Factors Influencing the Willingness of Dairy Farmers to Adopt Biogas Plants: A Case Study in Hokkaido, Japan

Atsushi Shimahata, Mohamed Farghali and Masahiko Fujii
Additional contact information
Atsushi Shimahata: Graduate School of Environmental Science, Hokkaido University, Sapporo, Hokkaido 060-0810, Japan
Mohamed Farghali: Graduate School of Animal and Food Hygiene, Obihiro University of Agriculture and Veterinary Medicine, Obihiro, Hokkaido 080-8555, Japan
Masahiko Fujii: Graduate School of Environmental Science, Hokkaido University, Sapporo, Hokkaido 060-0810, Japan

Sustainability, 2020, vol. 12, issue 18, 1-15

Abstract: Intensification of the livestock industry has become environmentally problematic due to the uncontrolled treatment of large amounts of watery manure. One solution is the adoption of biogas plants (BGPs). Hokkaido, Japan, has significant potential for BGP adoption, however, the large financial investments and lack of grid space for selling electricity are barriers. We investigated the relationship between the willingness of farmers to adopt BGPs and their current farming situations. Using a questionnaire survey and multivariate analyses, the results showed that large-scale farmers, particularly those with more than 100 mature cows, were clearly willing to adopt BGPs and expand their businesses in the future, while farmers who planned to downsize their businesses did not exhibit strong willingness to adopt BGPs. In addition, farmers willing to adopt BGPs thought the plants would help solve problems with manure treatment. BGPs might be more accepted by dairy farmers if there were greater incentives for installation given the role BGPs can play in providing stable energy and revitalizing local economies.

Keywords: biogas plants (BGPs); dairy farmers; Hokkaido; willingness; manure treatment; future farming plan; sustainable farming (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2020
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/12/18/7809/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/12/18/7809/ (text/html)

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:gam:jsusta:v:12:y:2020:i:18:p:7809-:d:417109

Access Statistics for this article

Sustainability is currently edited by Ms. Alexandra Wu

More articles in Sustainability from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().