research on sustainable farming

Sustainable Agriculture Research & Education Program

• What is Sustainable Agriculture?

The goal of sustainable agriculture is to meet society’s food and textile needs in the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs.

Practitioners of sustainable agriculture seek to integrate three main objectives into their work: a healthy environment, economic profitability, and social and economic equity. Every person involved in the food system—growers, food processors, distributors, retailers, consumers, and waste managers—can play a role in ensuring a sustainable agricultural system.

There are many practices commonly used by people working in sustainable agriculture and sustainable food systems. Growers may use methods to promote  soil health , minimize  water use , and lower  pollution levels  on the farm. Consumers and retailers concerned with sustainability can look for “ values-based ” foods that are grown using methods promoting  farmworker wellbeing , that are  environmentally friendly , or that strengthen the local economy. And researchers in sustainable agriculture often cross disciplinary lines with their work: combining biology, economics, engineering, chemistry, community development, and many others. However, sustainable agriculture is more than a collection of practices. It is also process of negotiation: a push and pull between the sometimes competing interests of an individual farmer or of people in a community as they work to solve complex problems about how we grow our food and fiber.

Topics in sustainable agriculture

• Addressing Food Insecurity
• Agritourism
• Agroforestry
• Conservation Tillage
• Controlled Environment Agriculture (CEA)
• Cooperatives
• Cover Crops
• Dairy Waste Management
• Direct Marketing
• Energy Efficiency & Conservation
• Food and Agricultural Employment
• Food Labeling/Certifications
• Food Waste Management
• Genetically Modified Crops
• Global Sustainable Sourcing of Commodities
• Institutional Sustainable Food Procurement
• Biologically Integrated Farming Systems
• Integrated Pest Management (IPM)
• Nutrition & Food Systems Education
• Organic Farming
• Precision Agriculture (SSM)
• Soil Nutrient Management
• Postharvest Management Practices
• Technological Innovation in Agriculture
• Urban Agriculture
• Value-Based Supply Chains
• Water Use Efficiency
• Water Quality Management
• Zero-Emissions Freight Transport

Directory of UC Programs in Sustainable Agriculture

This directory is a catalog of UC's programmatic activities in sustainable agriculture and food systems. All programs are sorted by activities and topic areas.

The Philosophy & Practices of Sustainable Agriculture

Agriculture has changed dramatically, especially since the end of World War II. Food and fiber productivity soared due to new technologies, mechanization, increased chemical use, specialization and government policies that favored maximizing production. These changes allowed fewer farmers with reduced labor demands to produce the majority of the food and fiber in the U.S.

Although these changes have had many positive effects and reduced many risks in farming, there have also been significant costs. Prominent among these are topsoil depletion, groundwater contamination, the decline of family farms, continued neglect of the living and working conditions for farm laborers, increasing costs of production, and the disintegration of economic and social conditions in rural communities.

Potential Costs of Modern Agricultural Techniques

A growing movement has emerged during the past two decades to question the role of the agricultural establishment in promoting practices that contribute to these social problems. Today this movement for sustainable agriculture is garnering increasing support and acceptance within mainstream agriculture. Not only does sustainable agriculture address many environmental and social concerns, but it offers innovative and economically viable opportunities for growers, laborers, consumers, policymakers and many others in the entire food system.

This page is an effort to identify the ideas, practices and policies that constitute our concept of sustainable agriculture. We do so for two reasons: 1) to clarify the research agenda and priorities of our program, and 2) to suggest to others practical steps that may be appropriate for them in moving toward sustainable agriculture. Because the concept of sustainable agriculture is still evolving, we intend this page not as a definitive or final statement, but as an invitation to continue the dialogue

Despite the diversity of people and perspectives, the following themes commonly weave through definitions of sustainable agriculture:

Sustainability rests on the principle that we must meet the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs. Therefore,  stewardship of both natural and human resources  is of prime importance.  Stewardship of human resources  includes consideration of social responsibilities such as working and living conditions of laborers, the needs of rural communities, and consumer health and safety both in the present and the future.  Stewardship of land and natural resources  involves maintaining or enhancing this vital resource base for the long term.

A  systems perspective  is essential to understanding sustainability. The system is envisioned in its broadest sense, from the individual farm, to the local ecosystem,  and  to communities affected by this farming system both locally and globally. An emphasis on the system allows a larger and more thorough view of the consequences of farming practices on both human communities and the environment. A systems approach gives us the tools to explore the interconnections between farming and other aspects of our environment.

Everyone plays a role in creating a sustainable food system.

Making the transition to sustainable agriculture is a process.   For farmers, the transition to sustainable agriculture normally requires  a series of small ,  realistic   steps . Family economics and personal goals influence how fast or how far participants can go in the transition. It is important to realize that each small decision can make a difference and contribute to advancing the entire system further on the "sustainable agriculture continuum." The key to moving forward is the will to take the next step. Finally, it is important to point out that   reaching toward the goal of sustainable agriculture is the responsibility of all participants in the system ,  including farmers, laborers, policymakers, researchers, retailers, and consumers. Each group has its own part to play, its own unique contribution to make to strengthen the sustainable agriculture community. The remainder of this page considers specific strategies for realizing these broad themes or goals. The strategies are grouped according to three separate though related areas of concern:  Farming and Natural Resources ,  Plant and Animal Production Practices , and the  Economic, Social and Political Context . They represent a range of potential ideas for individuals committed to interpreting the vision of sustainable agriculture within their own circumstances.

• Farming and Natural Resources

When the production of food and fiber degrades the natural resource base, the ability of future generations to produce and flourish decreases. The decline of ancient civilizations in Mesopotamia, the Mediterranean region, Pre-Columbian southwest U.S. and Central America is believed to have been strongly influenced by natural resource degradation from non-sustainable farming and forestry practices. 

Water is the principal resource that has helped agriculture and society to prosper, and it has been a major limiting factor when mismanaged.

Water supply and use.  In California, an extensive  water storage and transfer system  has been established which has allowed crop production to expand to very arid regions. In drought years, limited surface water supplies have prompted overdraft of groundwater and consequent intrusion of salt water, or permanent collapse of aquifers. Periodic droughts, some lasting up to 50 years, have occurred in California.

Several steps should be taken to develop drought-resistant farming systems even in "normal" years, including both policy and management actions:

1) improving  water conservation  and storage measures,

2) providing incentives for selection of drought-tolerant crop species,

3) using  reduced-volume irrigation  systems,

4) managing crops to reduce water loss, or

5) not planting at all.

Water quality.  The most important issues related to water quality involve salinization and contamination of ground and surface waters by pesticides, nitrates and selenium. Salinity has become a problem wherever water of even relatively low salt content is used on shallow soils in arid regions and/or where the water table is near the root zone of crops. Tile drainage can remove the water and salts, but the disposal of the salts and other contaminants may negatively affect the environment depending upon where they are deposited. Temporary solutions include the use of salt-tolerant crops, low-volume irrigation, and various management techniques to minimize the effects of salts on crops. In the long-term, some farmland may need to be removed from production or converted to other uses. Other uses include conversion of row crop land to production of drought-tolerant forages, the restoration of wildlife habitat or the use of agroforestry to minimize the impacts of salinity and high water tables. Pesticide and nitrate contamination of water can be reduced using many of the practices discussed later in the  Plant Production Practices  and  Animal Production Practices  sections.

Wildlife . Another way in which agriculture affects water resources is through the destruction of riparian habitats within watersheds. The conversion of wild habitat to agricultural land reduces fish and wildlife through erosion and sedimentation, the effects of pesticides, removal of riparian plants, and the diversion of water. The plant diversity in and around both riparian and agricultural areas should be maintained in order to support a diversity of wildlife. This diversity will enhance natural ecosystems and could aid in agricultural pest management.

Modern agriculture is heavily dependent on non-renewable energy sources, especially petroleum. The continued use of these energy sources cannot be sustained indefinitely, yet to abruptly abandon our reliance on them would be economically catastrophic. However, a sudden cutoff in energy supply would be equally disruptive. In sustainable agricultural systems, there is reduced reliance on non-renewable energy sources and a substitution of renewable sources or labor to the extent that is economically feasible.

Many agricultural activities affect air quality. These include smoke from agricultural burning; dust from tillage, traffic and harvest; pesticide drift from spraying; and nitrous oxide emissions from the use of nitrogen fertilizer. Options to improve air quality include:

      - incorporating crop residue into the soil       - using appropriate levels of tillage       - and planting wind breaks, cover crops or strips of native perennial grasses to reduce dust.

Soil erosion continues to be a serious threat to our continued ability to produce adequate food. Numerous practices have been developed to keep soil in place, which include:

      - reducing or eliminating tillage       - managing irrigation to reduce runoff       - and keeping the soil covered with plants or mulch. 

Enhancement of soil quality is discussed in the next section.

• Plant Production Practices

Sustainable production practices involve a variety of approaches. Specific strategies must take into account topography, soil characteristics, climate, pests, local availability of inputs and the individual grower's goals.  Despite the site-specific and individual nature of sustainable agriculture, several general principles can be applied to help growers select appropriate management practices:

      - Selection of species and varieties that are well suited to the site and to conditions on the farm;       - Diversification of crops (including livestock) and cultural practices to enhance the biological and economic stability of the farm;       - Management of the soil to enhance and protect soil quality;       - Efficient and humane use of inputs; and       - Consideration of farmers' goals and lifestyle choices.

Selection of site, species and variety

Preventive strategies, adopted early, can reduce inputs and help establish a sustainable production system. When possible, pest-resistant crops should be selected which are tolerant of existing soil or site conditions. When site selection is an option, factors such as soil type and depth, previous crop history, and location (e.g. climate, topography) should be taken into account before planting.

Diversified farms are usually more economically and ecologically resilient.  While monoculture farming has advantages in terms of efficiency and ease of management, the loss of the crop in any one year could put a farm out of business and/or seriously disrupt the stability of a community dependent on that crop. By growing a variety of crops, farmers spread economic risk and are less susceptible to the radical price fluctuations associated with changes in supply and demand.

Properly managed, diversity can also buffer a farm in a biological sense. For example, in annual cropping systems,  crop rotation can be used to suppress weeds, pathogens and insect pests. Also, cover crops can have stabilizing effects on the agroecosystem by holding soil and nutrients in place, conserving soil moisture with mowed or standing dead mulches, and by increasing the water infiltration rate and soil water holding capacity.  Cover crops  in orchards and vineyards can buffer the system against pest infestations by increasing beneficial arthropod populations and can therefore reduce the need for chemical inputs. Using a variety of cover crops is also important in order to protect against the failure of a particular species to grow and to attract and sustain a wide range of beneficial arthropods.

Optimum diversity may be obtained by integrating both crops and livestock in the same farming operation. This was the common practice for centuries until the mid-1900s when technology, government policy and economics compelled farms to become more specialized. Mixed crop and livestock operations have several advantages. First, growing row crops only on more level land and pasture or forages on steeper slopes will reduce soil erosion. Second, pasture and forage crops in rotation enhance soil quality and reduce erosion; livestock manure, in turn, contributes to soil fertility. Third, livestock can buffer the negative impacts of low rainfall periods by consuming crop residue that in "plant only" systems would have been considered crop failures. Finally, feeding and marketing are flexible in animal production systems. This can help cushion farmers against trade and price fluctuations and, in conjunction with cropping operations, make more efficient use of farm labor.

Soil management

A common philosophy among sustainable agriculture practitioners is that a "healthy" soil is a key component of sustainability; that is, a healthy soil will produce healthy crop plants that have optimum vigor and are less susceptible to pests. While many crops have key pests that attack even the healthiest of plants, proper soil, water and nutrient management can help prevent some pest problems brought on by crop stress or nutrient imbalance. Furthermore, crop management systems that impair soil quality often result in greater inputs of water, nutrients, pesticides, and/or energy for tillage to maintain yields.

In sustainable systems, the soil is viewed as a fragile and living medium that must be protected and nurtured to ensure its long-term productivity and stability.   Methods to protect and enhance the productivity of the soil include:

      - using cover crops, compost and/or manures       - reducing tillage       - avoiding traffic on wet soils       - maintaining soil cover with plants and/or mulches

Conditions in most California soils (warm, irrigated, and tilled) do not favor the buildup of organic matter. Regular additions of organic matter or the use of cover crops can increase soil aggregate stability, soil tilth, and diversity of soil microbial life.

Efficient use of inputs

Many inputs and practices used by conventional farmers are also used in sustainable agriculture. Sustainable farmers, however, maximize reliance on natural, renewable, and on-farm inputs.  Equally important are the environmental, social, and economic impacts of a particular strategy. Converting to sustainable practices does not mean simple input substitution. Frequently, it substitutes enhanced management and scientific knowledge for conventional inputs, especially chemical inputs that harm the environment on farms and in rural communities. The goal is to develop efficient, biological systems which do not need high levels of material inputs.

Growers frequently ask if synthetic chemicals are appropriate in a sustainable farming system. Sustainable approaches are those that are the least toxic and least energy intensive, and yet maintain productivity and profitability. Preventive strategies and other alternatives should be employed before using chemical inputs from any source. However, there may be situations where the use of synthetic chemicals would be more "sustainable" than a strictly non-chemical approach or an approach using toxic "organic" chemicals. For example, one grape grower switched from tillage to a few applications of a broad spectrum contact herbicide in the vine row. This approach may use less energy and may compact the soil less than numerous passes with a cultivator or mower.

Consideration of farmer goals and lifestyle choices

Management decisions should reflect not only environmental and broad social considerations, but also individual goals and lifestyle choices. For example, adoption of some technologies or practices that promise profitability may also require such intensive management that one's lifestyle actually deteriorates. Management decisions that promote sustainability, nourish the environment, the community and the individual.

• Animal Production Practices

In the early part of this century, most farms integrated both crop and livestock operations. Indeed, the two were highly complementary both biologically and economically. The current picture has changed quite drastically since then. Crop and animal producers now are still dependent on one another to some degree, but the integration now most commonly takes place at a higher level-- between  farmers, through intermediaries, rather than  within  the farm itself. This is the result of a trend toward separation and specialization of crop and animal production systems. Despite this trend, there are still many farmers, particularly in the Midwest and Northeastern U.S. that integrate crop and animal systems--either on dairy farms, or with range cattle, sheep or hog operations.

Even with the growing specialization of livestock and crop producers, many of the principles outlined in the crop production section apply to both groups. The actual management practices will, of course, be quite different. Some of the specific points that livestock producers need to address are listed below.

Management Planning

Including livestock in the farming system increases the complexity of biological and economic relationships. The mobility of the stock, daily feeding, health concerns, breeding operations, seasonal feed and forage sources, and complex marketing are sources of this complexity. Therefore, a successful ranch plan should include enterprise calendars of operations, stock flows, forage flows, labor needs, herd production records and land use plans to give the manager control and a means of monitoring progress toward goals.

Animal Selection

The animal enterprise must be appropriate for the farm or ranch resources. Farm capabilities and constraints such as feed and forage sources, landscape, climate and skill of the manager must be considered in selecting which animals to produce. For example, ruminant animals can be raised on a variety of feed sources including range and pasture, cultivated forage, cover crops, shrubs, weeds, and crop residues. There is a wide range of breeds available in each of the major ruminant species, i.e., cattle, sheep and goats. Hardier breeds that, in general, have lower growth and milk production potential, are better adapted to less favorable environments with sparse or highly seasonal forage growth.

Animal nutrition

Feed costs are the largest single variable cost in any livestock operation. While most of the feed may come from other enterprises on the ranch, some purchased feed is usually imported from off the farm. Feed costs can be kept to a minimum by monitoring animal condition and performance and understanding seasonal variations in feed and forage quality on the farm. Determining the optimal use of farm-generated by-products is an important challenge of diversified farming.

Reproduction

Use of quality germplasm to improve herd performance is another key to sustainability. In combination with good genetic stock, adapting the reproduction season to fit the climate and sources of feed and forage reduce health problems and feed costs.

Herd Health

Animal health greatly influences reproductive success and weight gains, two key aspects of successful livestock production. Unhealthy stock waste feed and require additional labor. A herd health program is critical to sustainable livestock production.

Grazing Management

Most adverse environmental impacts associated with grazing can be prevented or mitigated with proper grazing management. First, the number of stock per unit area (stocking rate) must be correct for the landscape and the forage sources. There will need to be compromises between the convenience of tilling large, unfenced fields and the fencing needs of livestock operations. Use of modern, temporary fencing may provide one practical solution to this dilemma. Second, the long term carrying capacity and the stocking rate must take into account short and long-term droughts. Especially in Mediterranean climates such as in California, properly managed grazing significantly reduces fire hazards by reducing fuel build-up in grasslands and brushlands. Finally, the manager must achieve sufficient control to reduce overuse in some areas while other areas go unused. Prolonged concentration of stock that results in permanent loss of vegetative cover on uplands or in riparian zones should be avoided. However, small scale loss of vegetative cover around water or feed troughs may be tolerated if surrounding vegetative cover is adequate.

Confined Livestock Production

Animal health and waste management are key issues in confined livestock operations. The moral and ethical debate taking place today regarding animal welfare is particularly intense for confined livestock production systems. The issues raised in this debate need to be addressed.

