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A note on European farmers' preferences under cumulative prospect theory
(2024)Journal of Agricultural EconomicsExplaining farmer decision making using cumulative prospect theory is of increasing importance. We present a systematic review on European farmers' preferences under the cumulative prospect theory framework. We identified 17 studies covering 2324 farmers from 12 European countries. All studies report that (on average) farmers are: (i) risk averse, (ii) loss averse, and (iii) overweight small probabilities and underweight large probabilities. ...Journal Article -
Quantifying the impact of farmers' social networks on the effectiveness of climate change mitigation policies in agriculture
(2024)Journal of Agricultural EconomicsTo reduce agricultural greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, farmers need to change current farming practices. However, farmers' climate change mitigation behaviour and particularly the role of social and individual characteristics remains poorly understood. Using an agent-based modelling approach, we investigate how knowledge exchange within farmers' social networks affects the adoption of mitigation measures and the effectiveness of a payment ...Journal Article -
Europe's ambitious pesticide policy and its impact on agriculture and food systems
(2024)Agricultural EconomicsEuropean countries have set ambitious policy goals to reduce the risks of pesticides to the environment and human health. European agriculture could play a leading role in the transition to a low pesticide risk future, with various societal benefits. However, such a transition also involves trade-offs, costs, and risks for farmers and society. Here, we summarize possible implications for agriculture and food systems in Europe and beyond ...Journal Article -
Precipitation causes quality losses of large economic relevance in wheat production
(2024)Q OpenAdverse weather conditions can affect both crop yield quantity and yield quality. In wheat production, especially the risk of a downgrading due to low baking quality, as indicated by the Hagberg Falling Number, can cause large economic losses after precipitation events. We here estimate precipitation effects on the risk of such a downgrading and quantify the resulting economic losses. To this end, we leverage a panel dataset from the Swiss ...Journal Article -
Risk Perceptions, Preferences and the Adoption Dynamics of Pesticide-Free Production
(2024)Journal of Agricultural and Resource EconomicsWe study the adoption of a new pesticide-free wheat production system in Switzerland. Large-scale transitions to such production systems have implications for the entire agricultural and food sector. Using survey data from 1,073 Swiss wheat producers, we empirically test whether risk preferences and risk perceptions in four domains relate to farmers’ decisions whether and when to adopt pesticide-free production. We observe heterogeneity ...Journal Article -
Short supply chains and the adoption of fungus‐resistant grapevine varieties
(2023)Applied Economic Perspectives and PolicyUsing fungus-resistant grapevine varieties can reduce pesticide use substantially, while maintaining production quantity and quality. Using survey data from 775 producers in Switzerland, we investigate the adoption of fungus-resistant varieties and especially analyze the relevance of marketing channels and short supply chains. We find that 20.1% of respondents use fungus-resistant varieties but the acreage is only 1.2%. Our results narrow ...Journal Article -
A note on synthetic data for replication purposes in agricultural economics
(2023)Journal of Agricultural EconomicsEmpirical studies in agricultural economics usually involve policy implications. In many cases, such studies rely on proprietary or confidential data that cannot be published along with the article, challenging the replicability and credibility of the results. To overcome this problem, the use of synthetic data—that is, data that do not contain a single unit of the original data—has been proposed. In this note, we illustrate the utility ...Journal Article -
The (in)stability of farmer risk preferences
(2023)Journal of Agricultural EconomicsWe test and quantify the (in)stability of farmer risk preferences, accounting for both the instability across elicitation methods and instability over time. We use repeated measurements (N = 1530) with Swiss fruit and grapevine producers over 3 years, using different risk preference elicitation methods (domain-specific self-assessment and incentivised lotteries). We find that farmers' risk preferences change considerably when measured ...Journal Article -
Action‐ versus results‐based policy designs for agricultural climate change mitigation
(2023)Applied Economic Perspectives and PolicyReducing agricultural greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions is key to achieve overall climate policy goals. Effective and efficient policy instruments are needed to incentivize farmers' adoption of on-farm climate change mitigation practices. We compare action- and results-based policy designs for GHG reduction in agriculture and account for farmers' heterogeneous behavioral characteristics such as individual farming preferences, reluctance to ...Journal Article -
Combining ex-ante and ex-post assessments to support the sustainable transformation of agriculture: The case of Swiss pesticide-free wheat production
(2023)Q OpenSustainable intensification of agriculture requires the adoption of new production techniques, tools, and programmes on a large scale. This implies substantial shifts in established ways of farming under uncertain information about potential economic and environmental outcomes. Research can support stakeholders such as farmers, industry, and policy in this transformation by providing evidence-based information. The provision of such ...Journal Article