Willing or complying? The delicate interplay between voluntary and mandatory interventions to promote farmers' environmental behavior

B-Tier
Journal: Food Policy
Year: 2023
Volume: 120
Issue: C

Authors (8)

Barreiro-Hurle, Jesus (European Commission) Dessart, Francois J. (not in RePEc) Rommel, Jens (Sveriges Lantbruksuniversitet) Czajkowski, Mikołaj (not in RePEc) Espinosa-Goded, Maria (not in RePEc) Rodriguez-Entrena, Macario (Government of Andalusia) Thomas, Fabian (not in RePEc) Zagorska, Katarzyna (not in RePEc)

Score contribution per author:

0.251 = (α=2.01 / 8 authors) × 1.0x B-tier

α: calibrated so average coauthorship-adjusted count equals average raw count

Abstract

Agri-environmental policies generally build around two complementary approaches: mandatory requirements and (compensated) voluntary measures. One of the challenges of the future EU Common Agricultural Policy is precisely to find the right balance between these two types of interventions. We conducted an experiment with farmers in three EU Member States to assess the impact of (1) increasing mandatory contributions to the environment, and of (2) decreasing unconditional income support. We also assess the effect of two key behavioural factors: environmental concern and trait reactance. Results show that both interventions reduce voluntary contributions to the environment, but the reduction is higher when mandatory contributions increase than when income decreases.. However, when mandatory contribution increases substantially, this more than offsets the reduction of voluntary contributions, leading to higher total contributions.

Technical Details

RePEc Handle
repec:eee:jfpoli:v:120:y:2023:i:c:s0306919223000799
Journal Field
Development
Author Count
8
Added to Database
2026-01-24