Using scenario-based influence mapping to examine farmers’ biosecurity behaviour

Understanding of farmers’ influences relating to biosecurity is surprisingly weak, beyond general remarks that farmers tend to trust their private vet. Previous studies have explored influences in relation to single issue events. There is a need for better methodologies to fully appreciate how farmers’ biosecurity practices are shaped. Using bovine Tuberculosis as a case study, this paper uses stakeholder mapping methods applied across different scenarios. The aim is to identify how farmers’ responses to animal disease policy are shaped by their relationships with different actors. Interviews were conducted with 50 farmers in three areas in England. Farmers were presented with four scenarios to control bovine Tuberculosis: 1) a badger cull, 2) an oral badger vaccine, 3) a cattle vaccine and 4) a range of control measures. The results show that as things get more uncertain, government institutions become more influential. Government institutions and government vets are also important in situations where farmers do not consider themselves ‘experts’ i.e. vaccination as opposed to culling. The influence of other farmers was not universal; it differed between scenarios. These data show the value of scenario-based stakeholder mapping as a methodology that can enable biosecurity researchers to: more accurately and systematically determine stakeholder influence and understand how these influences change and evolve; understand the role of farmer biosecurity practices, the self-concept and ‘good farming’; and identify broader logics of biosecurity that influence and potentially frustrate animal disease policy goals.