Confinement livestock production is increasingly a source of surface and ground water pollutants, particularly where there are large numbers of animals per unit area. Expensive waste management facilities are now a necessary cost of confined production systems. Waste is a problem of almost all operations and must be managed with respect to both the environment and the quality of life in nearby communities. Livestock production systems that disperse stock in pastures so the wastes are not concentrated and do not overwhelm natural nutrient cycling processes have become a subject of renewed interest.

• The Economic, Social & Political Context

In addition to strategies for preserving natural resources and changing production practices, sustainable agriculture requires a commitment to changing public policies, economic institutions, and social values.  Strategies for change must take into account the complex, reciprocal and ever-changing relationship between agricultural production and the broader society.

The "food system" extends far beyond the farm and involves the interaction of individuals and institutions with contrasting and often competing goals including farmers, researchers, input suppliers, farmworkers, unions, farm advisors, processors, retailers, consumers, and policymakers. Relationships among these actors shift over time as new technologies spawn economic, social and political changes.

A wide diversity of strategies and approaches are necessary to create a more sustainable food system. These will range from specific and concentrated efforts to alter specific policies or practices, to the longer-term tasks of reforming key institutions, rethinking economic priorities, and challenging widely-held social values. Areas of concern where change is most needed include the following:

Food and agricultural policy

Existing federal, state and local government policies often impede the goals of sustainable agriculture. New policies are needed to simultaneously promote environmental health, economic profitability, and social and economic equity. For example, commodity and price support programs could be restructured to allow farmers to realize the full benefits of the productivity gains made possible through alternative practices. Tax and credit policies could be modified to encourage a diverse and decentralized system of family farms rather than corporate concentration and absentee ownership. Government and land grant university research policies could be modified to emphasize the development of sustainable alternatives. Marketing orders and cosmetic standards could be amended to encourage reduced pesticide use. Coalitions must be created to address these policy concerns at the local, regional, and national level.

Conversion of agricultural land to urban uses is a particular concern in California, as rapid growth and escalating land values threaten farming on prime soils. Existing farmland conversion patterns often discourage farmers from adopting sustainable practices and a long-term perspective on the value of land. At the same time, the close proximity of newly developed residential areas to farms is increasing the public demand for environmentally safe farming practices. Comprehensive new policies to protect prime soils and regulate development are needed, particularly in California's Central Valley. By helping farmers to adopt practices that reduce chemical use and conserve scarce resources, sustainable agriculture research and education can play a key role in building public support for agricultural land preservation. Educating land use planners and decision-makers about sustainable agriculture is an important priority.

In California, the conditions of agricultural labor are generally far below accepted social standards and legal protections in other forms of employment. Policies and programs are needed to address this problem, working toward socially just and safe employment that provides adequate wages, working conditions, health benefits, and chances for economic stability. The needs of migrant labor for year-around employment and adequate housing are a particularly crucial problem needing immediate attention. To be more sustainable over the long-term, labor must be acknowledged and supported by government policies, recognized as important constituents of land grant universities, and carefully considered when assessing the impacts of new technologies and practices.

Rural Community Development

Rural communities in California are currently characterized by economic and environmental deterioration. Many are among the poorest locations in the nation. The reasons for the decline are complex, but changes in farm structure have played a significant role. Sustainable agriculture presents an opportunity to rethink the importance of family farms and rural communities. Economic development policies are needed that encourage more diversified agricultural production on family farms as a foundation for healthy economies in rural communities. In combination with other strategies, sustainable agriculture practices and policies can help foster community institutions that meet employment, educational, health, cultural and spiritual needs.

Consumers and the Food System

Consumers can play a critical role in creating a sustainable food system. Through their purchases, they send strong messages to producers, retailers and others in the system about what they think is important.  Food cost and nutritional quality have always influenced consumer choices. The challenge now is to find strategies that broaden consumer perspectives, so that environmental quality, resource use, and social equity issues are also considered in shopping decisions. At the same time, new policies and institutions must be created to enable producers using sustainable practices to market their goods to a wider public. Coalitions organized around improving the food system are one specific method of creating a dialogue among consumers, retailers, producers and others. These coalitions or other public forums can be important vehicles for clarifying issues, suggesting new policies, increasing mutual trust, and encouraging a long-term view of food production, distribution and consumption.  

Contributors : Written by  Gail Feenstra , Writer; Chuck Ingels, Perennial Cropping Systems Analyst; and David Campbell, Economic and Public Policy Analyst with contributions from David Chaney, Melvin R. George, Eric Bradford, the staff and advisory committees of the UC Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education Program.

How to cite this page UC Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education Program. 2021. "What is Sustainable Agriculture?" UC Agriculture and Natural Resources. <https://sarep.ucdavis.edu/sustainable-ag>

This page was last updated August 3, 2021.

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• Published: 09 April 2019

Sustainability in global agriculture driven by organic farming

• Frank Eyhorn 1 , 2 ,
• Adrian Muller 3 , 4 ,
• John P. Reganold 5 ,
• Emile Frison 6 ,
• Hans R. Herren 7 ,
• Louise Luttikholt 2 ,
• Alexander Mueller 8 ,
• Jürn Sanders 9 ,
• Nadia El-Hage Scialabba 8 ,
• Verena Seufert 10 &
• Pete Smith 11  

Nature Sustainability volume  2 ,  pages 253–255 ( 2019 ) Cite this article

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Agricultural practices need to change to meet the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals by 2030. How to achieve the SDGs is heavily contested. Here we propose a policy framework that triggers the required transition. Organic agriculture, although not a silver bullet, is a useful component in such strategy.

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Frank Eyhorn

IFOAM — Organics International, Bonn, Germany

Frank Eyhorn & Louise Luttikholt

Research Institute of Organic Agriculture (FiBL), Frick, Switzerland

Adrian Muller

Swiss Federal Institutes of Technology Zurich ETHZ, Zurich, Switzerland

Washington State University, Pullman, USA

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International Panel of Experts on Sustainable Food Systems (iPES Food) https://www.ipes-food.org/

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Research Article

Farmers’ willingness to adopt sustainable agricultural practices: A meta-analysis

Roles Conceptualization, Data curation, Formal analysis, Methodology, Software, Writing – original draft

* E-mail: [email protected]

Affiliation Department of Extension Economics, New Mexico State University, Las Cruces, New Mexico, United States of America

Roles Conceptualization, Methodology, Project administration, Supervision, Validation, Writing – review & editing

Affiliation Department of Agricultural and Applied Economics, Texas Tech University, Lubbock, Texas, United States of America

Roles Software, Validation, Writing – review & editing

• Sawssan Boufous, 
• Darren Hudson, 
• Carlos Carpio

• Published: January 5, 2023
• https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pstr.0000037
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This research is a meta-analysis that focuses on farmers’ willingness to accept adopting sustainable practices. We use a set of meta-regressions and statistical tests to analyze 59 studies providing 286 WTA estimates. Our aim is to examine gaps in the literature of sustainable agriculture adoption and highlight the major findings of peer-reviewed works. We found evidence for significant methodological factors affecting WTA values, and the presence of unique Willingness to Accept mean value that would be the true proxy for how much farmers’ must be compensated to adopt sustainable agriculture practices.

Author summary

The increasing growth of consumption needs puts pressure on the natural system, harming climate, biodiversity, water, and environment which has induced a recognition that action should be taken to mitigate irreversible damage to the environment. Sustainability is believed to be obtainable through a change in consumer’s and producer’s behavior, which can be primarily done through the transformation of our agricultural system using alternative farming approaches that are based on ecological principles [ 1 ]. The literature is very expansive on analyzing farmers’ willingness to adopt sustainability but it is limited in providing WTA values. Thus, in our meta-analysis we focus on quantitative WTA studies to investigate the presence of a proxy for a true mean WTA for sustainable agriculture and detect the methodological variables that might affect the WTA value. We found a proxy for the mean WTA for sustainable farming ranging between 567 USD/ha/year and 709 USD/ha/year, as well as a proxy for WTA producing biomass crops ranging from 2054 USD/ha/year to 2766 USD/ha/year. Also, among the significant methodological variables that affect WTA values are the use of a non-random sampling method, and contingent valuation. The two methods are found to lead to higher WTA values than when random and conjoint valuation methods are used.

Citation: Boufous S, Hudson D, Carpio C (2023) Farmers’ willingness to adopt sustainable agricultural practices: A meta-analysis. PLOS Sustain Transform 2(1): e0000037. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pstr.0000037

Editor: Isabel Marques, University of Lisbon: Universidade de Lisboa, PORTUGAL

Received: December 7, 2021; Accepted: November 14, 2022; Published: January 5, 2023

This is an open access article, free of all copyright, and may be freely reproduced, distributed, transmitted, modified, built upon, or otherwise used by anyone for any lawful purpose. The work is made available under the Creative Commons CC0 public domain dedication.

Data Availability: The data required to reproduce the above findings are available to download from: Boufous, Sawssan, 2022, "Farmers’ willingness to adopt sustainable agricultural practices: a meta-analysis", https://doi.org/10.7910/DVN/FTIW14 , Harvard Dataverse, V1.

Funding: The authors received no specific funding for this work.

Competing interests: The authors have declared that no competing interests exist.

1. Introduction

Scientists assert that producers need to change their conventional practices in favor of practices that promote environmental sustainability. As a concept, sustainability in agriculture has been defined by many entities but was knowledgeably introduced in late 1980 in the report of the World Commission on Environment and Development [ 2 , 3 ]. Since then, the concept has evolved and attained attention in agricultural policy debates [ 3 ]. The USDA defines sustainable agriculture as an integrated system of plant and animal production practices that aim to 1) satisfy human food and fiber needs, 2) enhance environmental quality and the resource base, 3) sustain the economic viability of agriculture, 4) use efficiently nonrenewable resources and integrate where appropriate biological cycles and controls, and 5) enhance the quality of life for farmers, farmworkers, and society as a whole [ 4 ].

Were sustainability practices generally profitable, we would expect farmers to have adopted them. Because they have not been widely adopted, researchers have investigated what compensation is required for adoption. There are a large number of practices that can enhance sustainability. Producer adoption of those practices is a key area of study resulting in a very broad literature. This abundance of literature has also encouraged the production of numerous qualitative and quantitative literature reviews summarizing past works on farmers’ preferences and adoption for sustainable agricultural practices. However, most of these reviews focused on either revealing the determinant factors of the adoption decision [e.g. Lastra-Bravo et al. [ 5 ]], and methodological approach affecting the Willingness to Accept (WTA) estimation, while being either limited to specific sustainable practices [e.g. Lesch and Wachenheim [ 6 ]; Loomis and White [ 7 ]; Van Houtven et al. [ 8 ]], or specific elicitation methods [e.g. Mamine et al. [ 9 ]; Barrio and Loureiro [ 10 ]].

This study aims to present a more expansive work by exploring past studies that focus on the elicitation of farmers’ willingness to produce bioenergy crops, to adopt practices that reduce pollution levels as well as their willingness to adopt water and soil conservation practices from all continents. We target studies with hypothetical settings using either conjoint analysis or contingent valuation, and that provide a quantitative estimate for the WTA. This paper elicits gaps in the literature and highlights the major findings of peer-reviewed works to estimate a unique WTA value that can be used as a proxy for how much farmers require in incentives to adopt sustainability practices in their farming, and identifies the methodological factors that a scholar should take into account while designing research on farmers’ preferences for sustainable practices.

2. Methods and procedures

Meta-analysis is a body of statistical methods that are useful in reviewing and evaluating empirical research results [ 11 ]. It integrates the finding of separate studies to determine the overall size of an effect and to determine the impact of moderating variables on the effect size. To do this, the meta-analysis needs to be reliable and valid allowing for the detection of the effect size and the impact of moderator variables [ 12 ]. To conduct our meta-analysis, several steps were followed to search, collect, and analyze the meta-sample. For convenience, the process is divided into two phases: (1) the search of the literature that will constitute the meta-sample, and (2) the estimation of the meta-regression.

Phase 1: Literature search

The objective of our investigation is to explore studies that focused on farmers’ WTA to adopt or to convert to sustainable farming practices; thus, it is important to set a definite list of keywords that represent our subject of interest and to set the correct search strategy that will be followed to collect the meta-data.

The first step is to search for the works corresponding to our topic of interest. Following the approach adopted by Tey et al. [ 13 ], we use the SPIDER search tool to target the studies that compose our meta-sample. This technique consists of finding keywords that best identify our topic during searches on electronic databases. Table 1 reports the keywords that have been employed to identify published works focusing on the WTA to adopt or convert to sustainable farming.

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https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pstr.0000037.t001

As reported in Table 1 , our research includes only quantitative studies, which means that our sample choice is limited to research works that report estimated values of the WTA excluding all other studies that present a qualitative analysis of producers’ WTA, as well as studies that express WTA premium per other metrics than a unit of area (e.g., some studies expressed WTA per household) or other than an monetary value (e.g., some studies report WTA in percentages). Also, the keywords reported in the section “Phenomenon of Interest” include practices that are considered sustainable farming practices based on the USDA’s definition of sustainable farming [ 14 ]. The search is conducted in the electronic databases reported in Table 2 and targeted published studies in English and French without a time-frame limit.

https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pstr.0000037.t002

Table 3 illustrates our literature search process for preparing the metadata. The preliminary search resulted in 557 eligible articles where 103 articles were removed as duplicates (this is because we are using different databases for the same keywords). For the remaining 454 articles, the title, abstract, and keywords were read, resulting in 166 eligible articles. These shortlisted articles were then examined individually to verify their eligibility to our criteria, which allowed us to identify the final 59 articles that constitute our metadata.

https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pstr.0000037.t003

Note that each keyword or set of keywords was individually used in the search in combination with the terms “Farmers”, “Adoption”, and “WTA”. Also, using our keywords, none of the published works in the French language were found to be eligible to our search criteria. In sum, these articles were either focusing on other aspects of sustainability adoption or were qualitative studies [i.e. Carvin and Said [ 15 ]; Plumecocq et al. [ 16 ]].

The choice of the 59 papers was based on their relevance by examining their abstracts, results, and methods and procedures sections. Once collected, we examined how WTA values are expressed in each study and brought to consistent terms when necessary. The sample studies include various type of producers, and various production environments. Values expressed in a foreign currency were converted to USD as well as values that were expressed in other metric measures converted to USD/hectare. Our meta-data comprises 59 studies and 286 WTA estimates.

Phase 2: The meta-regression analysis

Meta-regression analysis (MRA) is a form of meta-analysis especially designed to investigate empirical research [ 17 , 18 ]. Meta-regression seeks to provide a scientific approach to research synthesis [ 19 ], and to go beyond estimates that are obtained from individual studies [ 20 ].

In a meta-regression analysis, the dependent variable could be a summary statistic, or a regression parameter drawn from each study, while the independent variables may include characteristics of the method, design, and data used in these studies [ 11 ].

a. The MRA model.

However, given that the intuition behind the meta-regression analysis is that the variation in reported WTA estimates can be explained by the study design characteristics ( Table 4 ), the estimation of Eq ( 1 ) requires to consider two possible problems. First, due to heterogeneous variances in WTA estimation -non-homogeneous variances result from the different sample sizes, sample observations, and different estimation procedures of the sampled studies [ 20 ], a potential heteroskedasticity in the error terms can occur. Second, since we have 286 WTA estimates from 59 cluster studies, intra-cluster error correlations may affect WTA observations, which would result in biased standard error estimates [ 20 , 22 , 23 ].

https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pstr.0000037.t004

To solve these potential issues and generate efficient estimates of (1) with corrected standard errors, we use two regressions where the square root of sample size is used as weight: a weighted least squares (WLS) regression with robust standard errors [ 24 – 26 ] that serves as the base specification, and the weighted least squares with cluster robust standard errors that we consider to be the main model to which we are referring while interpreting our findings. Following previous meta-analyses literature in Agricultural Economics [e.g., Printezis et al. [ 23 ]; Lagerkvist and Hess [ 21 ]; and Lusk et al. [ 27 ]], this model is justified because it takes into account the 59 cluster studies and addresses potential heteroskedasticity [ 28 ].

b. Publication selection bias and precision effect.

Besides the two potential econometric problems mentioned in the previous section, a meta-analysis also presents the risk of publication selection bias. Publication selection bias refers to a tendency of having a greater preference for estimation and publishing statistically significant results compared to results that do not reveal statistical significance [ 22 ]. Stanley [ 25 , 29 ] shows that the relationship between analyzed estimates and their precision (e.g., standard errors or sample size) can serve as an indicator for publication selection bias. Therefore, we chose to use the square root of the sample size (labeled “sqrt(n)”) which can also serve as an adequate precision measure because it is proportional to the inverse of the standard error [ 25 , 30 – 33 ].

