Greenhouse gas emissions and mitigation potential from fertilizer manufacture and application in India

Crop management research is increasingly involving farmers in evaluating new technologies, identifying adoption constraints and opportunities for improving farm performance to produce more sustainable impact. ICRISAT and its partners worked with farmers in Malawi and Zimbabwe during the 1999/2000 and 2000/2001 seasons to evaluate a range of ‘best bet’ soil fertility and water management technologies and evaluate the impact of farmer participatory research. Although there was some variation in methods implemented at different sites, the study found that there is a basis for a comparison of methods. Community entry and participatory approaches that engage farmers in decision making throughout the research-development-diffusion-innovation process have higher setup costs compared to traditional ‘top-down’ approaches. But they improve efficiency, both in technology development and in building farmers' capacity for experimentation and collective learning. This results in the development of more relevant technologies, joint learning among farmers, researchers and extensionists and better impact. To make farmer participatory research projects more sustainable and introduce them on a wide scale, the study recommends that public and NGO investments be targeted to building district and village-level innovation clusters.     

重庆市农民合作社可持续发展影响分析

[目的]不同区域的农民合作社所处的发展环境和阶段不同,影响合作社可持续发展的因素也存在差异。通过探析重庆市农民合作社可持续发展的影响因素,提出针对性的政策建议,以期为农民合作社可持续发展提供重要参考。[方法]文章基于重庆市323个农民合作社的问卷调查数据,将影响农民合作社可持续发展的因素分为人力资源、运行机制、经营效果和外部环境4类,利用二元Logistic模型,对农民合作社可持续发展及其影响因素进行实证分析,在此基础上提出相关政策建议。[结果]普通成员的文化程度、管理者能力、合作社的组织结构完善性、成员对合作社的信任度、合作社的盈利能力、合作社的带动能力、政府的支持作用等对农民合作社的可持续发展具有显著正向影响,政府对内部事务的干预对农民合作社的可持续发展具有显著负向影响,其中管理者能力的影响远远高于其他因素。[结论]该文提出通过规范内部治理机制、提升人力资源素质、完善危机预警机制、优化外部发展环境和加强合作文化建设等政策含义,推动农民合作社可持续发展。     

Resource degradation and adoption of land conservation technologies in the Ethiopian Highlands: A case study in Andit Tid,North Shewa

This paper reports results from a study of resource degradation and conservation behavior of peasant households in a degraded part of the Ethiopian highlands. Peasant households' choice of conservation technologies is modeled as a two-stage process: recognition of the erosion problem, and adoption and level of use of control practices. An ordinal logit model is used to explain parcel-level perception of the threat of the erosion problem and the extent of use of conservation practices. Results show the importance of perception of the threat of soil erosion, household, land and farm characteristics; perception of technology-specific attributes, and land quality differentials in shaping conservation decisions of peasants. Furthermore, where poverty is widespread and appropriate support policies are lacking, results indicate that population pressure per se is unable to encourage sustainable land use. The challenge of breaking the poverty-environment trap and initiating sustainable intensification thus require policy incentives and technologies that confer short-term benefits to the poor while conserving the resource base.     

Stochastic Technology, Risk Preferences, and Adoption of Site-Specific Technologies

A model of farmer decision making is developed to determine the extent to which uncertainties about soil fertility and weather affect the value of site-specific technologies (SSTs) using jointly estimated risk and technology parameters. Uncertainty can lead risk-averse farmers to apply more fertilizers and generate more pollution than in the certainty case. Ignoring uncertainty and risk aversion would overestimate the economic and environmental benefits of SSTs and underestimate the subsidy required to induce adoption. Accounting for uncertainties and risk preferences might explain the low observed adoption rates of SSTs. Improving the accuracy of SSTs would increase the incentives for adoption.     

组织关系视角下的农民合作组织行政科层化问题研究——以用水协会(WUA)的构建和发展为例

在农民合作组织的构建和发展过程中政府运用公共权力对其进行控制和支持。当政府采用强控制时,支持措施以物质性资源提供为主,农民合作组织表现出强依赖性,在这种{强控制,强支持,强依赖}组织关系下,两类组织节约各自制度、交易及信息成本的行为引致农民合作组织行政科层化问题。解决问题的核心在于通过制度构建改变两类组织之间的关系,使之表现为{弱控制,强支持,弱依赖},可选择的制度构建包括避免规定地方政府在构建和发展农民合作组织方面的绩效责任、支持措施侧重于组织知识和管理能力等方面的培训、提供宽松的政策环境激励NGO等组织进行支持性投入和农民合作组织的自我发展。     

