SOWAP seeks to address some of the current environmental, social and economic concerns of practising conventional arable crop production in northern and central Europe. Present arable cropping systems rely on intensive mechanical cultivation of the soil to ensure a good quality seedbed for crop establishment, and a clean tilth to reduce competition between crop and weed species.

The agronomic benefits of this system are however counterbalanced by the environmental consequences of such intensive soil management. e.g. potential for soil erosion, reduced soil biodiversity, lack of opportunity for sequestering carbon and damage to aquatic ecosystems from transported sediments. SOWAP aims to assess the viability of a more “conservation-oriented” agriculture, where fewer tillage practices replace the numerous cultivations carried out under more “conventional” arable farming systems.