If the publication selection bias is not verified, then the observed WTA effects should vary randomly around this “true” effect, independently of their precision (sqrt (n)) [ 23 , 25 , 31 ]. Therefore, to test for the presence of publication selection bias, we use the funnel asymmetry test (FAT), which is also a t-test performed for the slope β 1 that is estimated using Eq 2 . Rejecting H 0 ; β 1 = 0, would indicate the presence of publication bias [ 25 ]. Note that it is mandatory to have at least 10 studies in a meta-data, and sampled studies should not have similar standard errors to perform this test, conditions that are fulfilled for our case. Also, to affirm the findings, it is recommended to provide a visual representation of the result by a plot of the dependent variable (WTA), and the precision measure variable (sqrt(n)) [ 23 ]. Following the recommendation of Nelson and Kennedy [ 20 ], we perform a robustness check, by estimating Eq ( 2 ) using the sample size “n” as the precision measure as well as presenting two regression models (WLS with robust errors and WLS with cluster robust errors) for all of our meta-regressions.

c. The variables

The dependent variable..

In the meta-regression models, the WTA estimates reported by the 59 articles are used as the dependent variable. As explained above, we converted the WTA values to USD/Ha/year to keep the common metric across studies consistent. The final total number of WTA estimates (n = 286) is larger than the number of studies included in the meta-regression (n = 59) because some studies report multiple WTA estimates due to multiple programs/schemes, or products or samples per each study.

The independent variables.

Year of study/Trend . identifies the year when each study was published. We choose the year of the study because many of the sampled studies do not provide the year in which the data was collected. We used a trend variable for each study since one study can have more than one WTA estimate. This variable allows testing if there is a trend over time in WTA for sustainable practices’ estimates [ 23 ]. For our MRA, a trend variable is created to assess the evolution of WTA elicitation through time.

The continent of study . the meta-data has studies that have been conducted in numerous countries. The continent to which each article belongs is controlled as a dummy variable. We created three dummy variables for Europe, Africa, America, and one for both Australia and Asia (Australasia), which serves as the base. This variable permits the identification of differences in the reported WTA estimates among the continents.

Sample size . the sample size used in each study is included to have an insight into how much sample size magnitude can influence the WTA estimation. The sampled individuals in all studies are individual farmers so that the sample size represents the number of sampled farmers.

Sampling method . the sampling method used in each study is also included as an explanatory variable to test if the manner of choosing the sample affects the WTA estimation. Random and non-random sampling methods were identified across our meta-data: random sampling, stratified sampling, quota sampling, cluster sampling, and convenience sampling. Thus, we created a dummy variable that takes the value one if the study uses a random sampling method and takes the value zero if a non-random sampling is used.

Elicitation method . several methods have been employed across the literature to analyze preferences and most of the studies used choice experiments. Because all the sampled research used hypothetical methods, two elicitation methods were identified across the metadata: conjoint (or choice-based) analysis and the contingent valuation method. A dummy variable was created taking the value of 1 if the study uses a “contingent valuation method” and the value of zero if it is using the “conjoint analysis”.

Energy . refers to the planting of biomass crops for energy production. In our data, we observe studies focusing on farmers’ willingness to plant biomass woody (e.g., pine hoak), grassy (e.g., switchgrass), and cereal (e.g., corn) crops. This variable takes the value of one when the article discusses the willingness to grow one of these biomass crops and takes the value of zero otherwise.

Soil . refers to all agricultural practices that aim to enhance/preserve soil health. Based on our data, included practices are agroforestry, cover crops, conservation tillage, rotational grazing, and organic farming. Thus, the variable takes the value of one if one of these practices is identified in the sample article and takes the value of zero otherwise.

Water . refers to practices that aim to conserve water resources like the conservation of wetlands, watersheds, water reservoirs, and riparian lands. Thus, it takes the value of one when the study sample focuses on one of these and the value of zero otherwise.

Pollution . refers to practices that aim to reduce pollution levels and those that preserve ecosystem biodiversity. The specific practices found in our data are reduction of chemical use, “climate-smart” agricultural practices, and biodiversity conservation. The variable takes one if one of these practices are identified and zero otherwise.

In addition to a model that includes all the WTA estimates and variables described above, we subdivided the metadata into four subsets based on the sustainable practice category and estimated separate models for each data subset. The categorization of these subsets is based on the last four dummies previously described (soil, water, energy, and pollution), such as (1) soil data for the sub-dataset that gathers studies focusing on soil health-related practices, (2) water data for the one combining studies on WTA adopt riparian lands, watersheds, and wetlands conservation practices, (3) energy data including studies on biomass crops production, and (4) Pollution data including studies on climate-smart agriculture, practices reducing pollution levels and preserving biodiversity.

Soil-health dataset.

For this subset, we have 136 WTA estimates derived from 17 studies. We identified two categories of sustainable practices: one related to agroforestry practices (forest), and another one referring to agricultural practices that are qualified as Best Management Practices (BMPs) such as organic farming, crop rotation, grazing rotation, cover crops, grassland conservation, and conservation tillage. We created an additional explanatory dummy variable for each of the two categories-agroforestry and BMPs—that is equal to one if the practice in the study sample is related to agroforestry and takes zero if the discussed practice belongs to the BMPs category, with the dummy BMP being the base category.

Biomass crops production dataset.

This subset contains 48 WTA estimates from 13 studies. We created three additional explanatory dummy variables corresponding to the biomass crop type: grassy crops (switchgrass & hay), cereal crops (corn & wheat), and woody crops (pine & hoak) that are the base variable for the analysis of this subset. Thus, the variables take the value of one when the respective biomass crop is identified in the sampled study and take the value of zero otherwise.

Water conservation dataset.

For this subset, we have 31 WTA estimates from 10 studies that focus on either farmers’ willingness to accept to adopt watersheds/wetlands conservation or riparian lands conservation. A. additional dummy explanatory variable was created to equal one for riparian lands and zero otherwise (watersheds/wetlands).

Pollution reduction dataset.

This dataset includes 69 WTA estimates from 19 studies and gathers studies investigating farmers’ willingness to adopt practices that aim to reduce pollution levels and preserve natural biodiversity. We created three additional explanatory dummies: one for practices that aim to reduce chemical use (chemical), one for practices that aim to preserve biodiversity (biodiversity) which is also the base for the analysis of this subset, and the last one for climate-smart agriculture practices (pollute). These variables take the value of one when the specific practice is observed and take the value of zero otherwise.

a. Summary statistics

The summary statistics table reveals that the average reported WTA to adopt sustainable practices in farming across the included studies is estimated to $403/Ha/year. The mean number of farmers participating in each study is 740 individuals, which forms the basis of the precision measure used in the publication bias analysis.

For the variables related to the study design, the data shows that 19% of the included studies used a contingent valuation method to elicit farmers’ WTA for sustainable practices in their farming, which implies that 81% of the meta-data used studies utilizing conjoint (choice-based) surveys. Data also shows that 59% of the meta-data studies were carried out in Europe, 18% were conducted in America, 23% in Africa, and only 6% in Asia and Australia. On average, 62% of the studies used random sampling methods to draw their samples.

Regarding the sustainable practices investigated in the sampled studies, 47% of the studies focused on farmers’ WTA for a practice that would enhance/conserve soil health, and 25% to preserve biodiversity and reduce pollution levels, while water conservation practices and biomass crops planting represented only 11% and 17% respectively, of the sampled studies.

At the subset level, descriptives show that practices related to BMPs and conservation of watersheds and wetlands are the most investigated practices (respectively, 79% and 74%) within their categories: “soil-health” and “water conservation” datasets, respectively. Also, 57% of the “biomass crops production” subset combines articles analyzing WTA to plant biomass woody crops, and 44% of the “pollution reduction dataset” is relative to studies valuing farmers’ WTA to adopt practices that aim to reduce chemical use.

b. FAT and PET analyses

Following Printezis et al. [ 23 ], we employ two approaches to correct the intra-study error correlations and publication bias using the square root of the sample size “sqrt(n)” and the sample size “n” as precision measures: the funnel asymmetry test (FAT) and the precision effect test (PET). Table 5 presents WLS regressions results for the simple model without additional study design covariates ( Eq 2 ). We base our interpretation on results obtained from the WLS cluster robust standard errors as it is the main model of our study.

https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pstr.0000037.t005

The Funnel Plot is used as an initial check for the presence of publication bias. It is a scatter diagram that plots the precision measure against the variable of interest, which are in our case: the square root of the sample size (sqrt(n)), and the WTA for sustainable farming practices (WTA $/ha). Publication bias is detected when the scatter is overweighed on one side [ 25 ]. Fig 1 displays a concentration to the right of the plot which might be an indication of publication bias.

https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pstr.0000037.g001

Because the funnel plot is a visual inspection and is subject to a subjective interpretation [ 25 ], there is a need to check this publication bias suspicion by a more objective test: the funnel asymmetry test (FAT). From the t-test obtained from the simplified MRA ( Eq 2 ), we found that the coefficient of the precision variable “sqrt(n)” in (3) of table (5), as well as the coefficient of “n” in (4) of table (5), are not significant which reject the null hypothesis, and thus, we conclude that in contrast to the funnel plot, there is no presence of publication bias in our metadata.

In his paper on publication bias, Stanley [ 25 ] explains highly skewed funnel plots in meta-analyses might result from the different econometric modeling choices supported by the sampled studies. However, because funnel plot analysis is a subjective method, we will limit our analysis of the subsets data’s publication bias to a more objective analysis using the funnel asymmetric test (FAT).

For the precision analysis test (PET), we observe that the estimated constant which serves as a proxy for the “true” mean WTA for sustainable agricultural practices, presented in Table 5 indicates the presence of a WTA for sustainable agriculture. That is, the constant estimate is significant in our two models implying that the weighted average of WTA for adopting sustainability in farming across the included studies ranges between $567/ha/year and $709/ha/year. The following sections will present the MRA results obtained from the overall metadata as well as from the four sub-metadata sets.

c. Meta-regressions analysis

C.1. overall data mra..

Table 6 presents the results of the full MRA models that consider methodological differences and other characteristics (e.g., location, agricultural practice) across the studies included in our analysis. Model diagnostics show that the two models are in overall significant based on the F-test.

https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pstr.0000037.t006

As previously demonstrated through the PET analysis, the result confirms the presence of a proxy of the true mean “WTA” because it shows a positive and significant constant. The result also shows significant covariates at the 10% level: time trend, Africa, soil, elicitation method, and random sampling. The overall model, however, likely suffers from significant heterogeneity of motivations across sustainability practices thus masking overall effects. Therefore, we estimated the MRA models on the data subsets and focus interpretations on those model results.

c.2. Soil-health data.

The subset “soil-health” includes studies focusing on eliciting farmers’ WTA for Best Management Practices (BMPs) and agroforestry practices. Those results, which include 137 estimates from 19 studies, are shown in Table 7 .

https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pstr.0000037.t007

The regression displays no evidence that farmers have a significant average WTA for soil-health practices (constant is not statistically significant) nor is there evidence that farmers treat agroforestry or other BMPs significantly differently (“agroforestry” is not statistically different from zero). However, regarding research methods for soil-health practices, it seems that contingent valuation leads to higher WTA premiums compared to studies using the conjoint valuation method. This result is not unexpected as some literature criticizes contingent valuation for generating more hypothetical bias than conjoint methods [e.g. Halvorsen et al. [ 35 ]; Stevens et al. [ 36 ]]. Also, the regression shows that, in contrast to findings from studies carried in Europe, Asia, and Australia, American farmers have a higher WTA value. The higher WTA values may reflect higher opportunity costs for American producers switching production practices. Finally, although only significant at the p = 0.116 level, the negative sign on the trend signals lower WTA values (or more willingness to adopt at lower payment rates) through time for soil health practices. This result could reflect the impact of education and demonstration projects on soil health practices that are leading producers to value those more on their own operations (require smaller payments to induce them to adopt). This result could also be a dummy study effect since studies using contingent valuation method represent only 1.5% of the observations.

c.3. Water conservation data.

The subset “water conservation” is limited to research works related to water conservation practices’ adoption, more specifically: riparian lands, wetlands, and watersheds conservation practices. This data includes 32 WTA estimates obtained from 8 studies.

The estimates resulting from the two regressions (WLS with Robust SE, and WLS with Clusters Robust SE) are all significant, except for the time trend variable trend in the clustered regression. Farmers demand higher WTA for adopting watersheds and wetlands conservation-related practices than for riparian lands conservation practices. Regarding the geographic area, we observe that in contrast to Australasia, higher incentives are required in Europe while in Africa, farmers require lower incentives. This later result does not support previous findings that demonstrate a low adoption of water conservation technologies by African farmers [e.g. Perret and Stenvens, [ 37 ]; Mango et al. [ 38 ]; Jha et al. [ 39 ]], which is a complex hurdle given the problem of water scarcity in Africa. Perret and Stenvens [ 37 ] relate this reluctance to a range of factors related to African farmers’ circumstances and needs. In their paper, they argue that resource-conserving technologies are mainly developed ignoring the farmers’ agenda of short-term production for survival, that most research is done in areas with favorable soil and climatic conditions which is not typical of farmers’ conditions, and that the adoption doesn’t depend upon only the farmers’ willingness but also upon the role of property rights to resources and collective action at the community level.

From Table 8 , and regarding the methodological covariates, the result shows that on average, studies carrying a random sampling method provide higher WTA which is in line with the result of the MRA model suing the overall data, while for the elicitation method, this dataset shows that using a contingent valuation method provides lower WTA than studies using conjoint valuation which is in contrast with the overall data MR result.

https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pstr.0000037.t008

Also, the negative sign and the significance of the constant’s estimate mean that if setting all other covariates equal to zero, there would be, on average, no evidence for a true mean WTA estimate for water conservation practices.

c.4. Pollution reduction data.

This third subset combines 73 estimates from 19 studies investigating farmers’ willingness to reduce chemicals’ use, conserve biodiversity, and adopt climate-smart agriculture practices.

The WLS Cluster Robust SE model result in Table 9 displays only three significant coefficients. The variable elicitation method is positive and highly significant meaning that on average, studies using contingent valuation reported a significantly higher WTA than those using conjoint analysis. In contrast with the previous results, the MRA result for the pollution-reduction practices dataset shows that studies that used random sampling reported lower WTA than those having used a non-random sampling method.

https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pstr.0000037.t009

Also, as this dataset provides a positive and significant estimate for the constant, it means that there might be a true proxy for the mean WTA for practices that aim to reduce pollution. To test for that, a PET is performed using Eq 2 ( Table 10 ).

https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pstr.0000037.t010

Table 10 shows different results. Using the squared root as a precision measure doesn’t provide significant estimates while using the sample size instead displays a significant estimate for the constant but not for the variable sample size. We can conclude that the hypothesis of the existence of a true proxy mean for the WTA for this category of practices is rejected.

c.5. Biomass crops production data.

This last subset includes studies on farmers’ willingness to grow/produce: grassy, woody, and cereal biomass crops. From the 15 studies, 50 estimates were collected.

All the covariates related to study design are significant ( Table 11 ). For the variables “crop” and “grass” (corresponding to cereal and grassy biomass crops, respectively), the estimates are highly significant and negative, which means that in contrast to woody biomass crops, studies focusing on grassy and cereal biomass crops reported WTPs. We also found that studies carried in America display higher WTA premiums compared to studies conducted in the other continents.

https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pstr.0000037.t011

Also, and in contrast with the other subsets results, this output shows the presence of a proxy for a true value of WTA for biomass crops production based on the positive and significant constant. Given this finding, we performed a robustness check using the simplified MR’s Eq ( 2 ) (PET analysis) to test for the presence of a proxy ( Table 12 ).

https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pstr.0000037.t012

Thus, based on the result, the proxy of the true mean WTA for biomass crops production ranges between 2054.4 USD/ha to 2765 USD/ha.

4. Conclusion and discussion

The literature on sustainable agriculture is extensive, with many studies investigating questions around producers’ willingness to adopt sustainable agricultural practices. A more limited literature estimates farmers’ economic valuation of sustainability. Thus, our interest in this review was limited to studies providing quantitative WTA values. Our metadata shows results from different research works offering a range of estimates that appears to vary significantly based on the region, the sustainable practice of interest, the elicitation method, and the sampling method.

Through this research, we looked forward to estimating a proxy for the “true” WTA for sustainable agriculture adoption and providing a comprehensive and quantitative analysis of previous works on the topic. To do so, five meta-regression analyses were estimated to analyze the effect of practice-category variables and study-specific characteristics on published empirical results, in addition to four simplified MRAs that were used to depict the proxy for the WTA.

The contribution of our work in the broad literature is that from the 59 collected studies and the 286 WTA estimates, that form our overall meta-data, we found that there is a significant mean estimate for sustainable farming practices. By using the precision measures square root of the sample size (sqrt (n)) and the sample size (n), we found that a proxy for the true mean WTA exists ranging, on average between 567 USD /ha/year and 709 USD/ha/year. A proxy for mean WTA for biomass crops production was also found following the same method, ranging between 2054 USD and 2766 USD per hectare and per year. Estimating a proxy for farmers’ WTA demonstrates the presence of a willingness to adopt sustainability and growing biomass crops by farmers worldwide which should reflect a positive general average response to the numerous environmental policies and programs encouraging sustainability. However, the ranging values should be taken very carefully because even if the metadata WTA values were carefully converted to a common metric and currency (WTA in USD per 1 ha per year), the conversion did not take into account inflation nor has been calculated in the same day for all observations, which means that if reevaluated to today’s currency exchange rate, for example, the ranging values would variate following currency rates’ fluctuation.