干旱风险冲击下牧户适应性生计策略及其影响因素

牧区连续严重干旱风险威胁着牧户生计,导致牧户的干旱风险管理成为其日常生计活动。准确理解和研究牧户应对日益严重的干旱风险的生计策略及其影响因素,在牧区发展政策措施的制定与实施以及提高牧民应对干旱风险能力方面具有重要的理论指导与实践意义。文章以英国国际发展署(DFID)的可持续生计分析框架和FAO的农户可持续生计灾害风险管理分析框架为基础,基于内蒙古草原牧区牧户的调研数据,借鉴已有研究成果并结合牧区实际建立牧户生计资本指标并进行测度,并运用Logit模型对牧户应对干旱风险所采取的多种生计策略的影响因素进行实证分析。研究结果表明:自然资本和金融资本是影响牧户应对干旱风险策略及组合最为广泛和显著的因素,其次为社会资本、物质资本和人力资本。因此,通过合理的草场流转制度、放牧制度和畜牧业信贷制度构建、生态环境保护补偿标准提高以及现代畜牧业产业组织方式的建立等方面提高牧户的自然资本和金融资本水平,能够增强牧户应对干旱风险的能力。     

Inducing the adoption of emerging technologies for sustainable intensification of food and renewable energy production: insights from applied economics*

Emerging advances in sustainable intensification technologies have the potential to transform land use and crop management approaches in ways that can increase resource productivity and reduce adverse environmental impacts of agricultural production. This paper describes emerging technologies that can sustainably intensify food and renewable energy production. We apply the findings from studies examining the adoption of technologies with similar stylized features to provide insights about the incentives and barriers for the adoption of these emerging technologies. We also present a landscape-based systems approach, based on welfare economics, to go beyond relying on a positive approach to explain observed adoption decisions to examining normative questions about the optimal mix, level, and location of adoption of these technologies to achieve desired societal outcomes. We conclude with a discussion of the insights from applied economics for the design of policy incentives to achieve these outcomes.     

Effect of yield and price risk on conversion from conventional to organic farming*

Although the benefits of organic farming are already well known, the conversion to organic farming does not proceed as the Dutch government expected. In order to investigate the conversion decisions of Dutch arable farms, a discrete stochastic dynamic utility‐efficient programming (DUEP) model is developed with special attention for yield and price risk of conventional, conversion and organic crops. The model maximizes the expected utility of the farmer depending on the farmer’s risk attitude. The DUEP model is an extension of a dynamic linear programming model that maximized the labour income of conversion from conventional to organic farming over a 10 year planning horizon. The DUEP model was used to model a typical farm for the central clay region in the Netherlands. The results show that for a risk‐neutral farmer it is optimal to convert to organic farming. However, for a more risk‐averse farmer it is only optimal to fully convert if policy incentives are applied such as taxes on pesticides or subsidies on conversion, or if the market for the organic products becomes more stable.     

Technological and policy options for sustainable agricultural intensification in eastern Uganda

This article presents a bio‐economic household model, which has been developed to assess the potential impacts of agricultural intensification efforts on economic and ecological indicators in eastern Uganda. A study region in the Lake Victoria Crescent was selected with comparative advantages for intensive agricultural production: high agricultural potential, high market access, and high population density. However, current production is characterized by low input–output systems revealing a discrepancy between development opportunities and actual development outcomes. Based on a farmer participatory research approach, production methods were introduced in the study region aimed at fostering sustainable agricultural development. Data from two community surveys, two comprehensive household and plot level surveys, and farm‐trial data were used to develop and calibrate bio‐economic models for four representative household types. Model scenarios reveal that farm households in eastern Uganda would not pursue sustainable intensification under current socio‐economic conditions. The market environment has to be improved substantially, i.e., transaction and transportation costs have to be reduced, innovative credit schemes for smallholders have to be introduced, and alternative forms of labor acquisition have to be promoted, to provide sufficient economic incentives for the adoption of environmentally sound production methods. In addition, agricultural service provision needs to be reformed and more agricultural research is needed for new and better‐targeted technologies.     

