An analysis of the potential effectiveness of aPayment-by-Results approach to the delivery ofenvironmental public goods and servicessupplied by Agri-Environment Schemes

Agri-environment schemes (AES) have been an important policy tool within the EU for over 15 years and are viewed as a central element of the Rural Development Regulation (RDR) in seeking to secure certain environmental public goods. Currently, AES tend to be action-based rather than result-based. As a result they offer payments for adherence to management prescriptions that are assumed to deliver environmental benefits, rather than making payments conditional on realisation of the benefits themselves. This prescription-based approach is a pragmatic response to the measurement and monitoring problems associated with many environmental benefits which can be difficult to identify, value and ascribe to causal factors with total certainty....