Seminario 17/09: Montserrat Viladrich (U. Lleida) – Protecting biodiversity on farm land: Which type of agri-environmental measure does it better?

Información

Abstract

Much biodiversity is found in farm land. However, there is usually a trade-off between farm land productivity and sustainability of natural resources.  Biodiversity conservation in agricultural land usually requires to carry on a series of conservationist practices that are costly. Therefore, farmer’s participation in conservationist programs requires economic incentives.  Our goal is to identify which is the most appropriated policy design for guaranteeing both the sustainability of the natural resources and economic efficiency. We provide a model where a natural resource is affected by the cultivation practices of two types of farmers, conservationist and non-conservationist, who adjust their farming practices in response to persistent differential payoffs. We show that the policy instrument design depends crucially on characteristics of the resource stock.