Criteria for a system level evaluation of farm advisory services

Agricultural advisory services are meant to provide farmers with relevant knowledge and networks for innovation, as well as adjustments to policy and markets in agriculture. Despite substantial investment into these services, there has been little evaluation of their performance and impact, in particular at a system level. A system level analysis is especially challenging in countries with a diverse and fragmented advisory community such as the United Kingdom. This paper proposes criteria for assessing advisory services based on a conceptual framework for analysing characteristics of advisory services as a component of the wider Agricultural Knowledge and Innovation System (AKIS). Using the example of the UK, we investigated characteristics pertaining to governance structures, capacity, management and advisory methods. Data were collected in an online survey of 80 agricultural advisory organisations. Findings showed that most criteria for functional advisory services were met: agricultural advisory organisations utilised diverse knowledge sources and cooperated to fill knowledge gaps; there was a stable workforce of advisors who received regular training; advisory organisations were flexible and adaptive; and all relevant advisory topics were covered. However, a number of client groups were not targeted by advisory organisations and some organisations used only a narrow range of advisory methods. The proposed criteria reflect a balance between a thorough assessment of a country’s advisory services and the typically limited time and budget available for regular evaluations. The criteria and associated proxy indicators should be fine-tuned to reflect the individual country’s situation, and quantitative survey data complemented by qualitative data.     

Market Advisory Service Recommendations and Wheat Producers' Selling Decisions

This study uses actual producer transaction data to determine how Oklahoma wheat producers' selling decisions compare to recommendations from market advisory services and market incentives as reflected in futures spreads. Results show that producers responded to expected returns to storage as measured by futures spreads. Also, Oklahoma producers make marketing decisions that are either unrelated or the opposite of recommendations from market advisory services .
La présente étude a utilisé des données de transactions réelles pour comparer les décisions de vente des producteurs de blé de l'Oklahoma avec les recommandations faites par des services consultatifs et les stimulants du marché tels que reflétés dans les écarts. Les résultats ont montré que les producteurs ont réagi aux rendements attendus de l'entreposage tels que mesurés par les écarts. De plus, les décisions commerciales des producteurs de l'Oklahoma sont soit indépendantes des recommandations des services conseils, soit totalement contraires à ces recommandations .     

Socio-Technical Scenarios as a Tool to Improve Farm Advisory Services

This article examines the use of the socio-technical scenarios (STSc) method to explore the future needs of farmers in the adoption of more sustainable farming practices. It also examines the changes needed for advisory services to meet those identified needs. It presents the results from four STSc workshops organised as part of the H2020 AgriLink project. Workshop participants (farmers, advisors, policymakers, researchers), jointly explored future changes towards more sustainable agricultural systems paying special attention to the role of advisory services in these transitions. Despite the diversity of national contexts, common results emerged concerning both the shortcomings of the current advisory systems and directions for improvement. Participants agreed that advising on single aspects would not achieve the required systemic changes; these would require more integrated advisory systems at different levels (improved cooperation and knowledge flow), supported by more consistent policies. We indeed identified discrepancies between policy expectations and the broader innovation context. Policies should facilitate the role of advisors in supporting farmers to adopt sustainable innovations, but more often they also create barriers for such innovations. Participants’ concrete recommendations for more farmer-centered advisory services illustrate the usefulness of the STSc to explore potential solutions to key problems in contemporary farm advisory systems.     

Young farmers’ support under the Common Agricultural Policy and sustainability of rural regions: Evidence from Lithuania

The present study examines the influence of young farmers’ support system including both direct payments for young farmers and rural development measures initiatives under the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) on the sustainability of rural regions. The intentions and decisions taken by young farmers in Lithuania are analysed within the rural sustainability concept. The empirical analysis relies on the questionnaire survey. In order to disentangle the possible effects of the CAP support on the farming sustainability (as it is perceived by the young farmers), we consider payments for farm establishment and expansion along with support for advisory services. The results show that young farmers’ support system under the CAP has the strongest perceived effect on income support in Lithuania without significant differences across different groups of farmers. The effect on investments is significantly lower for crop farms if opposed to the other farming types. Still, the results also indicate that environmental awareness of Lithuanian farmers is rather low as the demand for such advisory services appeared to be relatively low. The relatively high demand for advisory services on the business plan preparation suggests low levels of business administration and marketing skills among the young farmers, which indicates the need for development of the social dimension.     