构建新型农业社会化服务体系初探

我国农业社会化服务体系经过多年来发展不断完善,组织载体"多层次"、服务内容"多元化"、服务机制"多形式"格局基本形成,但是农业社会化服务组织不健全、服务内容与农民的需求差距大、生产要素配置不合理矛盾凸显等问题仍然突出存在。新时期构建农业社会化服务体系,应确立"顶层设计指导、公共财政扶持、局部试点先行、适时稳步推进"的原则,着力在生产经营服务、农村金融服务、公共监管服务三个方面,力求在组织创新、制度创新、管理创新上实现十个新突破。     

Do farmer,household and farm characteristics influence the adoption of sustainable practices? The evidence from the Republic of Moldova

Drought represents the main constraint on agricultural production in the Republic of Moldova indicating the need to shift from conventional agricultural practices to more sustainable ones. To provide a more comprehensive understanding of the determinants and barriers influencing the adoption of conservation agriculture practices, an analytic framework combining both binary and ordered probit models addressing the potential endogeneity of variables was applied. A survey was conducted among 234 smallholders in three districts in the Republic of Moldova from July to September 2016. The results indicated that the adoption of sustainable practices by small-scale farmers is influenced predominantly by farmer characteristics and by their perception of risk. The findings of this research confirmed that households with lower access to financial resources are less likely to adopt these practices. Consequently, the provision of alternative financing is needed in the promotion of sustainable agriculture practices.     

森林生态会计核算研究

现行会计体系存在两个主要缺陷:忽视危及经济持续生产能力的自然资源匮乏;忽视环境质量下降会危及人类的健康与福利。从而引起GDP指标的虚增,误导社会资源的有效配置。借助森林生态学、生态经济学,可在实践上构建起具有可操作性的森林生态会计,以有效反映生态信息及生态效益的外部性价值,制约对生态环境的破坏,并为我国已实施的巨额森林生态效益的资金补偿提供微观配置依据。     

Incentives to managers or participation of farmers in China's irrigation systems: which matters most for water savings,farmer income,and poverty?

The overall goal of our article is to better understand which matters for water savings, farmer income and poverty in China's irrigation systems: incentives to managers or participation of farmers. To pursue this goal, the article has three objectives. First, we track the evolution of water management reform, examining the practice of providing incentives to managers, and increasing the participation of farmers. Second, we identify the impact of water management reform on crop water use. Specifically, we want to measure whether or not incentives to managers and farmer participation in water management institutions affect the performance of the irrigation system. Because we also are interested in the potential results of water management reform, the article explores how changes in incentives and farmer participation affect farmer income and poverty. Based on a random sample of 51 villages and 189 farmers in four large irrigation districts in Ningxia and Henan provinces, both in China's Yellow River Basin, our results show that the two major forms of water management reform, water users' associations (WUAs) and contracting, have begun to systematically replace traditional forms of collective management. Our analysis demonstrates, however, that it is not the nominal implementation of the reform that matters, but rather it is the creation of new management institutions that offer water managers monetary incentives that lead to water savings. In contrast to the original design of China's reform policies, participation of farmers has not played a role in saving water. Importantly, given China's concerns about national food production and poverty alleviation, the reductions in water, at least in our sample sites, do not lead to reductions in income and do not increase the incidence of poverty.     

我国现行林业财政投入分析、政策效率评价及其实现机制研究

我国林业的长期可持续发展需要加大财政投入和支持力度,为林业可持续发展提供物质基础和政策支撑。文章针对我国林业财政投入总量不足,且整体增速较为缓慢;财政投入结构不合理,林业产业建设投资比重少;林业财政补偿标准低,且补偿范围不够全面等现状及问题,采用DEA模型,通过构建林业财政投入和产出指标,对林业总体政策投入效率、规模投入效率和政策投入效率进行评价,评价结果显示,近两年我国林业总体财政政策投入效率下滑,中央财政拨付的财政经费和税收优惠财政投入缺口较大。该文根据林业财政投入现状及评价结果提出了建立林业财政扶持资金机制、完善林业财政转移支付机制、健全森林生态效益补偿机制、规范林业产业税收激励机制等4种实现机制,为促进我国林业可持续发展提供参考。     

Adoption potential of nitrate mitigation practices: an ecosystem services approach

Nitrate pollution from agricultural drainage has caused water quality concerns worldwide, but there are several promising technologies to help mitigate this environmental degradation. While these practices primarily aim to improve water quality, they may also provide other ‘additive’ benefits or ecosystem services and the awareness of such benefits may influence their potential to be adopted by farmers. To investigate the impact that perceived ecosystem services has on a practice's adoption potential, we used a mixed methods approach consisting of a literature review, producer surveys, and a group discussion to explore farmer interest in and perceived benefits (on-farm and regional) of seven subsurface drainage nitrate reduction practices (controlled drainage, bioreactors, wetlands, nitrogen management rate, nitrogen management timing, cover crops, and diversified crop rotations). The nitrogen management practices were shown to be accessible and realistic options for water quality improvement as they elicited high interest and had the highest level of compatibility. However, these practices did not provide many other complementary ecosystem services. Conversely, wetlands had a high literature review-derived ecosystem service count, but were considered to have low compatibility, and survey respondents indicated less interest in this practice. The practice of cover cropping showed more moderate, yet consistently positive results for all factors.     

