for vertical landscape elements and corroborates findings of other studies

Conclusions

We conclude that conservation elements like ECAs are – apart from their ecological importance – powerful elements to enhance the public's preference for agricultural landscapes. Besides their structural and species diversity, ECAs increase visual landscape quality throughout the year as being mostly permanent elements with long-lasting flowering periods. This is a pleasing result because ecologically sound landscapes are more likely to be sustained if they evoke enjoyment and approval by the

Acknowledgements

We would like to thank Diethart Matthies for valuable comments on the manuscript and Gabriela Brändle and Reinhold Briegel for picture editing. The project was funded by the Swiss Federal Office of Agriculture.

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