Unbiasedness and Market Efficiency Tests of the U.S. Rice Futures Market

This study examines short-run and long-run unbiasedness within the U.S. rice futures market. Standard OLS, cointegration, and error-correction models are used to determine unbiasedness. In addition, the forecasting performance of the rice futures market is analyzed and compared to out-of-sample forecasts derived from an additive ARIMA model and the error-correction model. The results of our unbiasedness tests and the forecasting performance of the rice futures market provide supporting evidence that the U.S. long-grain rough rice futures market is efficient. The results have important price risk management and price discovery implications for Arkansas and U.S. rice industry participants.     

Fragmentation or creative diversity? Options in the provision of land management advisory services

Rural land managers need access to sound advice and information to respond to pressures from environmental regulations, declining farm incomes, changing patterns in international trade and new institutional arrangements within the domestic food chain. Governments have cut back their provision of advisory services but need more than ever to influence land managers’ decisions to achieve a growing array of policy objectives. The paper develops a conceptual framework for analysing advisory services and concludes, through a review of sixteen case studies, that the needs of both governments and land managers can be met by a diverse mixture of private and public sector provision.     

Who are Advisory Services Leaving Out? A Critical Reflection on ‘Hard to Reach’ Farmers

Although the Common Agricultural Policy of the European Union has broadened its objectives to integrate social issues, several hard-to-reach groups of farmers and workers continue to be ignored by advisory services and associated policies. Connecting with these groups has a strong potential to increase the economic and social cohesion of European agricultures. We interviewed over 1,000 farmers across Europe and identified features of these groups that are often overlooked by advisory services. We critically reflected on the social cohorts omitted from advisory services and how they could be better reached; they include farm labourers, new entrants or ‘career changers’, and later adopters. We clarify the different types of advisors in the advisory landscape, distinguishing between those who are linked to or independent from sales of inputs or technologies. We make concrete recommendations about how to engage advisors with hard-to-reach groups, with approaches suited to different national contexts of Agricultural Knowledge and Innovation Systems (AKIS); thus contributing to the ‘AKIS dimension of National Strategic Plans of the next Common Agricultural Policy, 2023–2027. We argue for the more effective use of advances in the social sciences through a better understanding of advice as social interaction which can bolster the inclusiveness of public policies.     

CAP and Advisory Services: From Farm Advisory Systems to Innovation Support

Farm advisory services have become an important topic in the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) of the European Union (EU). The aim of this article is to draw lessons from the implementation of the regulation and measures of the current 2014–2022 CAP in knowledge transfer and advisory services to contribute to debates about the future of farm advisory policies. Findings are based on two studies commissioned by the European Commission: an evaluation study implemented by a consortium of consultancies and researchers and a comparative analysis implemented in the frame of the H2020 research project AgriLink. The article first provides a historical perspective of the ‘knowledge and advice’ dimension of the CAP since 2007. We show a gradual transition towards greater flexibility of measures supporting innovation and knowledge flows. The professional status of farm advisors across European countries was more strongly acknowledged, offering new life-long training opportunities to advisors. However, the implementation of CAP’s advisory measures remains complex. As a result, the effects of these measures have been rather limited, with only few farmers reached overall. Fostering an inclusiveness of these measures remains an ongoing challenge for policymakers.     

What Can We Learn from Droppers and Non-adopters About the Role of Advice in Agricultural Innovation?

In this article we assess the diversity of sources of advice identified by 678 adopters, 295 non-adopters and 107 droppers (or dis-adopters, who have ceased or reduced the use) of agricultural innovations across 13 European countries. For most innovations, the volume and composition of advisory supports (e.g. public advisory services, farm business organisations, NGOs, research and development sector, other farmers), at the whole farm level were similar between adopters, non-adopters and droppers. However, there were significant differences in relation to specific innovations. Farmers adopting digital technologies, soil-improving cropping systems, and common management of natural resources identified more diverse sources when assessing innovations, suggesting that more diverse advisory support supported successful implementation. For new on-farm activities, non-adopters had more varied sources of advice than adopters. This demonstrates that non-adoption can be a well-informed decision. Droppers typically identified fewer sources of advice on an innovation than adopters, particularly in the later stages of the innovation process, suggesting that lack of advice impeded successful implementation. The findings suggest that public funding for advisory services could usefully target emergent gaps: to support the provision of up-to-date advice on topics to farmers who have difficulty accessing advice, and to prevent unnecessary dropping by supporting the implementation of innovations.     