Using our analysis, we also provide results on the effect that practice-category and methodological variables have on the WTA estimates. Starting with the methodological variables, it seems that the effect of using a random sampling method depends on one the practice used. On average, a researcher who examines farmers’ willingness to adopt water conservation programs (based on water conservation dataset analysis result), or sustainability without specifying the practice type (based on the overall metadata analysis result), would get a higher WTA than if he uses a non-random sampling method. While, if the research is oriented towards sustainable practices that are for biodiversity preservation, chemicals reduction, and climate-smart agriculture, the WTA values would likely be lower than if non-random methods were used. For soil-health practices and biomass crops growing, our results didn’t provide evidence of an effect of the sampling method on the WTA.

By analyzing literature, it was found that using either method random or non-random sampling gives the same result as long as the attribute being sampled is randomly distributed among the population [ 40 ]. However, if the relevance of this statement is true for conventional analyses, it is not verified yet for meta-analyses and should be an interesting research opportunity.

Regarding the elicitation method, four out of the five MRs display a highly significant and positive estimate for the variable elicitation method showing that the methodology of elicitation has a direct effect on the magnitude of the WTA value. The MRs result of the three subsets “biomass crops production”, “soil-health” and “pollution reduction” shows that using a contingent valuation method when eliciting farmers’ preferences for pollution reduction, biomass crops growing, and soil conservation practices lead on average to higher WTAs than if using conjoint analysis. While for water conservation practices, on average, using contingent valuation leads to lower WTA values. This result is interesting because it highlights a difference in outcomes that could reflect a difference in the suitability of an elicitation method over another based on the nature of the practice being valued.

Though the two methods are widely used in agricultural and environmental economics to estimate valuations, the two approaches are different in their settings: the contingent valuation (CVM) is generally designed to examine changes in a single attribute while the conjoint analysis is designed to examine multi-attribute goods [ 41 ]. Only few studies tried to compare the two approaches and determine if they provide different results [ 35 , 36 , 42 ], and the findings are controversial. For example, in a study that compares the two methods for WTA elicitation to value environmental amenities, Harper [ 41 ] found no statistical difference can be determined between contingent and conjoint analyses in environmental studies, while other studies estimating WTP found that using the conjoint valuation method provides higher WTP than the contingent valuation [e.g. Halvorsen et al. [ 35 ]; Printezis et al. [ 23 ]; Carlsson and Martinsson [ 43 ]; Lusk and Schroeder [ 44 ]; List et al. [ 45 ]]. Given our findings and the limited literature supporting (or not) these differences, we cannot draw a firm conclusion on the effect of contingent valuation use versus conjoint valuation use on WTA values. Therefore, it is clear that there is still a need to jointly investigate and test the reliability and suitability of these two methods based on the type of agricultural practice of interest.

The findings obtained from the four subsets’ MRAs show WTA measurement vary depending on practice category-type and/or the continent of the study, except for the subset “pollution reduction”. The result of our meta-analysis shows that American farmers require higher incentives to engage in biomass crops production in contrast to Australasian and European farmers, which is supported by the literature that identifies hesitation and skepticism among farmers as important barriers to the development of renewable energy industries in the United States [ 46 , 47 ]. At the same time, the coefficients of the variables regarding cereal and grassy biomass crops, are negative and significant which indicates that on average, farmers, in all regions, are require lower payments to grow/supply biomass cereal and grassy crops than for growing/supplying woody biomass crops.

Several studies have found reluctance among farmers to produce biomass crops in general, and woody crops specifically [e.g.: Signorini et al. [ 48 ]; Nepal et al. [ 49 ]; Jensen et al. [ 50 ]; Khanna et al. [ 51 ]; Jiang et al. [ 52 ]]. If grassy crops like switchgrass are seen as low-intensity cropping systems, woody and cereal crops are perceived as high-intensity cropping production systems [ 48 ]. Woody energy crops require different crop establishment, cultivation harvesting, and transportation processes [ 53 ] which involve additional costs to the farmer. In addition to that, grassy crops are found to have a greater probability of making profits than woody crops [ 54 ]. Similarly, cereal biomass crops are found to present other advantages. For example, cereal straws have the advantage to use on-farm technology for their production system [ 55 ], their storage and transportation are economically feasible, and are a potential source of additional income for farmers [ 56 ] as they can be transformed into fiber and used for isolation, in the textile industry, and more. These low production costs, as well as the profitability, may explain the low WTA for grassy and cereal biomass crops in comparison to WTA for woody biomass crops.

However, this result does not reflect all the existing literature as numerous studies discuss a low WTA to grow biomass crops. These studies explain this low interest by factors linked to farmer and farm characteristics like risk aversion, age, education, farm size, logistics, etc. [ 57 – 59 ], as well as factors linked to a lack of knowledge regarding biomass systems [ 59 ], and free technical assistance availability [ 59 – 61 ]. In sum, from this result we can provide some suggestions that would benefit researchers and farmers in the future. Based on the factors determining the low interest in supplying biomass crops, it is noteworthy to suggest that larger efforts need to be made in extension activities to elevate and ameliorate knowledge about biomass crops production among farmers. Also, this finding shows a gap that needs to be filled on the research on the feasibility and consequences of biomass crop planting, because there are still unanswered questions regarding biomass crops characteristics, storage, and transportation issues that affect farmers’ growing decisions, in addition to their risk aversion that should be also a research focus since it was mentioned more than once in the literature as one of the farmers’ determinant factors of non-adoption [e.g. Fewell et al. [ 58 ], Hand et al. [ 59 ]].

Another interesting finding of our research is the negative and significant coefficients for the variable Africa for MRAs of the overall data and the water conservation subset. Compared to farmers from Australasian and American farmers, African farmers require on average lower incentives for water conservation and biomass crops production practices. This result might mean that the efforts of the international and national programs and policies to implement sustainable practices in African agriculture [e.g. The Plan Maroc Vert [ 62 ], the Comprehensive Africa Agriculture Development Program -CAADP- [ 63 ], and ECOWAS Agricultural Policy-ECOWAP-[ 64 , 65 ]] were productive and could encouraged farmers to embrace sustainability. However, the literature provides strong evidence on African farmers’ low willingness to adopt sustainability [e.g., Perret and Stevens [ 37 ]; Mango et al. [ 38 ]; Jha et al. [ 39 ]], and our result is not in line with previous findings. Therefore, as most of the 22.6% sampled studies that were carried in Africa, have their WTA values expressed in local currencies (see S6 Table ) that were converted in $USD for uniformization purposes, we suggest that this controversial result is due to the lower value of African currencies compared to $USD since their currencies’ units trade under one $USD, this might explain the disparity between our result and the literature on sustainability adoption in Africa.

Many studies that focused on the barriers of sustainability adoption in Africa presented a wide range of factors that explain this behavior such as knowledge, labor, profit, [ 66 – 72 ], lack of infrastructure [ 73 ], corruption [ 74 ], gender bias in agriculture [ 75 ], and unstable governments [ 76 ].

Though there is a wide Agricultural Economics research focusing on Africa, based on my review, most studies investigating African farmers’ behavior and drivers for adoption or non-adoption of sustainability, follow the same research approach as studies conducted elsewhere. Consequently, since Africa overlaps many different issues that make its case complicated, researchers need to use more complex models and techniques (e.g. spatial models, dynamic models, general equilibrium models, etc.) [ 72 ], and give more importance to local political and social issues while analyzing African farmers’ behavior.

As a response to sustainable agriculture, an abundance of empirical studies has attempted its promotion by investigating and estimating consumers’ WTP for sustainable products [ 77 ]. These various studies showed that there is a very strong responsiveness and consumers were willing to pay a premium price for sustainability [ 78 ]. Premiums were found for biomass energy [ 79 ], organic fiber [ 80 ], supporting farmers’ adoption of BMPs that enhance water quality [ 81 , 82 ], for policies supporting agricultural practices reducing pollution [ 83 ]…etc.

However, this research is not without limits. First, since our meta-sample was randomly built, the subset regarding water conservation practices doesn’t contain studies carried in America, and similarly for Africa regarding the subset for bioenergy crops production. Thus, it would be better if we could find more studies about these practices in these regions.

Also, it would be ideal if the conversion of all WTA values were estimated at the same time using the same daily currency exchange rate. Also, since the meta-data is compiling values that were obtained from different econometric estimation procedures, future work should consider including variables to indicate the used econometric models.

Needless to say, that the sustainability of some practices is seriously questionable if we refer to all the energy and resources it consumes through the technology or/and the production systems used. Accordingly, this should be another concern to take care of in future research as it would be interesting to investigate within each practice category what would be the perfect sustainable practice. In other words, does a “fully” agricultural sustainable practice even exist?

Though these limits, we tried to avoid methodological mistakes of past meta-analyses in the environmental and natural resource economics, following the “best practices” guidelines for meta-analyses in the field [ 20 ].

In sum, our review shows that on average, farmers are only willing to adopt practices if paid. Moreover, this analysis leads us to state that there are still gaps in the literature regarding the analysis of farmers’ behavior regarding sustainable agriculture which calls for more research (see S1 Fig ). To conclude, this study provides valuable information about farmers’ valuation of sustainable agriculture, which should be taken into consideration by future research focusing on farmers’ WTA for sustainability. Also, knowing a more precise proxy for the value that producers are ready to forgo to adopt green farming, can help industrials and policymakers to understand both the average effect across studies and its variability which should lead to more informed decisions, regarding sustainability programs’ design and how to promote sustainability.

Supporting information

S1 fig. the trend of wta adopting sustainable farming studies based on science-direct publications..

https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pstr.0000037.s001

S1 Table. Number of sample studies and WTA estimates per continent.

https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pstr.0000037.s002

S2 Table. WTA estimates proxy in USD/Ha/Year per continent.

https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pstr.0000037.s003

S3 Table. Simplified meta-regression results for biomass crops production-related ag. practices data.

https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pstr.0000037.s004

S4 Table. Energy data summary statistics.

https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pstr.0000037.s005

S5 Table. Soil data summary statistics.

https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pstr.0000037.s006

S6 Table. Pollution data summary statistics.

https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pstr.0000037.s007

S7 Table. Water data summary statistics.

https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pstr.0000037.s008

S8 Table. List of articles included in the metadata.

https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pstr.0000037.s009

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Farming for Life Quality and Sustainability: A Literature Review of Green Care Research Trends in Europe

Marina garcía-llorente.

1 Department of Applied Research and Agricultural Extension, Madrid Institute for Rural, Agricultural and Food Research and Development (IMIDRA), Finca Experimental ‘‘El Encín’’Ctra N-II, Km 38, Madrid 28800, Spain

Radha Rubio-Olivar

2 Social-Ecological Systems Laboratory, Department of Ecology, Edificio de Biología, Universidad Autónoma de Madrid, C/Darwin 2, Madrid 28049, Spain; [email protected] (R.R.O.); [email protected] (I.G.B.)

Inés Gutierrez-Briceño

Associated data.

Green care is an innovative approach that combines simultaneously caring for people and caring for land through three elements that have not been previously connected: (1) multifunctional agriculture and recognition of the plurality of agricultural system values; (2) social services and health care; and (3) the possibility of strengthening the farming sector and local communities. The current research provides a comprehensive overview of green care in Europe as a scientific discipline through a literature review ( n = 98 studies). According to our results, the Netherlands, the UK, Norway and Sweden followed by Italy have led the scientific studies published in English. Green care research comprises a wide range of perspectives and frameworks (social farming, care farming, nature-based solutions, etc.) with differences in their specificities. Green care studies have mainly focused on measuring the effectiveness of therapeutic interventions. Studies that evaluate its relevance in socio-economic and environmental terms are still limited. According to our results, the most common users studied were people suffering from psychological and mental ill health, while the most common activities were horticulture, animal husbandry and gardening. Finally, we discuss the potential of green care to reconnect people with nature and to diversify the farming sector providing new public services associated with the relational values society obtains from the contact with agricultural systems.

1. Introduction

Agriculture has been performed by our species for approximately 10,000 years [ 1 ], and practices have been altered according to human needs and preferences. The agricultural industrialization of the 20th century dramatically changed agricultural activities and relations between agriculture and our culture; for example, agriculture now focuses largely on the maximization of both production and profit [ 2 ]. This change has become even more severe over the last 50 years, during the green revolution, with the intensification of large-scale agricultural production and the abandonment of the countryside in traditionally agricultural rural areas [ 3 , 4 ].

The consequences of this transition not only has environmental impacts (i.e., loss of agricultural landscapes, water pollution, loss of genetic heritage related to local varieties and breeds), economic impacts (i.e., loss in profitability) and cultural impacts (i.e., loss of local knowledge and identity linked to agricultural management) but also affects our general nutrition, relationships, health and quality of life. The value and importance of the relation between humans and nature has been overlooked during recent decades. However, currently, it is known that contact with nature has a positive influence on quality of life in terms of both physical and psychological health [ 5 , 6 , 7 ]. Nevertheless, this disconnection (in terms of access and appreciation) with agroecosystems and the ecosystem services that agroecosystems provide is increasing in western and urbanized societies. It is argued by Pretty [ 8 ] that as urbanized societies we have become disconnected from the land that sustains us and we cultivate; thus, we are losing part of our culture and identity.

Human beings, as part of nature, have always coexisted with it; thus, the association between people and nature has always existed. This concept has been formalized in the academic world through the study of social-ecological systems [ 9 ]. Following the biophilia theory [ 10 ], this connection should be more important and integrated into our lives, but the ability to connect with and understand nature often depends on our experiences as children, and such experiences should be reinforced in our society [ 11 ]. In addition to the biophilia theory, Kaplan’s attention restoration theory [ 12 ] and Ulrich’s psycho-evolutionary theory [ 13 ] should be highlighted, as these theories defend and explain why and how our surrounding natural environment influences our lives and is important for us. In socio-cultural terms, the current individualist lifestyle in western societies has resulted in a disregard for social well-being, deriving in a disconnection from other people and lack of community [ 14 ]. According to Spain’s Millennium Ecosystem Assessment, in recent decades in urbanized societies’ good social relations have deteriorated, with a specific tendency toward the loss of social cohesion and an increase in individualistic, sedentary and isolated lifestyles [ 15 ]. These trends are reflected by various indicators such the number of people living alone and the amount of television consumption [ 3 ]. This situation affects the most vulnerable people in the system more dramatically, placing them at risk of social exclusion.

Green care is an approach that aims to combine, simultaneously, caring for people and caring for land. It promotes health and well-being for people at risk of social exclusion through the use of natural environments as the central element [ 14 , 16 ]. In green care, a series of activities are carried out in the context of agricultural and natural environments where activities and interactions with nature take place (i.e., activities performed on farms, orchards and gardens, forests, etc.) to produce physical, psychological, emotional, social, cognitive-educational, social and labor-integration benefits for people at risk of social exclusion [ 7 , 14 , 16 , 17 , 18 ]. At those interventions, diverse social groups could be involved, including elderly people, people with mental disabilities, people with various mental disorders or mental health problems (i.e., dementia, stress, anxiety, depression and schizophrenia), refugees, teenagers with problems, ex-prisoners, people with addiction or abuse problems, women suffering from male violence, people with various physical disorders (cancer, obesity, hearing impairment and other disabilities), migrants with difficulties, long-term unemployed people, persons belonging to ethnic minorities, etc.

Green care is an inclusive and umbrella term that includes a broad variety of interventions such as nature-based rehabilitation, care farming, social farming, therapeutic horticulture, animal-assisted intervention, etc. While these concepts are sometimes used as synonyms, all of them are sustained by different backgrounds and theories and have different representations in each country. In this study we will refer to the term green care in order to cover a broad area of research. Over recent decades, in many European countries, the use of agriculture as a tool of public health and social integration has been developed in different forms. Many projects and initiatives have arisen, with the existence of more than 170 care farms in the UK as of 2011 [ 19 ], nearly 600 care farms in the Netherlands as of 2005 [ 20 ], and nearly 700 social farms in Italy [ 17 ]. In this way, in many European countries, green care is a practice with a long history; however, numerous research projects and studies have been developed to formalize the concept only in the last decade. In fact, in 2007, a cost action called “COST Action 866 Green Care in Agriculture” was created as one of the first attempts to increase scientific knowledge of green care, as one of the main limitations of green care has been the lack of evidence about the effectiveness of its various practices [ 16 ].

Since the end of the 20th century and the beginning of the 21st century, there has been an increase in the number of scientific studies focused on green care throughout Europe. Therefore, the current paper uses Europe as a case study with the intention of better understanding the main research trends and pathways that have been taken in terms of green care development to obtain a comprehensive understanding of the progress and dimensions of this new discipline in Europe. The proposed specific objectives of this systematic review have focused on analyzing: (1) which countries have published more, within which approach and which research areas have been emphasized by studies related to green care; (2) the temporal evolution of these studies and the research objectives investigated; (3) the targeted populations of green care studies as well as the activities carried out with each population; and (4) the methods used for assessing green care interventions. Finally, we discuss how our analysis can contribute to future research and green care practices.

2. Materials and Methods

2.1. search procedure.

