Analyse économique des paiements pour services environnementaux, entre label et mesure agro-environnementale

This PhD thesis applies empirical and theoretical microeconomic approaches to analyse the efficiency of payments for environmental services in the agricultural sector. I assess levers to promote their adoption by farmers at different scales. I show empirically that targeting part of the income support of the Common Agricultural Policy towards increased funding of agri-environmental and climate measures and support for organic farming promotes participation in these schemes. My main contribution is to show that a sponsorship bonus in payments for environmental services is promising to encourage the participation of a critical mass of farmers when ecological threshold effects exist. The results of this thesis also suggest that result-based payments,in the form of a collective bonus or a payment proportional to an environmental indicator, are effective on the condition that the level of payment is sufficiently attractive. With a theoretical approach, I focus on the demand side and propose a tool, the health label, to increase consumers' willingness to pay in the particular case where the joint production technology of environmental services is complementary to the improvement of the intrinsic health quality of the agricultural commodity. I contribute to the literature by showing that consumers' health concerns can efficiently finance environmental services and complement agri-environmental policies.Cette thèse de doctorat applique des approches microéconomiques empiriques et théoriques pour analyser l'efficacité des paiements pour services environnementaux dans le secteur agricole. J'évalue des leviers pour favoriser leur adoption par les agriculteurs à différentes échelles. Je montre empiriquement que cibler une partie des aides au revenu de la politique agricole commune vers un financement accru des mesures agro-environnementales et climatiques et du soutien à l’agriculture biologique favorise la participation à ces dispositifs. Ma principale contribution est de mettre en évidence qu'un bonus de parrainage dans les paiements pour services environnementaux est prometteur pour favoriser la participation d’une masse critique d’agriculteurs lorsqu'il existe des effets de seuils écologiques.Les résultats de cette thèse suggèrent aussi que des paiements basés sur les résultats, sous forme de bonus collectif ou de paiement proportionnel à un indicateur environnemental, sont efficaces à la condition que le niveau de paiement soit suffisamment incitatif. Avec une approche théorique, je m’intéresse à la demande et propose un outil, le label santé, pour augmenter le consentement à payer des consommateurs dans le cas particulier où la technologie de production jointe des services environnementaux est complémentaire à l'amélioration de la qualité intrinsèque du produit agricole en terme de santé. Je contribue à la littérature en montrant que les préoccupations de santé des consommateurs peuvent financer efficacement les services environnementaux et compléter les politiques agro-environnementales

How can labeling for health concerns improve environmental public good provisioning?

Although consumers are increasingly willing to pay for the environment, the private provision of public goods from the consumption of green goods remains limited. We propose in this paper to exploit an additional private attribute of green goods, the health benefits, in order to increase the provision of public good. Health can be seen as a positive internality associated with the consumption of some green goods. We show that correcting this internality by offering labels describing these health benefits can increase the supply of public goods. The level of public good remains underprovided from the perspective of a social planner, but, under certain conditions, may equalize or exceed the optimal level of the public good from the perspective of an environmental agency. A simulation is performed to illustrate the impact of consumer preferences on the provisioning of public good at market equilibrium

Payments for environmental services with provision thresholds: farmers’ preferences for a conditional bonus

The effectiveness of payment schemes for delivering agri-environmental public goods with provision thresholds (biodiversity, water quality) depends on reaching enough farmland enrolment at the landscape scale. Supporting the development of collaborative approaches with a financial bonus conditioned to a collective element on top of an individual basic payment is a promising way to favour participation and continuity of environmental commitments in an area. However, little is known on farmers’ attitudes towards such mixed-payment mechanisms. Using a choice experiment, we measure farmers’ preferences towards an individual bonus for sponsoring peers, which can be combined with a collective bonus for improving the ecological quality of rivers in northwestern France. Applying a mixed logit model, we find that respondents have a positive willingness to accept contracts with a sponsor bonus, but a negative willingness to accept a sponsor bonus combined with a bonus for reaching a collective environmental objective. We characterize respondents’ heterogeneity with a latent class model and identify 3 different attitudes towards the bonus options: (i) negative preferences for both, particularly for the combined bonus, (ii) indifference, (iii) positive preferences for both, even higher for the combined bonus

Payments for environmental services with ecological thresholds: farmers’ preferences for a sponsorship bonus

Designing incentives for agri-environmental public good provision with threshold effects calls for payment mechanisms favouring critical mass participation and continuity of commitments at the landscape scale. Studies show farmers are reluctant to collective requirements but favourable to a bonus rewarding collective action. We conducted a choice experiment to test the acceptability of a bonus in a hypothetical scheme for improving rivers’ water quality in France. We introduce a sponsorship bonus each time the farmer convinces a peer into entering the scheme that can be combined with a collective result bonus per hectare if the river reaches a higher step of the water quality scale. We consider the involvement of local financers could increase the willingness to pay beyond opportunity costs and income foregone, and propose higher levels of payment than agri-environmental schemes. Results suggests a sponsorship bonus on its own is cost-effective, and that preferences for the bonus levels are heterogeneous.

Cost of changing dairy cows’ diet to reduce enteric methane emissions in livestock farms.

Introducing fodder with high omega 3 content such as grass or linseed in the feed ration of dairy cows both improves the milk nutritional profile and reduces enteric methane emissions per litre. This lever is interesting to contribute to climate change mitigation but can also generate additional farm costs. Payment for Environmental Services, such as the Eco-Methane programme implemented by the association Bleu-Blanc-Coeur in France, can support a change of cows’ diet in dairy farms through the valorisation of methane emissions reduction. The effectiveness of such a scheme depends on (i) the definition of a precise indicator of enteric methane emissions capturing the feeding effect, (ii) a payment level that would be sufficiently attractive to compensate for the additional costs faced by farmers. This study compares two indicators of enteric methane emissions to show the effect of taking feeding into account. It also assesses the extra cost of milk production if the grassland areas in fodder crop rotation systems were to be increased in French dairy farms. The estimation of a variable cost function based on data from the Farm Accountancy Data Network (FADN) suggests a significant increase of the marginal cost of milk production with additional hectares of grass in mountainous areas, and in plains farms for which maize silage represents less than 30% of the fodder crop rotation system

Valuating the effect of farmer's participation in on-farm diversification activities on farm employment in Korea /

International Master of Science in Rural Developmen

Umsetzung der Eco-Schemes in fünfzehn Mitgliedstaaten der Europäischen Union

Eco-schemes are set to play an important role in the European Union’s Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) post-2022 for the delivery of environmental and climate benefits and enhanced animal welfare. This article surveys current plans for the design of eco-schemes in fifteen European Union Member States. The number of eco-scheme measures to be offered per country varies between 3 and 21, and the complexity and level of ambition of the individual measures are quite heterogeneous. The majority of the proposed eco-scheme measures either build upon components from greening obligations or stem from agri-environmental and climate schemes currently offered under Pillar 2. All fifteen Member States address Green Deal targets, with particular emphasis being given to biodiversity enhancement and non-productive land. Eight of the countries surveyed are planning to provide support for organic farming through an eco-scheme. The greater creative freedom offered by the CAP’s New Delivery Model has resulted in a situation where similar measures are programmed as eco-schemes in some countries and as Pillar 2 measures in others. By adding yet another policy instrument to the CAP’s toolbox, the complexity of the CAP is vastly increased. It remains to be seen how farmers will respond