Environmental Awareness, Economic Orientation, and Farming Practices: A Comparison of Organic and Conventional Farmers

Mccann, Elizabeth; Sullivan, Shannon; Erickson, Donna L.; Young, Raymond De

doi:10.1007/s002679900064

Cited by 119 publications

(107 citation statements)

References 14 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Unclassified

Order By: Relevance

“…Likewise, those with experience in intensive agriculture are more likely to be 'production maximisers' (Brodt et al, 2006) or 'disengaged' from environmental behaviours due to significantly stronger farming connections (McCann, 1997;Raymond & Brown, 2011). Other studies suggest that the relationship is not so simple.…”

Section: Farming Experiencementioning

confidence: 90%

The influence of farmer demographic characteristics on environmental behaviour: A review

Burton¹

2014

Journal of Environmental Management

198

104

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Many agricultural studies have observed a relationship between farmer demographic characteristics and environmental behaviours. These relationships are frequently employed in the construction of models, the identification of farmer types, or as part of more descriptive analyses aimed at understanding farmers' environmental behaviour. However, they have also often been found to be inconsistent or contradictory. Although a considerable body of literature has built up around the subject area, research has a tendency to focus on factors such as the direction, strength and consistency of the relationship -leaving the issue of causality largely to speculation. This review addresses this gap by reviewing literature on 4 key demographic variables: age, experience, education, and gender for hypothesised causal links.Overall the review indicates that the issue of causality is a complex one. Inconsistent relationships can be attributed to the presence of multiple causal pathways, the role of scheme factors in determining which pathway is important, inadequately specified measurements of demographic characteristics, and the treatment of non-linear causalities as linear. In addition, all demographic characteristics were perceived to be influenced (to varying extents) by cultural-historical patterns leading to cohort effects or socialised differences in the relationship with environmental behaviour. The paper concludes that more work is required on the issue of causality.

show abstract

Section: Farming Experiencementioning

confidence: 90%

The influence of farmer demographic characteristics on environmental behaviour: A review

Burton¹

2014

Journal of Environmental Management

198

104

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…Other factors that might influence a farmer's decision to adopt organic agriculture include placing a high value on the quality of farm products (Kallas et al, 2010) or on soil management (Kaufmann et al, 2011) and soil quality; or concern about the ecological and human health effects of agro-chemical use (McCann et al, 1997;Kaufmann et al, 2011). Kaufmann et al found that positive perceptions about the impact of organic farming methods on human, wildlife and plant health significantly correlates with organic adoption decisions (Kaufmann et al, 2011).…”

Section: Adoption Of Transformative Agriculture Technologiesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…A study by McCann et al (1997), found that organic farmers were more disposed to the risks associated with their adoption decisions, by, for example, accepting reduced yields and delayed return on their productive investment for future benefits. The willingness to take related risks has also been associated with adopters of no-till (Bultena and Hoiberg, 1983) and riparian buffer agroforestry practices (Trozzo et al, 2014).…”

Section: Adoption Of Transformative Agriculture Technologiesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Understanding perennial wheat adoption as a transformative technology: evidence from the literature and farmers

Adebiyi

Olabisi

Snapp

2015

Renew. Agric. Food Syst.

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Perennial grain crops are an example of a 'transformative technology,' in which the functionality and science of the technology differ in a fundamental manner from conventional grain crops. A review of the literature indicates that the motivation for farmer adoption of transformative technologies is complex and poorly understood. At the same time, many studies have found concern and awareness about environmental issues to be significantly and positively correlated with the adoption of no-till agriculture, organic farming and agroforestry. Building on these insights, we conducted an ex ante study of perennial wheat adoption among 11 farmers from Michigan and Ohio. Perennial wheat is not yet commercially available, so a semi-structured interview format was chosen to allow for in-depth discussions of the crop's potential characteristics and uses. Consistent with the literature on transformative technology adoption, farmers who approached us to learn more about perennial grains described soil and environmental quality as their primary motivations for doing so. Farmers suggested a total of ten different uses for perennial wheat, only one of which was mentioned specifically by interviewers. This diversity of proposed uses implied a wide range of criteria for adoption. A striking result was that the ability of perennial wheat to compete with annual wheat on the basis of yield, a focus of researchers, was brought up by only one of the interviewees, as many farmers proposed perennial wheat as a means of solving a problem for which no other crop provided an adequate solution, often by planting perennial wheat on an under-used or marginal area of the farm. This is suggestive that interacting with farmers could alter priorities in perennial grain improvement, as has occurred in other radically transformative agriculture technologies.

show abstract

“…Info media measures how frequently the farmers used magazines/press, TV/radio or the Internet as a source for farming information in the past 12 months, also divided by three. Guided by the literature, statements in relation to the following attitudes are included: environmental attitude, profit orientation, risk attitude as well as attitudes toward information gathering 8,9,11,22 . Overall, the survey is designed to address the aforementioned research questions: what are the characteristics of farmers who successfully adopt organic farming, and more importantly, do these farmers differ from farmers who subsequently ceased organic production and from farmers who do not adopt at all?…”

Section: Survey Design and Hypothesesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Consequently, several studies have examined the characteristics and attitudes of organic farmers [6][7][8][9][10][11] . Organic farmers generally differ in their household and farm characteristics from their conventional counterparts: organic farmers are younger, better educated, more likely to be women and from an urban background 7 .…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Comparing attitudes and characteristics of organic, former organic and conventional farmers: Evidence from Ireland

Läpple

2012

Renew. Agric. Food Syst.

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Despite an overall growth rate of the organic farming sector in the European Union, a considerable number of farmers cease organic production each year. Given the commitment of many European governments to increase the size of their organic farming sectors, reducing the rate of withdrawals from organic production may be an easier option than attracting new farmers into organic farming. In order to reduce the rate of withdrawals, knowledge about those farmers is required. However, to date, little is known about farmers who adopt and subsequently abandon organic farming. This study attempts to fill this gap in the literature by comparing and contrasting the farm and personal characteristics of organic, former organic and conventional farmers. To this end, primary data from 596 Irish cattle and sheep farmers are utilized. Overall, the findings reveal significant differences between the three groups. More specifically, organic farmers are found to be the most environmentally aware farmers, who also rate information gathering as more important than the remaining two groups. Organic farmers are younger, better educated and more likely to be women than conventional farmers. Former organic farmers stand out to be the least risk averse group and also express lower environmental awareness than organic farmers. Conventional farmers are found to be the most profit oriented and least environmentally aware group. In addition, this group farms more intensely stocked enterprises than the remaining groups. The paper concludes with a discussion of some policy recommendations aimed at increasing the size of the organic sector.

show abstract

Environmental Awareness, Economic Orientation, and Farming Practices: A Comparison of Organic and Conventional Farmers

Cited by 119 publications

References 14 publications

The influence of farmer demographic characteristics on environmental behaviour: A review

The influence of farmer demographic characteristics on environmental behaviour: A review

Understanding perennial wheat adoption as a transformative technology: evidence from the literature and farmers

Comparing attitudes and characteristics of organic, former organic and conventional farmers: Evidence from Ireland

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About