Assessment of social demand heterogeneity to inform agricultural diffuse pollution mitigation policies

Francisco Alcon, Jose A. Zabala and J. Martinez-Paz

Ecological Economics, 2022, vol. 191, issue C

Abstract: Agroecosystems provide several agroecosystem disservices, among which diffuse nutrient pollution is one of the most significant, mainly due to its negative impacts on surrounding ecosystems, such as coastal ecosystems. Therefore, the implementation of agricultural measures to mitigate nutrient pollution might become a way to overcome this environmental challenge. However, proper implementation requires both a cost-effectiveness assessment and social support. This paper aims to value the social demand for agricultural measures to mitigate nutrient pollution and the benefits gained in the surrounding ecosystems from their implementation. Additionally, the demand preference heterogeneity is assessed. Measures proposed by a law intended to mitigate diffuse nitrate pollution in the Campo de Cartagena catchment area (south-eastern Spain) and thereby restore one of the main coastal lagoons in the European Mediterranean Sea, the Mar Menor, are used as a case study. A choice experiment and latent class mixed logit were employed to disentangle heterogeneous social preferences. Despite the fact that preference heterogeneity was revealed regarding the proposed agricultural measures, strong preferences linked to the restoration of the Mar Menor were shown by all the distinct classes. The socioeconomic benefits derived from the measures along with the expected environmental benefits from the restoration of the surrounding ecosystems exceed the farmers' costs for their implementation. Consequently, the results provide guidance to policy makers in the establishment of socially supported strategies for agricultural nitrate pollution mitigation.

Keywords: Agriculture; Mitigation measures; Choice experiment; Preference heterogeneity; Latent class mixed logit (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2022
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0921800921002755
Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:ecolec:v:191:y:2022:i:c:s0921800921002755

DOI: 10.1016/j.ecolecon.2021.107216

Access Statistics for this article

Ecological Economics is currently edited by C. J. Cleveland

More articles in Ecological Economics from Elsevier
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Catherine Liu ().