Zbigniew Floriańczyk

The need for sustainable agricultural sector is growing rapidly due to climate changes. As there are still knowledge gaps and the need for innovations that support farmers in the sustainability transition, there is a need for determining priority research areas that are vital for the sustainable development of agriculture. The aim of our study was to derive a long-term vision of the desirable agricultural sector in Poland and prioritize research areas required to make Polish agriculture sustainable. We applied the living lab approach and, by conducting a backcasting exercise with the lab members, we identified a desirable vision of agriculture in Poland and the research areas needed to realize this vision. Using Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) and Cumulative Voting (CV), we prioritized these research areas. Our results show that adaptation to climate changes is the most important area of research, having 38.6% of the total possible number of points using AHP and 29.7% in the case of CV. The analysis of the Polish strategic documents related to agriculture and agricultural research shows that, to some extent, these key research areas are already part of the national policy, but there is not sufficient funding and coordination to tackle all aspects of sustainability in agriculture.

The economic theory links the growth of production factors remuneration with the productivity improvement. In the case of contemporary European agriculture, among the most important income creators are money transfers, namely direct payments. These transfers are part of the agricultural and rural policy directed at fulfillment of societal goals. The research investigates relations between changes of agricultural productivity and the share of direct payments in incomes from agriculture in the EU member states. The level of direct support and the productivity development were analyzed in the context of programming the agricultural growth policy. Teoria ekonomii łączy wzrost wynagrodzenia czynników wytwórczych z poprawą produktywności. W przypadku współczesnego rolnictwa europejskiego wśród czynników dochodotwórczych istotną pozycję zajmują transfery bezpośrednie. Transfery te są jednym z podstawowych instrumentów polityki rolnej i służą realizacji celów społecznych. W przeprowadzonym badaniu poddano zmiany produktywności rolnictwa krajów unijnych i roli transferów bezpośrednich w tworzeniu dochodu rolniczego. W szczególności przeanalizowano związki między poziomem wsparcia bezpośredniego a wzrostem produktywności w kontekście programowania polityki wzrostu rolnictwa