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Paper short abstract

In the face of wild pollinator decline, a stakeholder workshop on habitat restoration in Latvia uncovers a rich set of technological and social barriers and enablers, as well as deeper systemic tensions - institutional distrust, bureaucratic burdens and agricultural logics at odds with conservation.

Paper long abstract

Wild pollinators underpin food production, biodiversity, and other ecosystem services yet face decline from agricultural intensification, land use shifts and climate change. There is a pressing need to undertake targeted measures to restore pollinator habitats by adjusting land management practices, including the restoration of semi-natural grasslands. Yet adoption of recommended measures as part of this green transition by farmers and other actors remains limited.

To identify and discuss the perceptual, institutional, and practical conditions that support or get in the way of joint actions aimed at restoring wild insect pollinator habitats at field-farm-landscape scales, a stakeholder workshop was held in the Vidzeme region in Latvia as part of the EU-funded RestPoll project, bringing together 18 participants including farmers, researchers, NGO representatives and local community members.

Based on 91 barriers and 58 enablers identified by workshop participants at individual and community level spanning across informational, cultural, financial, political, biophysical, technical, and land use factors, the analysis reveals a set of practical and epistemic tensions between and within various stakeholder groups. These include ones related to knowledge gaps and distrust of institutions, mismatches between generic policy instruments and local conditions, conflicting agricultural and conservation logics, diverging interests of local and foreign landowners, and the undervaluation of farmers' practical, place-based knowledge in restoration governance.

Addressing pollinator habitat restoration effectively requires moving beyond technical and financial measures toward policy frameworks that are responsive to the diverse knowledge, conditions, and concerns of farmers and local communities.

Keywords: Pollinator habitat restoration, tensions, agricultural landscapes, Latvia