New Entrants Need Tailored Farm Advice

Supporting new entrants in farming is an increasingly important political and practical issue in European agriculture. This article looks at a specific group of new entrants – career changers – who move into agriculture from other occupational and educational backgrounds. As they bridge several worlds, they are often important innovators. One of the main challenges encountered by this group is the lack of tailored advice and insufficient capacity of the existing agricultural advisory services to respond to their specific innovation needs. The article examines how career changers use the knowledge from their background and access new knowledge on agriculture. The research is based on biographical interviews with individuals who have changed their careers and in-depth interviews with advisors in Latvia. The results suggest that the gap between knowledge needs and knowledge services is being filled through the creation of professional networks by new entrants with each other and with industry experts and customers and to a lesser degree with formal advisory services. We discuss how in this situation various actors in the EU’s agricultural knowledge and innovation system (AKIS) may better help the career changers to professionalise in farming and undertake sustainability-oriented innovations.     

Hired hooves: Transactions in a south Indian village factor market

Bullocks are an important resource in Indian agriculture where they are used as draft animals. Previous research suggests that farmers who do not own bullocks, or own bullocks in insufficient numbers relative to their land holdings, adjust bullock-land ratios through transactions in the land market, rather than by hiring bullock services. The reasons given for this behaviour are that there are 'inhibited' or 'missing' village markets for bullock services. Results from a survey of the activities and transactions of six bullock contractors during an entire cropping period show that village markets for bullock services exist continuously and are far from being inhibited. Close monitoring of the bullock contractors' transactions supplied rich evidence of the manifold contractual arrangements used in this village market for bullock services.     

New knowledge networks of small-scale farmers in Europe’s periphery

In this paper we assess the types of knowledge networks utilised by small-scale farmers in four case studies (located in Bulgaria, Poland, Portugal, and the United Kingdom). We focus on knowledge acquired to inform three new activities being undertaken by study participants: agricultural production, subsidy access and regulatory compliance, and farm diversification (specifically agritourism). Findings demonstrate that the new knowledge networks are dominated by different forms of expertise: formal ‘agricultural advisors’ identified in the case studies primarily offer codified managerial knowledge through centralised networks, suggesting that state-funded services for small-scale farmers are largely embedded in traditional, linear models of knowledge transfer. Production and diversification knowledge is exchanged through ‘distributed’ and ‘decentralised’ networks, where a range of actors are involved across varying geographical distances. Findings highlight issues associated with the quality and independence of both ‘free’ and paid advice, as well as the importance of combining tacit and codified knowledge for credibility. In all four cases, we found that small-scale farmers utilise formal advisory services primarily for accessing subsidies (e.g. completing application forms), rather than acquiring production knowledge. The authors argue that by utilising the state funding allocated to advisory services for small-scale farmers primarily to enable these farmers to access subsidies, important opportunities for innovation by both advisors or farmers can be lost.     

Style and Performance of Agricultural Market Advisory Services

This article develops measures of marketing style for advisory programs in corn and soybeans and estimates the relationship between style characteristics and pricing performance. Style is measured by the intensity of futures and options use, degree of activeness in marketing, and seasonality of sales. The data set consists of advisory programs tracked by the AgMAS project at the University of Illinois between 1995 and 2004. Results indicate that active programs making large bets on price movements obtain a higher average price than more conservative programs. This is consistent with active advisors possessing superior information and/or analytical skills rather than being overconfident. However, estimates of the relationship between pricing performance and activeness are sensitive to the inclusion of a single high-performing program.     

农民对林业社会化服务的需求及对主要供给主体的认知——以林改后的福建省为例

本研究以林改后的福建省为例,通过对农民的林业社会化服务需求及他们对林业服务主要供给主体的认知调查,探讨切实可行的林业社会化服务体系建设问题。本研究的成果体现在3个方面:⑴调查了林农对林业社会化服务的需求;⑵调查了林农对政府、社会及市场3个主要供给者的认知;⑶针对林农需求及认知,提出政府、社会及市场3方在林业社会化服务体系建设中的相互协调与侧重。     

Building knowledge systems for sustainable agriculture: supporting private advisors to adequately address sustainable farm management in regular service contacts

Advisory service provisioning on sustainability issues such as environmental care and food safety is considered suboptimal in privatized extension systems, which comprise a diverse set of private advisors. Apart from funding dedicated ‘public good’ projects, government also relies on these advisors to address sustainability issues in their regular service contacts with farmers. Policy measures have hence been proposed to stimulate farmer demand for such sustainable farm management (SFM) advice (pull measures) and to build capacity among advisors (push measures). This paper assesses two interventions, in nutrient management and mastitis prevention, that integrate pull measures (awareness building and economic incentives) and push measures (promoting facilitative advisory styles and optimizing knowledge system linkages) to stimulate advisory service provisioning on SFM. Results indicate that effectiveness appears to depend on an adequate mix of, and balance between, push and pull measures. Awareness building is a prerequisite to creating demand for such services and appears more important than economic incentives. However, awareness is not built by the interventions alone; indeed, a lack of awareness may not be the main problem: the broader institutional context may not be conducive to a proactive approach to addressing SFM if regulatory frameworks are unclear and inconsistent. The main conclusion is that, despite interventions having an impact, it is uncertain whether the demand for, and supply of, SFM advice will be sustained after interventions are withdrawn.     

