Karim Chaib

A Dynamic Stochastic Programming model of crop rotation choice to test the adoption of long rotation under price and production risks

This article investigates the role played by both production and market risks on cash crop farmers’ decision to adopt long rotations considered as innovative cropping systems. We build a multi-period recursive farm model with Discrete Stochastic Programming. The model arbitrates each year between conventional and innovative, longer rotations. Yearly farming operations are declined according to a decision tree, so that production risk is an intra-year risk. Market risk is considered as an inter-year risk influencing crop successions. Simulations are performed on a specialized French cash crop farm. They show that when the long rotation is subsidized by an area premium, farmers are encouraged to remain in longer rotations. They also show that a high level of risk aversion tends to slow down the conversion towards longer rotations.

Marketing Contracts and Risk Management for Cereal Producers

This article presents an analysis of risk management by French cereal farmers Producers are subject to market and production risks and to environmental restrictions. The paper analyses cereal farmers’ strategies to manage risks through marketing contracts and production decisions. Three main categories of marketing contracts are adopted bearing different risk levels: forward contracts, average price contracts and spot contracts. A hundred wheat producers are surveyed in SouthWest France. The quantitative analysis of their contractual choices shows that risk perceptions and the farmer’s level of education have an influence on contractual choice while crop diversification is negatively correlated with forward contracts.

Farmers' innovation adoption behaviour: role of perceptions and preferences

One way for grain farmers to reconcile productivity with environmental protection is to adopt agroecological innovations. These innovations are complex; combining classic agronomic tools with innovative production techniques. Adoption of innovations is a source of additional uncertainty. A number of studies have shown that agronomic, economic and psychosocial determinants affect the adoption decision process. However, few of the determinants identified in the literature appear to be common and applicable to all production contexts. Furthermore, other non-directly observable determinants influence the innovation adoption decision. This paper reviews the recent literature to identify the role of observable and unobservable determinants, such as individual perceptions and preferences, in the agroecological innovation adoption process.