The methodology of this study consists of a systematic review of the existing scientific literature on green care in Europe. Specifically, we gathered and selected all studies published in peer-reviewed journals via the search engine Web of Science. To encompass the spectrum of terminology used to refer to green care, we considered this term as well as all related terms that have been used. The complete list of English keywords included “care farm”, “ecotherapy”, “farm animal-assisted”, “gardening-based intervention”, “green care”, “horticultural therapy”, “nature-based rehabilitation”, “nature-assisted therapy”, “social farm”, “therapeutic garden”, “therapeutic horticulture”, “working in nature”.

The search was restricted according to the following criteria: (1) all studies published until 2017 were included to avoid incomplete years (i.e., 2018); (2) original articles were from scientific journals to avoid double counting (and excluded short communications, letters to the editor or editorials, communications in congresses and reviews); (3) scientific articles were restricted to those published in English; and (4) scientific articles were published in European countries.

Initially, 128 scientific articles were gathered in the search. Following the application of the above selection criteria and an inspection of the abstracts, 98 valid articles were selected ( Supplementary material, Table S1 ). The remaining articles were excluded from the study because they did not meet any of the above criteria or because a read through of the publication indicated that they did not correspond to the topic in question ( Figure 1 ).

Flow diagram with the different phases of a systematic review (adapted from PRISMA, [ 21 ]).

2.2. Database Generation and Analysis

We extracted the following information from these publications: (1) publication identification (title, authors, year and journal); (2) discipline (level of disciplinary integration, i.e., uni-disciplinary or interdisciplinary, discipline area and research labels); (3) study characteristics (country studied, study type—theoretical or empirical); (4) study approach (following the terminology used in the study) and purpose; (5) target population; (6) type of activities conducted; and (7) methodological approach used to assess the intervention (when an intervention was implemented) ( Table 1 ).

List of variables extracted from the database.

Regarding the purpose of publications, the published studies were classified into three main categories: (1) therapeutic assessments, including all the studies from the health sector that analyzed the effectiveness of different interventions; (2) concept, development and relevance of green care, including all the studies that practically or theoretically addressed the emergence of this new approach or aimed to define concepts, hypothesize potential benefits, or consider the impacts of its implementation; and (3) publications where the professionals were the cornerstone of the article and defined their preferences, views, needs to provide this health and social service as well as their networks (i.e., how are they organized).

First, we explored the current state of knowledge of green care through a general descriptive analysis of all included studies. To do so, we analyzed the countries that have published more studies, the theoretical framework used (care farming, nature-based rehabilitation, etc.), the field-specific disciplines related to the subject, the temporal evolution of the studies that included green care as their main research goal, the activities conducted, the main stakeholders and the methods used. Then, chi-square tests were performed to detect significant associations between specific variables. Specifically, chi-square tests were used to assess the relationship between countries and theoretical frameworks used, countries and discipline areas, countries and user types, countries and activities conducted, and finally, between activities and user types.

3.1. Overview of the Scientific Studies on Green Care Carried out in Europe

A comparison of the studies published in different European countries showed that four countries led the scientific research on green care: the Netherlands (24%), the UK (22%), Norway (17%) and Sweden (16%). These top four countries were followed by Italy, which accounted for 7% of the publications, and other countries, such as Denmark, Spain, Germany, Switzerland, Belgium, Finland and France, which had low representation (approximately 1–4% each) (see Figure 2 ). The differences in the percentages of studies published in different countries may be due to the language restrictions used during the search process, as we analyzed only papers published in English.

Number of publications per country, including the approach used.

Green care research comprises a wide range of perspectives and frameworks with differences in their specificities. In this regard, we identified seven different terminologies associated with those frameworks: care farming (used at 31% of the publications), nature-based rehabilitation (which includes forest interventions and ecotherapy, used at 16% of the publications), green care (15%), therapeutic horticulture (13%), therapeutic gardening (11%), social farming (8%) and farm animal-assisted interventions (5%). We detected significant differences performing chi-squared contingency-table test showing that some countries follow specific approaches. In this regard, the Netherlands used green care concept in its broadest sense more than other terms in their research studies (χ 2 = 27.46; p < 0.05). In the UK most of the studies came from the therapeutic horticulture approach (χ 2 = 21.64; p < 0.05). In Norway we found a significantly higher number of studies using the farm animal-assisted intervention approach (χ 2 = 30.06; p < 0.05). Publications conducted in Sweden used the term nature-based rehabilitation significantly more than other terms (χ 2 = 52.87; p < 0.05). Finally, studies from Italy used mainly the term social farming (χ 2 = 35.46; p < 0.05) ( Figure 2 ).

Most of the articles (63% of the studies analyzed) were interdisciplinary in nature, which allowed for a holistic approach to assessing the field of green care. Concerning the disciplines that assessed the subject of green care, health sciences and environmental sciences were the dominant areas (45% each of them), followed by social sciences (10%). In Europe, green care has been frequently framed in the field of health sciences (including areas such as rehabilitation, geriatrics and gerontology, occupational health, public health, psychiatry, dietetic and nutrition and oncology) and has included research on the therapeutic effects of green care and its impact on indicators of health and well-being. Such research includes publications on the impacts of therapeutic landscapes for older people [ 22 ], horticulture for clinical depression [ 23 ], and farm animal-assisted interventions for people with clinical depression [ 24 ]. From the environmental perspective (including researchers from the fields of vegetal science, agriculture, ecology and forest science), examples of published studies have focused on the values of landscapes and their management [ 25 ] or on the conceptualization of terms and the capacity of green care farms to promote social-ecological sustainability and ecosystem services [ 26 ]. A lower number of authors came from social sciences backgrounds emphasizing socioeconomic aspects; such as analyzing the economic impacts of green care, including indicators of expenditure and employment [ 27 ]; or investigating the evolution of rural social cooperatives engaged in green care farm practices [ 28 ]. When we performed the chi-squared contingency table test we detected significant differences, showing that the Netherlands and the UK were specialized in specific research areas. Such specialization was specifically seen in the Netherlands, where there was a predominance of studies coming from the environmental sciences (χ 2 = 9.21; p < 0.05). In the UK most of the studies came from the health sector (χ 2 = 11.88; p < 0.05), which is consistent with the therapeutic horticulture approach used with clear health goals defined ( Figure 2 ).

3.2. Temporal Evolution of Green Care Studies and Their Research Objectives

The first study was published in the UK in 1979, and it focused on the requirements of horticultural training programs for people with mental health disabilities [ 29 ]. During the 1990s, two studies were published in relation to the concept, development and relevance of green care. These two theoretical studies were conducted in the health sector and explored the role of horticultural therapy [ 30 ] and gardens [ 31 ] in supporting people with disabilities, and they emphasized the elderly population. These types of studies had the purpose of providing confidence to caregivers regarding the use of green tools in human well-being interventions. Since 2004, a progressive increase in the number of studies has been observed, and this increase has been exponential since 2010 ( Figure 3 ). In 2004, a network was created to promote knowledge sharing in European countries; it was the community of practice (Cop) “farming for health”. Later, in 2007, a project called “COST Action 866 Green Care in Agriculture” was launched, and it aimed to further investigate the concept of green care and its development in different European countries. The COST Action 866 Green Care Initiative was born in 2007 as a network in which researchers, engineers and scientists cooperated and whose main objective was to increase knowledge within the framework of green care. This project involved researchers from 22 countries, and it aimed to promote scientific knowledge in relation to green care, develop and deepen the concept, and highlight the potential of this new discipline in different European countries [ 16 ]). Thus, COST 866 was one of the first initiatives to formalize green care as a scientific discipline. Subsequently, at the scientific level, the European SoFar (Social Farming in Multifunctional Farms) project was financed by the Sixth Framework Programme during the 2006–2009 period. More recently, the SoFab Project (Social Farming across Borders) has been approved and implemented (2014–2017) in Ireland and Northern Ireland through INTERREG IVA Cross-border Programme funding. All these academic initiatives may explain the increase in the number of published studies.

Temporal trends in published research by the study purpose.

Considering the general purposes of these publications, articles assessing health interventions have a long tradition, while studies exploring the concept, development and implementation of this discipline have been present but to a much lesser extent. During recent years, articles from the perspective of green care providers and how they are organized have become more visible ( Figure 3 ). In our sample, we found that 58% of the studies were assessments on therapeutic intervention. Specifically, these studies from the health sector analyze the effectiveness of different treatments with different user types. Währborg et al. conducted a study comparing the effects of therapeutic gardening with the effects of conventional therapy on the rehabilitation of people suffering from depression or stress [ 32 ]. The results obtained after therapy concluded that people who had been treated in nature required less medical help than the other group. The study carried out by [ 33 ] aimed to evaluate whether the results of therapy that used activities in boreal forests could be utilized for the rehabilitation of patients suffering from exhaustion disorder. One of the results obtained suggested that the effect of this therapy is transitory, indicating that activities in nature should not be temporary in our lives; rather, these activities should be incorporated into our daily lives. The influence of contact with nature on children with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder was examined by [ 34 ]. The way in which women with stress-related illnesses experienced rehabilitation in a therapeutic garden was described by [ 35 ].

Then, 27% of the studies emphasized the concept, development and relevance of green care and included practical or theoretical publications that addressed the emergence of this novel approach; these studies aimed to identify the concepts and potential benefits, implementation possibilities and legislative frames that supported its implementation. These aspects differed by country, and many of these studies analyzed the evolution of green care in different countries that had their own particularities and trends, as seen by the evolution in the Netherlands [ 36 , 37 ], Flanders [ 36 ], Italy [ 28 ], and Switzerland [ 38 ]. Finally, in 15% of the publications, professionals were the cornerstone of the research, and they defined their preferences, views, need to provide this social service and health care, as well as their networks and organizational strategies and the benefits that they could obtain by including green care (mainly care and social farms) in their enterprises [ 39 , 40 , 41 ].

3.3. Target Population and Greem Care Activities

Green care research covers a wide range of users who benefit from the interventions in which they participate. Following our sample, 10 categories of users have been identified, and two of these categories stand out ( Figure 4 ): people suffering from psychological health illnesses such as depression, burnout and/or stress (e.g., [ 35 , 42 ]; in 30% of the studies), and people suffering from mental health illnesses, such as cases of dementia, schizophrenia, personality and behavioral disorders and other mental health problems (e.g., [ 43 , 44 ]; in 21% of the studies). Other publications focused on children and young people at risk of exclusion (e.g., those with behavioral problems or with dysfunctional family backgrounds; such as [ 11 ]; in 8% of the studies), on people with learning disabilities (e.g., [ 45 ]; in 7% of the studies), on elderly populations (e.g., [ 22 ]; in 7% of the studies), and on people suffering from physical disabilities or physical health illnesses (e.g., people with chronic muscle pain, coronary and pulmonary diseases or cancer; [ 46 ]; in 6% of the studies). Finally, a more limited number of studies focused on people suffering from addictions (4%), offenders (e.g., [ 47 ]; in 3% of the studies), people experiencing long-term unemployment (e.g., [ 48 ]; in 1% of the studies), and refugees and displaced people (e.g., [ 49 ]; in 1% of the studies).

Type of users involved in green care programs.

Most of the studies were concentrated on a particular type of user (in 90% of the studies). We found a higher number of studies on people suffering from mental health illnesses in the Netherlands than in other countries (χ 2 = 4.71; p < 0.05). We found a significantly higher number of studies focused on people suffering from psychological health illnesses in Sweden than in other countries (χ 2 = 23.67; p < 0.001). Finally, we found a significantly higher number of studies focused on people with learning disabilities in the UK than in other countries (χ 2 = 7.74; p < 0.05).

A wide variety of activities and tasks have been analyzed in the literature review conducted. Horticulture stands out as the most widely performed activity (32%), followed by animal husbandry by feeding and taking care of farm animals and working in stables (27%), gardening (26%), and outdoor activities, such as forest walks and other physical activities in green spaces (24%; Figure 5 ). Other types of activities that were carried out included being in contact with nature (e.g., passive exposure to vegetated environments) and contemplation (12%); food processing, cooking and preparing meals from farm products for sale (9%); agriculture production, including viticulture and olive orchards (9%); relaxation (6%); conversation with the farmers, other staff and the farm community (7%); firewood collection (2%) and equine-assisted therapy (2%). There were also mentions of training and educational activities through combined workshops (e.g., textile, carpentry, ceramics and art) focused on agricultural education and user training for labor market integration.

Green care activities carried out during interventions.

In 60% of the publications analyzed, a unique principal activity was studied, with 27% of the studies having two or three activities and 13% of the publications describing more than four activities. The typology of activities also differed from country to country in some cases, and we found a higher number of studies on engaging in outdoor activities (χ 2 = 6.73; p < 0.05), relaxation activities in nature (χ 2 = 18.38; p < 0.001) and gardening (χ 2 = 6.03; p < 0.001) in Sweden than in other countries. Gardening was significantly more studied in the UK than in other countries (χ 2 = 5.11; p < 0.05). In addition, Norway and the Netherlands produced more studies related to animal-assisted interventions, including activities such as animal husbandry (χ 2 = 7.36 and χ 2 = 5.25, respectively; p < 0.05). Finally, we tested associations between activities and user types. Following chi-square tests, we found that research publications studied the impact of relaxation activities on people suffering from psychological health illness (χ 2 = 7.00; p < 0.05).

3.4. Methodological Tools for Assessing Green Care Interventions

The most common methods used to evaluate green care interventions were interviews (43%) and surveys (41%; Figure 6 ). Interviews involved semi-structured guides and open-ended questions to explore users’ experiences with green care practices. This was the case in the work conducted by [ 50 ], who analyzed forest-based rehabilitation through semi-structured interviews and analyzed the results from the perspective of the grounded theory. Interviews were carried out by [ 51 ] with care farmer professionals to explore the characteristics of diverse types of care farms in the Netherlands. Interviews were conducted by [ 52 ] with therapeutic garden users who had stress-related disorders to explore how they experienced the rehabilitation process.

Methodological tools to assess intervention effectiveness.

Other studies have used quantitative data collected from questionnaires using experimental or quasi-experimental designs at clinical assesments. How a woodland program improved the psychological well-being of members of deprived urban communities was assessed by [ 53 ] using the perceived stress scale. Horticultural therapy as a physical health, mental health and social interaction with patients with chronic musculoskeletal pain was used by [ 54 ]. They used an experimental design and assessed indicators measured by the West Haven-Yale multidimensional pain inventory or the hospital anxiety and depression scale. A lower number of other studies gathered information from participant observations (8%), official statistics (7%), focal groups (7%), participatory methods (2%) and recordings (2%).

4. Discussion

4.1. overview of green care discipline across europe.

This study builds on previous literature reviews of green care interventions. A literature review was completed by [ 55 ] ( n = 38 studies) on nature-assisted therapy that used controlled and observational studies to evaluate the scientific evidence, while five other publications were dedicated to specific user groups. The impacts on military veterans of sport and physical activity, including nature-based physical activities, were analyzed by [ 56 ] , ( n = 11 studies). In the same way, [ 57 ] focused their literature review ( n = 20 studies) on military veterans suffering traumatic experiences after active service and their participation in nature-assisted therapies. The evidence on the effectiveness of farm-based interventions for people with mental health disorders was reviewed by [ 58 ] ( n = 11 studies). The benefits of gardening-based mental health interventions was evaluated by [ 59 ] ( n = 10). Regarding dementia care, Whear et al. used qualitative and qualitative studies to examine the impacts of gardens and outdoor spaces on people with dementia ([ 60 ]; n = 17 studies), while González et al. evaluated the benefits of sensory gardens and horticultural activities ([ 61 ]; n = 16). Those reviews aimed to evaluate evidence that supported the effectiveness of green care interventions to significantly improve public health, mainly the health of specific users. Finally, a descriptive review was conducted by [ 62 ] of research on care farms for adults with mental health problems in Norway.

This research provides the first attempt to complete a comprehensive review of green care as a scientific discipline and includes studies assessing not only the effectiveness of interventions from the perspective of health but also other key aspects that require scientific attention, such as the concept, development and relevance of green care, as well as publications where professionals’ preferences, views, needs and networks were explored. Here, we analyzed trends in green care research using 98 publications that were conducted in different European countries. Although this study covered all Europe, we specifically reviewed scientific articles published in English. This limit provided a systematic method of searching for publications and avoided duplication; simultaneously, there was a limitation imposed by not collecting works published in other languages. For instance, there is evidence concerning the situation of green care under the approach of social farming in Catalonia in studies written in Spanish [ 63 ] or Catalan [ 64 ]. Much research conducted in Italy, mainly within the framework of social farming, has been published in Italian [ 17 ]; thus, such research has been underrepresented in the current study. In addition, Pawelczyk et al. attributed the lack of knowledge and research in Poland to the lack of knowledge about the usefulness of farming activities as a tool for tackling socio-health problems [ 65 ].

