View article

Compliance with the Water Framework Directive (WFD) will require substantial reductions in agricultural phosphorus (P) losses in the Nordic countries Denmark, Norway, Sweden and Finland. Falling P surpluses in agriculture for more than a decade and voluntary programmes of good agricultural practice have not reduced P losses to surface waters, while general regulatory measures have primarily focused on nitrogen. Without addressing the role of critical source areas for P loss, policy measures to abate diffuse P losses are likely to be ineffective. This has created a demand by environmental authorities for instruments that assess the risk of P losses from agricultural land and facilitate the planning of mitigation measures. In Nordic countries index-type risk assessment tools for diffuse P losses are under development inspired by experiences with P indexing in the USA. A common feature is that they are empirical …