Rethinking agri-environmental schemes for a greener Europe [Opinion]

Agriculture covers nearly 40% of European Union (EU) land, making farming practices central to biodiversity conservation and climate goals. Agri-environmental schemes (AES)—voluntary incentives under the EU’s Common Agricultural Policy—have received billions in public funding, yet farmland biodiversity continues to decline and environmental targets remain largely unmet. Drawing on multiscale empirical research across five European case studies, we identify key systemic barriers to AES effectiveness: insufficient spatial targeting, inflexible contract design, bureaucratic burden, inadequate advisory support, and weak monitoring. In this opinion article, we argue that a fundamental overhaul is needed and propose an adaptive, multiscale policy framework that integrates bottom-up co-design with farmers, spatially explicit environmental goals, and evidence-based monitoring to deliver measurable ecological outcomes across Europe.