In this study we decided to use the broadest framework (green care) in order to cover the larger number of studies developed in Europe. However, as presented in our findings and also pointed out by other authors, there is a diversity of terms associated with different interpretations of the synergy between being in contact with natural and agricultural landscapes and the promotion of health together with other quality of life dimensions (e.g., employment, good social relationships, equity, education) [ 14 , 48 , 66 ]. Here, we identified seven terms used in research publications, the most popular being care farming. Nevertheless there were differences among countries, for example the green care term was used more in the Netherlands research, therapeutic horticulture approach in UK, farm animal-assisted intervention in Norway, the concept of nature-based rehabilitation in Sweden, and studies from Italy mainly used the term social farming. Some of the differences between those approaches are in the level of care and therapy provided [ 16 ]. Those interventions done within structured rehabilitation or health programs with clearly defined patient-orientated goals are commonly defined with the terms therapy or care such as therapeutic horticulture, therapeutic gardening or care farming [ 67 ]. In care farming and social farming the objectives are more related to conducting meaningful occupational activities and achieving employment goals at real production and commercial farms [ 40 ] and especially within social farming the therapeutic intent is not so explicit, with the aim being to promote innovation and collaboration pathways between sectors in local communities following social and employment inclusion and integration principles [ 68 ]. Other studies differ by the key element or tool used during the intervention, such as being in contact with nature at outdoor surroundings (at nature-based rehabilitation, [ 50 ]) or farm animal-assisted therapy being essential to the interactions established with animals (such as empathy, expression emotions or not being judged; [ 69 ]). In this way, green care is an umbrella term that represents a complex interaction between nature–people with different goals and specificities that determines the formalization of the approach. Green care is a dynamic concept, that has developed rapidly during the last 10 years and that will continue in progress as it represents a mirror of the different European countries and societies in terms of its culture, path dependence, needs and future expectations. This study reflects the green care research trends, giving the opportunity to offer an overview of the recent years and present time and to draw conclusions for the future. As presented by Di Iacovo et al., in Europe there are two models derived from two welfare systems: the northern European specialized model and the Mediterranean communitarian one. While in the first (followed by countries such as Sweden and the Netherlands), green care farms provide a health service (delivered by specialized facilities and skills) in private farms they receive direct payments (from the state or from the market being directly paid by users) for those services [ 70 ]. In the Mediterranean model (e.g., Italy or Spain) usually farmers do not receive a direct payment but receive other benefits more related with enhancing their reputation and expanding their networks. In this model, the goals pursued are more linked to social inclusion and justice than therapy. This situation may also explain the larger number of studies found in northern countries compared with those in the Mediterranean area; the number of studies being higher when the green care activities are more explicitly defined and where it is essential to measure the therapeutic effectiveness of the interventions conducted. In fact, there are small cooperatives or enterprises operating at the agrifood sector sustained by social economy and following agroecological principles (e.g., community supported agriculture) which are closely connected with social farming (e.g., justice, inclusion, solidarity, promotion of rural economies) but this is not explicitly stated, and it would be interesting to study the association between both approaches.

4.2. Target Population and Green Care Activities

It has increasingly been seen that green care responds to the needs of diverse groups, such as the training and working skills required by people who have experienced long-term unemployment or low employability, and the social integration of marginalized communities or spaces for community dialogue and interaction [ 71 ]. It improves not only their health but also their physical, psychological and emotional well-being (e.g., [ 55 ]). Green care provides opportunities to allow people to actively participate in society and agricultural landscape conservation. Green care has the potential to stress the relationships established between people and nature, uncovering the relational values obtained from agricultural landscapes. In an increasingly urban society, spending time in more natural, greener and more rural environments can help to meet new food, labor and social needs [ 72 ]. It has been proposed that to go beyond the classical duality to sustain landscape conservation based on intrinsic vs. instrumental values, policies should take into consideration relational values derived from the relationships establish between people and nature (e.g., cultural identity, stewardship principles), including relationships that are between people but involve natural surroundings (e.g., social cohesion) [ 73 ]. Active exposure to nature can promote a healthier lifestyle in the long term, which can help people cope with the effects of rapid lifestyles experienced in cities (e.g., stress, depression, fatigue) and address problems (quality food or lack of physical activity) facing people with increasingly sedentary futures [ 74 ].

Regarding green care activities, according to our findings, the most researched activities are horticulture, feeding and taking care of farm animals, gardening activities and outdoor activities, such as forest walks and green exercise. We found some significant associations between users and activities. In this regard, [ 75 ] analyzed different green care farming activities in terms of their suitability for different type of users taking into account aspects such as previous knowledge needed, need of support, risk due to the use of tools, etc. It would be a step forward to carry out further research to connect practices and specific well-being objectives to reach different users.

5. Conclusions

Some of the difficulties that a new science, movement and practice such as green care can face include gaining scientific, political and social credibility. Despite the advances in research publications, the potential of green care is still poorly understood [ 19 , 38 ]. As shown, in the last decade, researchers have started to study the effectiveness of green care compared to other therapeutic processes. However, since green care (mainly its orientation through social farming) contributes to rural revitalization—and the conservation of the agricultural landscape—it requires more scientific research that evaluates its relevance in socio-economic and environmental terms. It has been stressed that there is a need to recognize the complexity of views required to evaluate green care and to go beyond health indicators, since the mainstream measures of those indicators could mask and underestimate key components necessary to assess the development of green care practices (e.g., management procedures, networks of actors involved, certifications, consumer knowledge and acceptance of green care farms products, private or public policies to support them, etc.) [ 76 ]. Further research that proposes indicators and measures to analyses it as an innovative practice to diversify the farming sector, conserve agricultural landscapes and improve human well-being is required to ensure its establishment. In this regard, green care farming can be a major source of income for farmers [ 19 , 20 ] and a way to increase their visibility and reputation [ 26 ], which can stimulate the economy of the sector. It is necessary to determine which strategies farmers use, whether they are sufficiently innovative and whether they favor economic development [ 77 ]. It is also important to analyze the key factors that contribute to the success of green care projects by focusing on the point of view of producers and their willingness to innovate [ 40 ]. According to our findings, during recent years, the number of publications from the perspective of green care providers has been increasing ( Figure 3 ). A shift in production models on farms can attract new types of workers by offering diversified activities through other approaches, skills, interests, benefits and resources that break with traditional farming and livestock activities. The diversification of agricultural activities can offer farm owners opportunities to provide new services. Green care, together with agro-tourism, has also been seen as motivation for women to diversify farming activities and promote female succession in farm properties in Norway, helping to counterbalance the masculinization of rural areas [ 78 ]. This can provide an incentive to significantly halt population declines in rural areas and could stimulate an increase in the number of women owners at the head of green care activities that occur on farms.

Green care activities can play a key role in enhancing life quality and sustainability in rural areas by providing economic and social benefits, as seen by recent cases of rural social cooperatives that have emerged in Italy [ 28 ]. Such cooperatives create a new relationship between urban and rural areas, as urban people are attracted to local markets in which they can find organic and ethical products with added social value. As was shown by [ 79 ], people were willing to support a green care initiative in the UK and were willing to contribute their money and voluntary time. Similarly, Carbone, A. et al. found that consumers’ buying groups in short food supply chains in Italy hold a strong concern for ethical issues when purchasing products and had an interest in supporting social farming products [ 80 ]. Unlike other economic sectors, agricultural activity can be understood as a transversal field with the capacity to influence a diversity of well-being components, not only in terms of production but also in terms of nutritional, educational, social and relational components as well as a new way of understanding the food system and our relationship with natural environments. This viewpoint aims to intensify social capital over intensive technological capital. From this perspective, farmers are essential actors since they can provide new services to society.

Acknowledgments

We would like to thank the two anonymous referees for providing thoughtful and valuable comments and suggestions.

Supplementary Materials

The following are available online at http://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/15/6/1282/s1 , Table S1: Publications included in the systematic review.

Author Contributions

M.G.L. conceived and designed the study; R.R.O. and I.G.B. conducted the literature review and data extraction; M.G.L. provided conceptual and analytical advice; R.R.O., I.G.B. and M.G.L. conducted the data analysis, M.G.L. wrote most of the paper.

This research was funded by a grant from the Spanish National Institute for Agriculture and Food Research and Technology, co-funded by the Social European Fund (Doc-INIA CCAA); and the IMIDRA research projects: Social Farming viability at the Madrid Region (FP16 VAS) and Assessment of Ecosystem Services provided by Agroecosystems (FP16 ECO).

Conflicts of Interest

The authors declare no conflict of interest.

The agricultural transition: Building a sustainable future

In 2020, we released our report Agriculture and climate change , which identified key actions the agricultural industry could take to support decarbonization. 1 “ Reducing agriculture emissions through improved farming practices ,” McKinsey, May 6, 2020. For this report, our research has focused on how decarbonization measures have evolved, as well as on the key barriers to their adoption and the actions industry players and investors can take to support their uptake. At the same time, conversations about sustainable transitions have increasingly focused on agriculture’s effects on nature and society beyond climate change. For example, agricultural land covers half of all habitable land and is responsible for 70 percent of freshwater withdrawals. 2 Hannah Ritchie and Max Roser, “Land use,” Our World in Data, September 2019; “Water in agriculture,” World Bank, October 5, 2022. In addition, food systems are the primary driver of biodiversity loss around the world, and these systems have growing effects on biosphere integrity, human health, and food access. 3 “Our global food system is the primary driver of biodiversity loss,” United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), February 3, 2021. While climate change remains the focus of this report, decarbonization and the actions to achieve it cannot be considered separately from their broader impacts on nature and society. Trade-offs and other benefits associated with decarbonization actions are highlighted throughout the report.

About the authors

Achieving a 1.5° pathway will require actions that extend beyond the farm throughout the value chain. Chief among these actions are reducing food loss and waste, adopting dietary shifts, and adapting how we use arable land, all of which are critical to decarbonization and will help the industry meet global food needs while maintaining the livelihoods of farmers (Exhibit 1).

• Tackling food waste. Approximately 30 percent of the world’s food is lost or wasted every year. 4 “Food loss” refers to food that is lost at or near the time of harvest, while “food waste” refers to food that is fit for consumption but discarded at the consumption or retail phase. For more, see UNEP food waste index report 2021 , UNEP, March 4, 2021. Food loss and waste not only contribute an estimated 8 to 10 percent of global anthropogenic emissions 5 Climate change and land , Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), 2019. but also drive food insecurity and overproduction, the latter of which contributes in turn to nature degradation. It is estimated that food waste could be reduced by approximately 23 percent by 2050, which would account for approximately 0.7 metric gigatons (Gt) of CO 2 equivalent (CO 2 e). 6 “IPR Forecast Policy Scenario + Nature,” PRI Association, January 9, 2023. To achieve these reductions, we will need to better connect supply chains, improve preservation, adapt purchasing habits, and make more productive use of food loss or waste, creating opportunities for industrials across the value chain.
• Shifting what we eat. Dietary shifts are already opening new markets and creating value for farmers and industrials. Producers and consumers can avoid releasing a substantial amount of emissions by turning to alternative protein sources, including plant-based products and precision-fermented and cellular products that are nearly identical to animal protein products. For example, classic plant-based options emit 12 percent of the total greenhouse gases (GHG) emitted by cattle and have a lesser ratio of methane per kilogram of product. 7 “Global Livestock Environmental Assessment Model (GLEAM),” Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), accessed January 4, 2023. Dietary shifts away from animal proteins could save nearly 640 million hectares of land, which could in turn be reforested or be a locus for other nature-based solutions. 8 Global innovation needs assessments: Protein diversity , ClimateWorks Foundation, November 1, 2021. Of course, in the case of alternative protein sources, trade-offs, including human health, food access, and farmer equity, are especially important and must be adequately considered as part of any transition.
• Addressing land use with nature-based solutions. Agricultural land covers approximately 4.9 billion hectares, or 38 percent of the world’s terrestrial area, and is estimated to account for approximately 80 percent of global land-use change as land is cleared or converted for cropland, feed production, or grazing land. 9 “Land use in agriculture by the numbers,” FAO, May 7, 2020; Tim G. Benton et al., Food system impacts on biodiversity loss: Three levers for food system transformation in support of nature , Chatham House, February 2021. Given this enormous land-use footprint, nature-based solutions, including conservation and restoration solutions, have the potential to abate 6.7 GtCO 2 e in 2050—approximately 80 percent of the total abatement potential. 10 Based on McKinsey analysis and Inevitable Policy Response (IPR) Nature Scenario; “IPR 2021 Forecast Policy Scenario and 1.5C Required Policy Scenario,” Vivid Economics, accessed January 4, 2023. The largest levers for achieving this potential concern improved forestry practices, especially forest restoration. Notably, adoption of many nature-based solutions will likely require increased land-use intensification to meet global food demand and adequate incentives for farmers to limit future land conversion.

Changing how we farm, the focus of this report, is critical to a successful transition. Building on our previous work, we have defined 28 measures that can support decarbonization on the farm while creating potential value for the industry and farmers (Exhibit 2). Together, these measures have an annual emissions-reduction of approximately 2.2 GtCO 2 . Many of these measures can be implemented at little to no cost to the farmer and have benefits beyond emissions reductions, including yield and biodiversity uplift.

Although a 1.5˚ pathway exists and can create value for farmers and the broader industry, meaningful barriers are preventing adoption of decarbonization solutions at scale. Farmers are central to the sustainability transition, but they do not yet have sufficient incentives to adopt new methods and technologies. Emissions tracing and other actions require new, innovative solutions to facilitate decarbonization. And there is much room to grow in helping farmers overcome challenges in scaling their operations and maintaining profitability.

The findings in this report can guide food and agriculture organizations as they transition to increased sustainability. Each intervention should be tailored to its specific context, but broadly speaking, change requires the following:

• financial incentives to spur farmer action, whether through carbon markets, green premiums, subsidies, rebates, or other green-financing mechanisms
• ecosystem collaboration and improved tracking and traceability to bring solutions to market and support monetization of on-farm practice changes and purchaser decision making
• research and investment to bend the cost curve to reduce adoption costs of existing solutions and support the development and scale-up of new technologies

The food and agriculture value chain has a chance to create a more sustainable ecosystem that feeds a growing planet while maintaining the livelihoods of farmers. With tailored and concentrated action, industry players, policy makers, and investors can accelerate the path to this future while enabling their own growth.

Although the path to achieving 1.5˚C will not be straightforward, it can create real business value for farmers and players throughout the value chain, with additional environmental benefits beyond reducing climate change. Action will be required beyond the farm, but there is a real opportunity to drive on-farm decarbonization while capturing business value. A more sustainable future for agriculture that feeds a growing planet while maintaining the livelihoods of farmers is feasible. And industry players, policy makers, and investors can accelerate the path to the future while enabling their own growth.

Onyx Bengston is a consultant in McKinsey’s Denver office; Sherry Feng is a consultant in the New York office, where Vasanth Ganesan is a partner; Joshua Katz is a partner in the Stamford office; Hannah Kitchel is a consultant in the Boston office; Pradeep Prabhala is a partner in the Washington, DC, office; Peter Mannion is a partner in the Dublin office; Adam Richter is a consultant in the New Jersey office; Wilson Roen is a consultant in the Chicago office; and Jan Vlcek is a consultant in the Vancouver office.

The authors wish to thank the following people for their contributions to this report: Michael Aldridge, Peter Amer, Robert Beach, Stephen Butler, Jude (Judith) Capper, N. Andy Cole, Amelia de Almeida, Albert De Vries, Stefan Frank, Pierre J. Gerber, Mathijs J. H. M. Harmsen, Roger S. Hegarty, Mario Herrero, Ermias Kebreab, Michael MacLeod, Jennie Pryce, Caeli Richardson, Kendall Samuelson, Pete Smith, Philip Thornton, Mark van Nieuwland, Roel Veerkamp, and Xiaoyu (Iris) Feng.

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Making Small Farms More Sustainable — and Profitable

• Lino Miguel Dias,
• Robert S. Kaplan,
• Harmanpreet Singh

A case study of Better Life Farming, an innovative public-private partnership in India, Indonesia, and Bangladesh.

Smallholder farms provide a large proportion of food supply in developing economies, but 40% of these farmers live on less than U.S.$2/day.  With a rapidly growing global population it is imperative to improve the productivity and security of farmers making up this sector.  This article presents the results of Better Life Farming, an ecosystem that connects smallholder farmers in India, Indonesia, and Bangladesh to the capabilities, products, and services of corporations and NGOs.

More than 2 billion people currently live on about 550 million small farms, with 40% of them on incomes of less than U.S. $2 per day. Despite high rates of poverty and malnutrition, these smallholders produce food for more than 50% of the population in low-and middle-income countries, and they have to be part of any solution for achieving the 50% higher food production required to feed the world’s projected 2050 population of nearly 10 billion people.

• LD Lino Miguel Dias is Vice-President Smallholder Farming in the Crop Science Division at Bayer AG, a global pharmaceuticals and life sciences company based in Germany, and Invited Professor at University of Lisbon, Portugal.
• Robert S. Kaplan is a senior fellow and the Marvin Bower Professor of Leadership Development emeritus at Harvard Business School. He coauthored the McKinsey Award–winning HBR article “ Accounting for Climate Change ” (November–December 2021).
• HS Harmanpreet Singh is Smallholder Partnerships Lead for the Asia Pacific region at Bayer AG, a global pharmaceutical and life Sciences company.

