Small farm as sustainable nexus of contracts: understanding the role of human capital and policy based on evidence from Poland

Bazyli Czyżewski, Agnieszka Poczta-Wajda (), Piotr Kułyk and Jolanta Drozdz
Additional contact information
Bazyli Czyżewski: Poznan University of Economics and Business
Agnieszka Poczta-Wajda: Poznan University of Economics and Business
Piotr Kułyk: University of Zielona Góra
Jolanta Drozdz: Vilnius University

Environment, Development and Sustainability: A Multidisciplinary Approach to the Theory and Practice of Sustainable Development, 2023, vol. 25, issue 9, No 52, 10239-10260

Abstract: Abstract The concept of the nexus of contracts, derived from transaction cost economics (TCE), provides a holistic view of the production entity in agriculture from the perspective of a whole food system. TCE has been criticized, however, because it focuses exclusively on cognitive limitations of rationality that may prevent a transaction from occurring. An extended approach to human capital (HC), which includes so-called hidden HC, can address the doubts raised by the critiques. This study attempts to answer the question of how to shape environmentally sustainable nexus of contracts (SNC) in small-scale farming. The main objective is to assess the relationship between HC, including hidden HC, and a sustainable nexus of contracts under the influence of the European Union’s common agricultural policy (CAP). The proposed SNC comprises operations eco-management, contractual integration (hierarchy), and management of resources (labor, capital) with regard to their intensity. Structural equation modeling (SEM) with simultaneous confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) using ordinal variables was applied. The study is based on surveys performed in 2018 in Poland on a representative sample of 674 small-scale farms. It was hypothesized that the extended notion of HC is decisive for the development of SNC. This hypothesis has been confirmed, revealing the dominant role of training and participation in cultural/social events (which extend the perceptual boundaries of farmers) and indicating an almost negligible role of the length of education.

Keywords: Sustainable farming; Human capital; Bounded rationality; Small farm; SEM; CFA (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2023
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s10668-022-02485-2 Abstract (text/html)
Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.

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:spr:endesu:v:25:y:2023:i:9:d:10.1007_s10668-022-02485-2

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.springer.com/economics/journal/10668

DOI: 10.1007/s10668-022-02485-2

Access Statistics for this article

Environment, Development and Sustainability: A Multidisciplinary Approach to the Theory and Practice of Sustainable Development is currently edited by Luc Hens

More articles in Environment, Development and Sustainability: A Multidisciplinary Approach to the Theory and Practice of Sustainable Development from Springer
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().