Investment decision-making under economic policy uncertainty

It is widely established that economic policy uncertainty (EPU) affects investment decisions and performance, yet research in this area has overlooked the direct property investment market. This article seeks to rectify this and proposes a multistage multilevel analytical framework to offer new insights and a richness of findings. Using a news-based measure of EPU in the United Kingdom, and controlling for economic conditions, a national-level analysis reveals some evidence of Granger-Causality between EPU and total returns, indicating that pricing is responsive to uncertainty. These findings suggest that EPU is an important risk factor for direct property investments, with pricing implications. Differences in data and performance measure are important, however, with income returns unresponsive. A micro-level investigation begins to reveal some of the asset-pricing decisions underpinning the national results, indicating investors’ concerns for income streams are consistently high, regardless of varying EPU. Pricing can also cause changes in EPU, such as in the retail and industrial markets (increasingly linked through logistics) reflecting sector-specific stakeholder groups and newsworthy issues. This evidence highlights how important it is for policy-makers to understand the complex and bi-directional relationship, that indecision can undermine investment confidence and cause investment market volatility, in turn raising EPU.     

OBJECTIVE AND SUBJECTIVE INFLUENCES ON THE DECISION TO TRADE ON THE LONDON POTATO FUTURES MARKET

Among dealers in the physical commodity, the benefits associated with risk reduction are important factors in motivating the decision to engage in futures trading. Although it is possible to evaluate, in an objective sense, the ability of a market to reduce risk, actual and potential users may also be heavily influenced by their subjective assessments of the performance and reliability of a futures market. This paper argues that the recent decline in the level of usage of the London Potato Futures Market may be more the product of unfavourable attitudes to trading than of a decline in the performance of the market with respect to risk reduction.     

A Marketing Approach to Commodity Futures Exchanges: A Case Study of the Dutch Hog Industry

This paper proposes a marketing strategic approach to commodity futures exchanges to optimise the (hedging) services offered. First, the environment of commodity futures exchanges is examined. Second, the threats and opportunities of commodity futures exchanges are analysed. Our analysis demonstrates that market orientation is an important element in the market strategies of commodity futures exchanges. Our market strategic framework is applied to the Dutch hog futures market. It is concluded that market penetration is an appropriate strategy. Consequently, to identify the variables that distinguish between farmers who initiate futures positions and farmers who do not, we conducted a discriminant analysis on data gathered from 418 Dutch hog farmers. The discriminant analysis shows that latent variables, such as farmers' perceived performance, farmers' reference price and farmers' market orientation, are important discriminating variables. Furthermore, farmers' cash market behaviour (in terms of the frequency of selling in the spot market) is an important discriminating variable as well. The usefulness of these results as input for a penetration policy is demonstrated.     

Do Plant Clinics Improve Household Food Security? Evidence from Rwanda

One of the main drivers of food insecurity is pests, which are estimated to cause around 40% of crop losses worldwide. We examine the food security effects of plant clinics, a novel agricultural extension model that aims to reduce crop losses due to pests through the provision of demand‐driven plant health diagnostic and advisory services to smallholder farmers. The study is based on survey data from maize‐growing households in Rwanda, where 66 plant clinics have been established. Using switching regression and matching techniques as well as various food security metrics, including the food insecurity experience scale, we find evidence that participation in plant clinics is significantly associated with a reduction in household food insecurity. For instance, among the participating households, plant clinics contribute to a decrease in the period of food shortage by one month and a reduction in the severity of food insecurity by 22 percentage points. We also show that these effects are more pronounced for female‐headed households. Overall, our findings suggest that plant clinics can play an important role in achieving the Sustainable Development Goal 2 of zero hunger.     

基于AHP评价法的中国农村商业银行信贷风险预警系统构建的实证研究

农村商业银行在提供金融服务的同时,也面临来自借款人层面的信贷风险。而这种信贷风险的产生源于信贷市场中的信息不对称、有限理性和羊群效应等。文章利用层次分析法,从借款人角度构建农村商业银行信贷风险的预警体系,设计农村商业银行信贷风险的控制策略。并用江苏省10家农村商业银行2018年的数据进行验证,研究结论显示:个别农商行的信贷风险水平较高,在经济下行期,且有向高风险发展的趋势,建议从构建风险预警体系、完善内部控制建设等方面加强重视和防范。