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Sustainable Agriculture

Agriculture often places significant pressure on natural resources and the environment. Sustainable agricultural practices are intended to protect the environment, expand the Earth’s natural resource base, and maintain and improve soil fertility. Based on a multi-pronged goal, sustainable agriculture seeks to:

• Increase profitable farm income
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USDA Announces More Than $146M Investment in Sustainable Agricultural Research

WASHINGTON, Oct. 6, 2021 – U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) Secretary Tom Vilsack announced today an investment of more than $146 million in sustainable agricultural research projects aimed at improving a robust, resilient, climate-smart food and agricultural system.

This investment is made under the National Institute of Food and Agriculture’s (NIFA) Sustainable Agricultural Systems program. This innovative program focuses on a broad base of needed research solutions from addressing labor challenges and promoting land stewardship to correcting climate change impacts in agriculture and critical needs in food and nutrition.

“USDA is tackling urgent challenges facing American agriculture and communities across our nation. Critical issues like food insecurity, drought resilience and response, animal disease prevention, and market disruption requires investments to help meet these challenges. This is the time for agriculture, forestry, and rural communities to act. Together we can lead the way with investments in science and research and climate-smart solutions that feed and nourish families, improve the profitability and resilience of producers, improve forest health, while creating new income opportunities, and building wealth that stays in rural communities,” said Secretary Vilsack.

This investment is part the third installment of NIFA grants within its Agriculture and Food Research Initiative’s (AFRI) Sustainable Agricultural Systems program designed to improve plant and animal production and sustainability, and human and environmental health. AFRI is the nation’s leading and largest competitive grants program for agricultural sciences. These grants are available to eligible colleges, universities and other research organizations.

“Investments in research projects likes these awarded today will result in long-term improvements in agricultural practices that will benefit consumers, farmers and the environment,” said NIFA Director Dr. Carrie Castille. “It takes an inclusive systems approach to tackle these major issues. We are excited to see impacts this research investment will generate for our nation to move us towards solutions that benefit all Americans.”

Examples of the 15 projects funded under the AFRI Sustainable Agriculture Systems projects include:

• University of California researchers and their partners aim to alleviate groundwater over-use and sustain irrigated agriculture in the Southwest United States. They will develop innovative education programs and novel Extension programming to support sustainable groundwater and irrigated agricultural systems, create models (geophysical, hydrology, biophysical, and socioeconomics), develop climate change adaptation management strategies, and produce decision support tools. ($10 million)
• University of Hawaii and partners will develop a Children’s Healthy Living Food Systems Model and simulations to identify and test drivers of resiliency in food supply chains for decreasing food waste and increasing food and nutrition security, healthful diets and health among children. The work aims to prevent chronic disease in households and communities across the U.S. Affiliated Pacific insular area. ($10 million)
• Central State University and its multidisciplinary team, partnering with 1890 land-grant Historically Black Colleges and Universities, a 1994 land-grant Tribal College and 1862 Land-grant Universities, will investigate using hemp as an aquaculture feed ingredient to address food safety concerns about consuming seafood raised with hemp feed additives. They will also research ways to increase economic markets and production sustainability for seafood and hemp. ($10 million)
• A Colby College partnership project will compare and optimize algae feed additives for dairy cows, and will assess the impact at the animal-, farm- and community-level. The project will include developing integrated public outreach programs to enhance milk production, mitigate greenhouse gas emissions and recover nutrients. ($10 million)

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Sustainable farm work in agroecology: how do systemic factors matter?

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• Published: 15 February 2024

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• Sandra Volken   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0001-9856-2957 1 &
• Patrick Bottazzi 1  

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Agroecological farming is widely considered to reconcile improved working and living conditions of farmers while promoting social, economic, and ecological sustainability. However, most existing research primarily focuses on relatively narrow trade-offs between workload, economic and ecological outcomes at farm level and overlooks the critical role of contextual factors. This article conducts a critical literature review on the complex nature of agroecological farm work and proposes the holistic concept of sustainable farm work (SFW) in agroecology together with a heuristic evaluation framework. The latter was applied to ten case studies to test its relevance, affirming positive outcomes of agroecology on SFW, such as improved food sovereignty, biodiversity conservation, and social inclusiveness, but also showing trade-offs, including increased workload and potential yield reductions. Further, results show that contextual factors, such as policy support, market regulation, and access to resources, heavily influence the impact of agroecological practices on SFW. This article strongly argues for the importance of a holistic understanding of SFW and its contextualization within multiple socio-ecological system levels. The proposed framework establishes clear relationships between agroecology and SFW. An explicit recognition of these multidimensional relationships is essential for maximizing positive outcomes of agroecology in different contexts and fostering SFW. On a theoretical level, this research concludes that, from a holistic perspective, work is an entry point to studying the potential of agroecology to drive a sustainable agroecological transition in economic, social, and ecological terms.

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Introduction

Conventional agriculture and food systems not only contribute to soil degradation and exacerbate ecological challenges, but also have significant impacts on farmers’ working conditions (FAO 2014 ; FAO and IFAD 2019 ). These impacts are evident through the excessive use of harmful chemical inputs, the immense pressure on farmers’ workload, their alienation through monotonous tasks, and inadequate financial and moral compensation, including the lack of social recognition, training support, and opportunities for capabilities development. The complexity of working conditions alongside ecological outcomes of conventional or alternative farming systems requires further critical and theoretical analysis.

Agroecology has been defined from both social and ecological criteria as a holistic concept of sustainable agriculture that combines issues of social justice with complex practices of agroecosystem management (Wezel et al. 2014 ). Defined as a set of farming practices, a science, and a social movement, agroecology is a holistic concept that includes an extensive collection of ecological, economic, and social characteristics brought forward by scientists and social movements over the past four decades (Wezel et al. 2009 ). This generic and universally accepted definition considers multiple dimensions and aspects of ‘sustainability’. As a farming approach, agroecology emphasizes stimulating synergies between biotic and abiotic components of the agroecosystem by reducing external inputs and maintaining the regenerative capacity of the agroecosystems (Rosset and Altieri 1997 ). As a science, agroecology promotes the diversity of knowledge, indigenous and scientific, and defends most aspects of cognitive and contributive justice for farmers and other vulnerable food system actors (Coolsaet 2016 ; Timmermann and Felix 2015 ). As a social movement, agroecology emphasizes the necessity to preserve ecosystems to preserve human and non-human life in all its manifestations. It promotes the empowerment of farmers and rural societies in opposition to land and resource grabbing and the domination of transnational companies in imposing their inputs and products with unfair conditions. The agroecological movement supports farm workers’ and other food system actors’ engagement in preserving the broader agroecosystems, reinforcing food sovereignty, and strengthening solidarity networks (Altieri et al. 2011 ). agroecology is also a philosophical and spiritual attitude related to fundamental aspects of the nature-society relationship and the values of sufficiency for human well-being (Rabhi 2017 ; Toledo 2022 ). All these aspects, taken from critical literature on agroecology and social movements, have manifest and more hidden implications on working conditions and the construction of a holistic concept of sustainable farm work (SFW) .

Following these thoughts, agroecology has also been considered as means to reconciliate environmental integrity and decent working and living conditions. Several studies have attempted to conceptualize these links for the most vulnerable farmers. It has been widely suggested that agroecological farming is more demanding in terms of human labor input (e.g., Rosset and Altieri 1997 ) with significant impacts on workload or labor costs (Pearson 2007 ) while providing higher food prices, improving long-term yield stability, and decreasing fertilizer costs (Altieri et al. 2011 ; Van der Ploeg et al. 2019 ). As additional compensation for higher workloads, the literature suggests that agroecology provides a better quality of work by increasing motivation and work satisfaction (Mann and Besser 2017 ), empowering women, and creating more equitable gender relations (Bezner Kerr et al. 2019 ), quality of life and health of workers (Jansen 2000 ), social support (Dupre et al. 2017 ), or political expression (Dumont and Baret 2017 ). Moreover, agroecology is promising benefits beyond the farm level, including ecological benefits (e.g., Palomo-Campesino et al. 2018 ; Rosa-Schleich et al. 2019 ) and a potential increase in rural employment (Garibaldi and Pérez-Méndez 2019 ; Jansen 2000 ).

While it is crucial to understand these diverse dimensions of social, economic, and ecological conditions on agroecological farms, it is also essential to understand the contextual factors influencing them. Such factors might be related to the farm or its immediate surroundings or happen at broader social and ecological system levels (Jansen 2000 ; Orsini et al. 2018 ), such as the direct market context (Van der Ploeg et al. 2019 ), as well as any ecological, social, economic, and political aspects (Crowder and Reganold 2015 ; Jansen 2000 ). Although all these factors appear sporadically in the key literature on agroecology, little research has attempted to provide a systematic review of the leading direct and indirect factors enabling or influencing sustainable work in agriculture inspired by the agroecology literature. Considering such contextual factors is crucial to prevent drawing inaccurate conclusions regarding the true impact of agroecology on SFW. These factors, especially in combination, can significantly affect the impact of agroecology on various dimensions of SFW. For example, the availability of natural fertilizers such as green manure, which reduces input costs, combined with a high local demand for agroecological products could explain why agroecological farms might yield higher profits than conventional farms.

Moreover, most of the current debate on the effects of agroecological practices is around the trade-offs and synergies at the farm level and usually concerns labor input, economic outcomes (profits, yields), and ecological benefits. Several recent studies synthesized scientific evidence, indicating that agroecological practices can lead to synergistic outcomes but also trade-offs (D’Annolfo et al. 2017 ; Garibaldi et al. 2017 ; Orsini et al. 2018 ; Rosa-Schleich et al. 2019 ; Van der Ploeg et al. 2019 ). On the one hand, reducing working conditions to plot-based activities is a way to reduce agroecology to a simple technical innovation rather than a societal transformation (Rosset and Altieri 1997 ). On the other hand, approaches to sustainable work have started to raise concerns about workers’ multiple psychological, social, and ecological needs to keep a satisfactory quality of life and remain productive in the longer term (Kira et al. 2010 ; Zink 2014 ; Timmermann and Felix 2015 ). In our view, despite multiple attempts to summarize the effects of agroecology on working conditions, these approaches remain too narrowed and limited to a productivist definition of farm work.

The purpose of this article is threefold: First, to present and discuss the holistic concept of SFW and its main dimensions in link with what is suggested in the literature on agroecology. Second, to propose a holistic and heuristic framework of SFW combining these dimensions and the multi-level factors potentially influencing its achievement. Third, to apply this framework to several empirical case studies selected from the literature, evaluating its applicability and relevance. Finally, the article provides a brief discussion and overall conclusion, including potential directions for further research.

• Sustainable farm work

This chapter explains the proposed concept of SFW and the holistic SFW framework, including relevant literature underpinning the concept. The first subchapter describes the dimensions of SFW, the second subchapter describes the contextual factors facilitating the sustainability of farm work driven by agroecology and introduces the SFW framework.

A qualitative literature review was conducted to develop the SFW concept, selectively including articles relevant to the developed framework and, for the most part, previously known or recommended to the research team. The process involved the deliberate selection and screening of theoretical works discussing sustainable work and agroecology, followed by identifying the connections between the concepts. The search continued until the core concept of SFW was established. The idea of the framework, that the context influences how agroecology affects SFW, was derived from previous works on agroecological transition and meta-analyses comparing agroecology and conventional farming. Reviews and applied research articles comparing conventional and sustainable agriculture were screened to refine the dimensions of SFW and the contextual layers until no substantially new concepts appeared.

Dimensions of sustainable farm work from an agroecological perspective

This article argues that analyzing trade-offs and synergies between environmental integrity and quality of work on agroecological farms requires an awareness of the multiple meanings of agroecology. Beyond a set of ecological farming practices, agroecology holds an equally important meaning as a social movement (Wezel et al. 2009 ), aiming to reinforce food sovereignty, preserve rural societies, and promote a diversity of knowledges (Coolsaet 2016 ), as well as a more fundamental attitude reviving the relationship between humans and nature (Rabhi 2017 ). These meanings imply the need for a more holistic and integrated concept of working conditions in agroecology - a concept that combines personal, farm-level, and broader social and ecological aspects.

The proposed concept of SFW builds on a combination of several theoretical backgrounds on sustainable work, quality of work in agriculture, and ecological sustainability of farming and incorporates the idea of a nexus between ecological, economic, and societal sustainability. For example, Kira et al. ( 2010 ) discuss the social aspects of sustainable work, while Bohnenberger ( 2022 ) and Zink ( 2014 ) add ecological elements to the sustainability of work, which is combined with the broad literature on ecological outcomes of sustainable agriculture (Palomo-Campesino et al. 2018 ; Rosa-Schleich et al. 2019 ). Addinsall et al. ( 2015 ) relate the concept of sustainable livelihoods to agroecology by adding food sovereignty as a critical outcome of sustainable livelihoods. The sustainable livelihoods framework (Scoones 1998 ) adds further aspects to the sustainable outcomes of work, including the sustainable use of natural assets to build a livelihood. Moreover, Gosetti ( 2017 ) defines the quality of working life as a critical aspect of the social sustainability of work. Various researchers investigated the diverse quality of work aspects in sustainable agriculture (e.g., Jansen 2000 ; Dumont and Baret 2017 ; Dupre et al. 2017 ; Orsini et al. 2018 ) and Timmermann and Felix ( 2015 ) and Gosetti ( 2017 ) include societal outcomes beyond the farm level. Following these multiple theoretical backgrounds and concepts, we propose a definition of SFW as a particular productive experience that preserves human and non-human interconnections, wellbeing, and reproducibility . In that perspective, human work is considered part of a broad social and agroecological system rather than a simple productive input which aligns with the fundamental principles of agroecological farming (Gliessman 2016 ). The subsequent paragraphs detail each dimension of SFW and their connections with the holistic conception of agroecology as stated in the literature.

Building on existing literature, we propose to subdivide the concept of SFW into four main dimensions : (1) Intrinsic quality of work (of the farmer, family, and farm workers), (2) Societal inclusiveness of work, (3) Respectful relationship with non-humans and the ecosystems, and (4) Sustainable livelihoods. Each dimension comprises one or several categories , further elaborated in the following paragraph and summarized in Table  1 .

Intrinsic quality of work : Intrinsic quality of work means the direct physical and psychological experience of work as perceived by a person. It comprises the deep personal working and living conditions of the farmer, the farm family, and farm workers, including paid and unpaid work. The intrinsic quality of work prevents negative aspects of the working experience, such as the excessive workload and time dedicated to work, overtime, stress levels, physical and psychological pain, and physical integrity and health issues (Gosetti 2017 ). It underlines the importance of self-esteem, autonomy at work, and the appreciation of applying specific knowledge and skills (Dumont and Baret 2017 ). The literature on agroecology has emphasized the intrinsic motivations of farmers to go beyond the financial benefit. The intrinsic quality of work must, therefore, be open to all these dimensions to conform with the monetary and non-monetary valuation of working experience.

Societal inclusiveness of work : Several theories argue that agroecology has implications for societies as a contribution to and relationships between farm workers, food system actors, and the surrounding community. The social relations & contribution to the public space category describes the quality of gender relations (Jansen 2000 ), shared governance and decision-making, worker’s rights, and social engagement of the worker beyond the farm level (Gosetti 2017 ). The category of political inclusion & recognition considers political experience and capacity to influence the food system, including the proximity with consumers (Dumont and Baret 2017 ), social support (Dupre et al. 2017 ), and the experienced visibility and recognition (Gosetti 2017 ). Recognition among peers and other food system actors is vital for meaningful work and is affected by the type of social relations (Timmermann and Felix 2015 ). The social justice & equity category reflects on how different benefits of work are distributed within the labor market (Gheaus and Herzog 2016 ), shedding light on significant differences in the experienced work life between farmers, farm workers, and food system actors. It comprises concepts of social differentiation (Jansen 2000 ), contributive and distributive justice (Timmermann and Felix 2015 ), equity among farms and their possibility to contribute to society and the fair distribution of tedious and unpleasant tasks. Finally, societal inclusiveness of work includes the contribution of agroecological farm work to rural employment and sustainable development (Orsini et al. 2018 ). Agroecological approaches to work keep a critical eye on increasing labor productivity, which might lead to pressure on workers, overproduction, and loss of employment (Bohnenberger 2022 ). Following the post-work paradigm, Bohnenberger ( 2022 ) also discusses the necessity to reduce individual workloads and dedicate more time and energy to non-commercial aims such as family care, collective action, or citizen engagement.

Relationships to non-humans and ecosystems : The human experience of work and the non-human ecosystem exist in mutual connection. Both aspects are intrinsically related within a social-ecological system, with SFW at their interface. On the one hand, agroecological farm work contributes to a healthy environment and the conservation of biodiversity & ecosystem services (Palomo-Campesino et al. 2018 ; Rosa-Schleich et al. 2019 ). Sustainable and meaningful work cannot be separated from the integrity of the ecosystems and other species (Bohnenberger 2022 ; Zink 2014 ). On the other hand, workers caring for the preservation of the natural agroecosystem and its biodiversity, for example, by reducing chemical inputs, improve at the same time their own health and, more generally, their working conditions. The experience of a healthy environment and environmental awareness of workers is an integral part of agroecology (Timmermann and Felix 2015 ).

