Computing stochastic Pareto frontiers between economic and environmental goals for a semi-arid agricultural production region in Austria

Abstract Multi-objective programming is frequently used in agro-environmental management studies to find compromises between competing policy objectives. We develop an integrated modelling framework to compute stochastic Pareto frontiers using realizations of three climate scenarios (SIMILAR, DRY, WET) for the semi-arid Seewinkel region in Austria. The stochastic Pareto frontiers relate net benefits of agricultural production (NB) to three environmental goal indicators including groundwater extraction (GWEX), nitrate leaching (NO3), and topsoil organic carbon stocks (SOC). The simulation results depict trade-offs and environmental co-benefits depending on the climate scenario and induced land use changes. A 1% (or 20%) decline of NB reduces GWEX by 11–83% (or 61–100%) and NO3 by 18–19% (or 49–53%), and increases SOC by 1% (or 5%), depending on the climate scenario. The results also reveal some environmental co-benefits for all Pareto frontier combinations. Climate change intensifies or alleviates trade-offs between NB and environmental goal indicators: in a dry climate scenario, trade-offs between NB and GWEX as well as SOC increase, while in a wet climate scenario, trade-offs between NB and NO3 increase. Overall, we find that efficient climate change adaptation of land use and management practices significantly improves the environmental outcomes for fairly small reductions in agricultural net benefits.