Overcoming collapse of farming systems: shifting from vicious to virtuous circles in the extensive sheep farming system in Huesca (Spain)

Farming systems in Europe are perceived by stakeholders as having a low level of resilience and sustainability when confronted with shocks and ongoing stresses. Specifically, European extensive livestock systems are faced with challenges such as low farm income, uncertain policies, and changing meat consumption patterns, which are causing these systems to decline. Focused on the extensive sheep farming system in Huesca (Spain), our aim with this paper is to analyze the dynamics that have driven this system close to collapse and propose strategies that can reverse its dynamics to make the system both resilient and sustainable. This assessment is framed under an integrated resilience and sustainability approach, in which resilience variables (challenges, functions, and resilient attributes) and sustainability dimensions (economic, social, environmental, and institutional) are considered. Drawing on qualitative system dynamics and participatory causal loop diagram mapping, we show that the extensive sheep production system is threatened not only by challenges (e.g., increasing feeding costs), but also by weakly expressed resilience attributes (e.g., lack of diverse policies) and diminished functions (e.g., declining number of farms). There are delayed vicious circles in the system’s dynamics that are interrelated across sustainability dimensions, implying that time will be required to reverse the system’s dynamics. Hence, to foster the resilience of farming systems, specifically extensive livestock systems, a coordinated range of long-term strategies and policies (agricultural, environmental, sanitary, urban, labor, consumption, and innovation) are needed, aimed at responding to challenges, weak attributes, and diminished functions across different sustainability domains.