Culture and agricultural biodiversity conservation

Yanbing Wang, Sergei Schaub, David Wuepper and Robert Finger

Food Policy, 2023, vol. 120, issue C

Abstract: Farmers’ behavior towards sustainable agricultural production is key to reducing the environmental footprint of agriculture and conserving biodiversity. We investigate the causal effect of culture on pro-environmental behaviors of farmers, and how policy instruments interact with culture to influence behavior. We exploit a unique natural experiment in Switzerland, which consists of two parts. First, there is an inner-Swiss cultural border between German- and French-speaking farmers who share the same natural environment, economy, and institutions, but differ culturally in their norms and values. Second, we exploit the effects of an agri-environmental policy reform that increased the monetary incentives to enroll land into biodiversity conservation. Using a spatial difference-in-discontinuities design and panel census data of all Swiss farms between 2010 and 2017, we show the following findings: Before the reform, farmers on the French-speaking side of the cultural border systematically enrolled less land into biodiversity conservation, compared to the German-speaking side. With increased monetary incentives following the policy reform in 2014, the French-speaking farmers enrolled relatively more additional land than the German-speaking farmers, shrinking the discontinuity. These findings indicate that while there exist cultural differences in pro-environmental behaviors, increased monetary incentives can reduce the importance of cultural differences. We discuss the implications for policy.

Keywords: Biodiversity; Conservation; Culture and policy; Environmental behavior; Agri-environmental schemes; Result-based schemes (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: D71 D91 Q18 Q57 Z13 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2023
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (3)

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Working Paper: Culture and Agricultural Biodiversity Conservation (2022)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:jfpoli:v:120:y:2023:i:c:s0306919223000805

DOI: 10.1016/j.foodpol.2023.102482

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