节水财税金融政策模式创新研究

我国节水管理的财税金融支持政策较为薄弱。节能与节水同样具有显著公益性和外部性,其财税金融政策经验可供节水领域借鉴。从政策手段、支持目标和实施效果等政策要素角度,对比分析我国节水与节能财税金融支持政策存在的差距。在政策手段上,支持节水的财政、税收、贷款、基金、债券等政策工具尚未得到系统应用,上市融资、保险、证券等金融手段还处于探索阶段。在政策目标上,对节水灌溉设施运行维护、节水技术与产品研发及推广、节水示范等支持较弱。在政策效果上,节水行业发展规模和效率水平都明显落后于节能行业。基于政策要素对比,将所需完善的政策手段和支持目标进行组合,得到需要创新实施的10项节水财税金融政策模式。     

Agents for diffusion of agricultural innovations for environmental outcomes

In New Zealand, local governments are tasked with both sustainably managing natural resources and supporting adoption of practices and technologies for environmental outcomes. Unfortunately, farmers in New Zealand lack trust in advice on environmental performance provided by local governments. Hence, local governments may seek to partner with others to disseminate information about environmentally friendly practices and technologies to farmers. Empirical evidence indicates that New Zealand farmers are more likely to adopt new practices after seeing them successfully demonstrated; therefore, local government would do well to partner with those who have tried the practices themselves and those with large farmer networks. In this paper, we use unique survey data to identify the characteristics of such “innovators” and “connectors”. We also identify the characteristics of individuals who trust environmental information provided by local governments. We find that sex, age, education level, financial robustness, farm size, and the number of distinct land uses are correlated with both innovativeness and connectedness. However, among these characteristics, only education and financial robustness predict trust in environmental information provided by local governments.     

Environmental discounting behaviour of smallholder farmers in Chibombo District,Central Zambia

This study utilised 158 semi structured interviews, three focus group discussions and two key informant interviews to achieve its aim of investigating environmental discounting by smallholder farmers in Chibombo, Zambia. Results suggest that most smallholder farmers were willing to continue using mineral fertilisers in the short to medium term even when they were told there could be potentially negative effects as a result. This result was attributed to the farmers’ experience with neutralising soil acidity through lime application and crop rotations. The proportions of smallholder farmers who would continue using pesticides increased with the period it takes for pesticide induced soil infertility to manifest. The respondents seemed more concerned about effects on the soil that would manifest in five years. Smallholder farmers preferred soil improving practices with short term benefits, and low risk. The proportions of smallholder farmers willing to plant fertiliser trees reduced from 68.5 % when the benefits accrue in five years to about 38 % when said benefits accrue to the next generation. Study recommends that agricultural development interventions should focus on low risk, locally available technologies with shorter term benefits and minimal future costs. Study recommends that agricultural development interventions include innovation of practices with shorter term benefits, minimal future costs and farmer sensitisation on the benefits of sustainable agriculture.     

基于PEST模型的德清休闲农业发展战略研究

[目的]以休闲农业发展具有典型性的德清县为例,通过PEST模型分析其休闲农业发展环境和特色路径,制定休闲农业发展战略,以期为德清及其他县域休闲农业发展提供参考。[方法]利用PEST模型,结合德清县休闲农业发展现状,分别从政治、经济、社会及技术等4个方面分析对其休闲农业的影响。[结果]德清县休闲农业拥有政策环境良好、区域经济水平提高、产业结构调整、旅游消费观念转变、消费环境改善、技术发展及应用较好的优势,同时存在政策落实不到位、规划不协调、融资困难、市场无序竞争、技术供应不能满足发展需求以及人才流失等问题,面临着经济新常态背景下和云计算、物联网、大数据等新技术对休闲农业产业发展的挑战。[结论]基于此,提出四大战略:(1)构建监管体系,促进可持续发展;(2)扩大金融产品供给,促进产业融合;(3)对接消费需求,提升市场竞争力;(4)强化人才支撑,促进智慧化发展。