Sustainable livelihoods : Chambers and Conway define livelihoods in its simplest sense as “a means of gaining a living” (Chambers and Conway 1991 , p. 5). This definition could be attributed to the economic outcomes of work. Sustainable livelihoods were introduced later by the British Department for International Development (DFID) and comprised capabilities (what we can do with what we have), assets (such as various types of natural, social, physical, human, and financial capitals), strategies (or actions) and outcomes (Scoones 1998 ). A recent framework combined agroecology with the sustainable livelihood framework, focusing mainly on sustainable livelihood assets and outcomes (Addinsall et al. 2015 ). From an agroecological perspective, work outcomes should not be reduced to their simple financial dimension but instead considered from a more holistic perspective, considering the importance of non-monetary value, such as reduced vulnerability or improved food sovereignty, as well as the mutual contribution of work and natural assets (Addinsall et al. 2015 ). This is the case, for example, of the progressive establishment of a permaculture or agroforestry systems which creates synergies among multiple outcomes on the long run. Such a definition considers that agricultural production depends on natural capital, such as land and healthy soils or clean water. Farmers can only produce food and sustain their work and livelihoods through access to these capitals. Access to human capital, including skills and knowledge, is equally critical to sustaining livelihoods.

Contextual factors facilitating the sustainability of farm work driven by agroecology

Territorial approaches to Agroecology, as explored by recent literature (e.g., Duru et al. 2015 ; Wezel et al. 2016 ; Magrini et al. 2019 ), highlight the importance of considering the contextual factors surrounding farms in advancing the agroecological transition. Magrini et al. ( 2019 ) employ Geels et al.‘s (2011) multi-level perspective to portray the agri-food system as a socio-technical system, either supporting or hindering the shift from agroecology as a niche practice to a dominant paradigm. Duru et al. ( 2015 ) emphasize stakeholder engagement and the need for coordinated changes in various contextual elements to effectively guide the agroecological transition. These discussions underscore the significance of the entire agri-food system, including institutions, consumer behavior, and farmers’ values, in influencing the outcomes of agroecology. The importance of such contextual factors in either facilitating or hindering the positive effects of agroecology on SFW forms the core idea of the SFW framework presented here.

We grouped contextual factors into four layers : (A) the Farmer and Farming system, (B) the Agroecosystem landscape, (C) the proximate socioeconomic system, and (D) the broader market, institutional and political system. The layers are arranged to highlight the distance between each layer to the farm and the farmer, from proximate and personal factors to more distant national and international ones. Table  2 provides an overview of the four layers and the more detailed contextual factors . The following paragraphs describe the layers and provide examples of how contextual factors might influence the effects of agroecology on SFW. Some of these examples are highlighted in the framework in Fig.  1 .

Farmer and farming system : Farmer and farming system factors are the most proximate factors influencing the sustainability of farm work created by agroecological practices. These include demographic aspects, personal characteristics, and preferences of the farmer, farm family and other farm workers. According to Jansen ( 2000 ), farmers often convert to organic farming because certain lifestyles and values influence their farming approach, working relations, and personal satisfaction. Such values might differ between women and men. Women and men might also experience differences in the quality of work according to their position in the productive process, power relations (Jansen 2000 ) and discrimination, and the level of co-participation in productive and reproductive activities. The importance of the position in the production process and the degree of ownership and control can also be derived from Marx’s theory of work (e.g., Milios and Dimoulis 2018 ). The educational background of a farmer, its implication in the knowledge-making processes and experience, capabilities, and capacity to innovate and adapt to different situations are crucial as well (Coolsaet 2016 ; Coquil et al. 2018 ). Gosetti ( 2017 ) brings up the notion of local work cultures and their relevance to how the quality of work is perceived. Farming system characteristics and practices are also crucial and include the type of land use, productive strategies, and main productive infrastructures (Orsini et al. 2018 ). Specific practices for fertility building, tillage, and weed and pest control are particularly labor-demanding (Wezel et al. 2014 ), and the type of cover crops might affect costs and ecological benefits (Rosa-Schleich et al. 2019 ). A literature review from 28 published papers on sub-Saharan Africa case studies has shown the complex trade-off between agroecological land use strategies, yield, and workload, where, in most cases, workload increased more than yields (Dahlin and Rusinamhodzi 2019 ). On-farm processing of products might generate additional value for agroecological products (Van der Ploeg et al. 2019 ), while it can also add to additional management demand (Dupre et al. 2017 ). Farm and farming systems include, therefore, a complex set of human, technical, and agronomic factors, leading to an infinite number of settings with a strong influence on the sustainability of farm work.

Agroecosystem landscape : Landscape approaches of agroecology have now gained momentum (García-Llorente et al. 2012 ; Wezel et al. 2016 ; Jeanneret et al. 2021 ). Agroecosystem resilience depends on the interconnectedness between other components such as forested areas, hydrological systems, biodiversity, and multiple farming systems. The landscape scale emphasizes the agroecosystem’s capacity to generate farm resilience and provide natural resources such as biomass, soil fertility, pollination, and other ecosystem services. Such services are directly linked to farmers, their working experiences and conditions, and livelihood outcomes (Addinsall et al. 2015 ). Environmental challenges such as droughts, pollution, or low biodiversity increase the benefits of ecological and resilient agroecological practices. The total resilience capacity of the agroecosystem can considerably increase or alleviate the pressure on farmers’ working conditions and their capacity to go through periods of higher pressure from others or benefit from positive externalities generated by proximate natural or human entities (Duru et al. 2015 ; Wezel et al. 2016 ).

Proximate socioeconomic system : Proximate socioeconomic and market-related aspects of the local or regional food system can directly and powerfully affect the working conditions of farmers and the sustainability of their work. Social norms and values and resulting consumer preferences and agricultural support structures such as farmers’ organizations and technological support structures, social movements, or participatory schemes such as community-supported agriculture are essential aspects of the proximate societal factors. Van der Ploeg et al. ( 2019 ) highlight several cases in which short-value chains, local markets, consumer support, and demand for agroecological products significantly improve the benefit of agroecological farming in Europe. Also, they describe a case from Austria where a farmer cooperative made a critical difference in negotiating with other food system actors to build fair relationships based on trust and long-term collaborations. Such initiatives might alleviate price pressures and workload related to direct marketing activities. Dupre et al. ( 2017 ) discuss the multiple forms of social support, including technological and economic support and farmers’ recognition by consumers. Proximate food networks can, to some extent, have a positive influence on food prices, input costs, or labor costs depending on the capacity of collective action of food system actors (Jansen 2000 ; Garibaldi et al. 2017 ; Rosa-Schleich et al. 2019 ; Van der Ploeg et al. 2019 ). Proximate socioeconomic system factors thus have substantial implications on the potential of agroecology to contribute to SFW. However, they are critically dependent on the broader market and politics and on asymmetric power relations with conventional food system operators.

Broader market, institutions, and politics : National and international market-related and political regulations, support structures, and constraints are less proximate to the everyday life of farmers but might have strong underlying effects and limitations on their working conditions (Jansen 2000 ; Van der Ploeg et al. 2019 ). Such broader factors include trade liberalizations, taxes, subsidies, price (de-)regulations, land governance and access to credits, production standards, and public information and education. An example of trade liberalization is given by Jansen ( 2000 ), who describes that imports of cheaper organic products from countries with low labor costs reduce prices for organic products in the importing country. Another example of regulations on the use of pesticides is given by Rosa-Schleich et al. ( 2019 ). If pesticides are prohibited, the benefits of biological control might be more substantial.

Together with the Tables  1 and 2 ; Fig.  1 depicts the SFW framework, more specifically, the links between contextual layers and SFW dimensions. Each field in the diagram in Fig.  1 represents the connection between a particular layer and a particular SFW dimension. For example, in quadrant 1, the innermost field represents the links between contextual factors of layer A and the SFW dimension 1. Each field contains two small circles, a plus and a minus circle. The small circle with a plus represents all positive links between the layer and the SFW dimension, while the size of the circle represents the number of these links. One positive effect of a specific contextual factor on a specific category of the respective SFW dimension is counted as one positive link. An effect of a different factor on the same or a different outcome category is counted as another link. The same link for two different case studies is counted as two links. Thus, the size of the circle depends on how many cases are analyzed and report a particular link and how detailed the list of factors identified in a certain context are. The size of the minus circle represents the number of adverse effects of contextual factors on SFW categories. If the same factor affects the same category once positively and once negatively, it is counted as two different links. The diagram thus provides an overview of the relevance of the local context in explaining the outcomes of agroecology. The size of the circles is a measure of how many factors affect a SFW dimension and how many categories are affected by each factor, thus highlighting the sensitivity of a particular dimension to the context. The diagram also provides an overview of the contextual layers most relevant in supporting or hindering beneficial outcomes of agroecology.

SFW Framework linking the four contextual layers A-D , represented as concentric circles, with the overlapping SFW dimensions 1–4 , represented as the four quadrants of the circle

Application of the framework to literature: insights from a qualitative meta-analysis

We applied the developed SFW framework to empirical literature on outcomes of sustainable agriculture published in academic journals. We systematically searched for literature to see how relevant the local context and the different categories of SFW were. We first describe the method for searching and analyzing this literature and then present the results.

Our research approach was inspired by the qualitative meta-analysis approach described by Schnepf and Groeben ( 2019 ). This approach allows the systematic identification and analysis of qualitative and quantitative research. Mozzato et al. ( 2018 ) have applied a similar approach to analyze the influence of local and spatial context on the adoption of sustainable farming practices.

We developed a search query ( Appendix ) and searched the Scopus database for empirical literature on labor-related and other socioeconomic and ecological outcomes of sustainable farming approaches. This search led to 711 initial results after removing two duplicates. Then, we selected relevant articles according to the following criteria, applied first on the title and abstract level and then on the full-text level. We included studies that: (1) provided primary data and empiric results, (2) were conducted in a real-life situation, not in an experiment station or by researchers, (3) looked at outcomes on the whole farm- or regional-level, not on plot-level, but also not aggregated over multiple farms, (4) compared agroecological farms with conventional farms, or using some kind of before-after evaluation method, (5) focused on smallholder arable farms (no sole livestock), (6) focused on labor-related outcomes, and (7) analyzed farms that applied a holistic approach to sustainable farming, not, for example, mere substitution of synthetic fertilizers with organic fertilizers. Because of the limited number of peer-reviewed articles using the term ‘agroecology’, we also considered other holistic approaches to sustainable agriculture (organic farming, permaculture, and conservation agriculture) or applications of at least two central agroecological re-design practices as described in Wezel et al. ( 2014 ) Footnote 1 . About 5% of articles were double-screened by a second person to refine the exclusion criteria. To facilitate the screening process of abstracts and titles, we used the online tool Rayyan (Ouzzani et al. 2016 ) ( https://rayyan-prod.qcri.org/welcome ). We selected and exported 79 articles to EndNote Reference Manager for full-text eligibility screening.

Finally, ten articles (Table  3 ) were exported to MAXQDA software for coding and content analysis (Bryman 2012 ). We applied the framework described in the previous chapter as coding structure. A second coder double-coded the codes on the outcomes for part of the articles to confirm the coding structure. All codes were labeled closely to what the authors explained, reducing the degree of interpretation as much as possible. In other words, nothing was coded as a contextual factor if the authors did not explicitly use it to explain an aspect of SFW. For example, livestock or organic material availability was not interpreted as a contextual factor for reduced input costs if the authors did not describe it that way, e.g., “availability of livestock provided manure which reduced input costs.” We did so because we believe that most interpretations would be close to speculation due to the complexity and diversity of individual situations.

This chapter describes the findings from applying the SFW framework to ten empirical case studies, highlighting the contribution of agroecological practices to SFW, explicitly focusing on the interfering role of contextual factors. In the following, the outcomes of each dimension of SFW are described with a focus on the most important contextual factors affecting them. Figure  2 shows the big picture of these links between contextual factors and outcome categories.

Agroecology generally contributed to improving sustainable livelihoods (Dimension 4) in most of the case studies, in particular aspects such as food sovereignty, financial outcomes, as well as quality of land, which is one of the most critical assets to SFW. While yields only improved in about half of the cases, food sovereignty is consistently evaluated positively. A simple example of this is the reduction of sprayed chemicals, which significantly improved the quality of food and the environmental health in the Philippine case (Mendoza 2004 ). A healthy environment provides a home to more abundant fauna, such as fish, which in turn serve as an additional food source, complementing and diversifying food sovereignty. We were able to identify strong ties between financial outcomes and the proximate socioeconomic context, the market, and the support from society or NGOs. Organic olive growers in Spain benefit from mutual exchange with sheep herders, who provided organic inputs that saved costs (Alonso Mielgo et al. 2001 ). Farmers producing wheat and beans under conservation agriculture in Bangladesh report that they benefit from the high demand for ecological products and a cooperative’s support to access markets (Dhar et al. 2018 ). In contrast, in Belgium, agroecological farms offering a vegetable box subscription, because of their diverse and small production output, experience high competition in supply (Dumont and Baret 2017 ). Organic vegetable farmers in Spain similarly prefer direct marketing, which provides slightly higher prices, but they experience a lack of demand and thus depend on supermarket channels offering low prices (Medland 2016 ). Finally, agroecological sustainability , mainly the quality of land, is directly improved depending on the right combination of agroecological practices. Farmers in Kenya report improved soil quality due to crop rotations with legumes and the application of compost and mulch. The improved soil moisture significantly increased their resilience to droughts (Spaling and Vander Kooy 2019 ).

Intrinsic quality of work (Dimension 1) is critical for farmers to sustain a meaningful work life and motivate the younger generation to continue their efforts in agriculture. The time spent at work is a major category of the intrinsic quality of work. While agroecology tends to increase the overall human workload at the farm level, depending on specific agroecological practices and strategies, the workload per person depends on further factors. Indonesian rice farmers had to apply much more organic fertilizers, which required much time despite saving money. Moreover, these organic farmers spent much more time with weeding and pest management than conventional farmers (Komatsuzaki and Syuaib 2010 ). Alternative marketing channels, such as the vegetable box scheme of the Belgian farmers, require much time for marketing, although it helps producers anticipate the demand and distribute the time slightly better over the year (Dumont and Baret 2017 ). Agroecological farmers in Ohio, USA, also experienced higher workload for direct marketing and managing complex systems. They relied on labor exchange with neighbors or the help of family to reduce the workload per person, especially during peak period (Bruce and Som Castellano 2017 ). The possibility of hiring skilled workers reduced the workload in some of the case studies analyzed. However, as discussed in the next paragraph, this depends on financial outcomes, which are not necessarily higher in agroecological farming than conventional. Intrinsic satisfaction with work can affect the acceptance of a higher workload. Although agroecology is generally associated with intrinsic motivations, the excessive workload can become conflictive with adequate family care, leading to crowding out work motivations in the long run (Dumont and Baret 2017 ). Intrinsic satisfaction is highly subjective. This is shown by some Malawi farmers finding the search for alternative organic material tedious. In contrast, others find it challenging and associate pride with innovative solutions (Bezner Kerr et al. 2019 ). The quality of work is also determined by improved physical integrity and health , as well as autonomy and independence , which might compensate for a higher workload. While we found many positive effects of agroecology on farmers’ autonomy from synthetic inputs and markets, this depends on the local food system and availability of alternative food supply chains (e.g., Medland 2016 ). While agroecology can potentially increase the intrinsic quality of work, this aspect remains extremely subjective and dependent on multiple trade-offs and limitations due to the local context.

Social inclusiveness of work (Dimension 2) is a crucial aspect explaining how agroecology could improve the social fabric of rural societies at multiple levels. It can enhance social relations within farm households or between farms, as evidenced by the positive outcomes for Malawian and Kenyan farmers (Bezner Kerr et al. 2019 ; Spaling and Vander Kooy 2019 ). Participatory agroecological research projects and church values that prioritize equity have led to shared decision-making, reduced women’s workload, and mutual support. Spanish olive growers experienced high levels of peasant solidarity among organic farmers (Alonso Mielgo et al. 2001 ). Furthermore, the feeling of political inclusion and recognition is essential in creating a reciprocal relationship between farmers’ power to affect society and politics, as well as society and politics’ support for agroecological farms. However, the degree to which agroecological farmers can effect change may be limited, leading to disappointment for farmers with a strong vision for contributing to change. Belgian vegetable gardeners, for instance, felt supported by society through direct marketing activities, but felt that their support was not reflected in prices (Dumont and Baret 2017 ). Ensuring social justice is crucial for maintaining a peaceful and meaningful social fabric. Again, this happens at the farm level and between farms. Indonesian rice farmers, for example, increased the workload of sharecroppers by requesting the application of more organic fertilizers without paying them more (Komatsuzaki and Syuaib 2010 ). Considering justice between farms, Malawian farmers (Bezner Kerr et al. 2019 ) emphasized how agroecology is specifically for people with low incomes as well, while in other regions, only those who could pay a fee to participate in a cooperation would benefit from their support (Oelofse et al. 2010 ; Dhar et al. 2018 ). Finally, agroecology has the potential to contribute to the creation of employment , which is critical for a vibrant and sustainable rural society. In about half of the cases analyzed, employment increased, however, not always in concert with good working conditions for employees. The creation of employment depends on labor demand as well as financial outcomes. For example, farmers in the USA could not afford to hire workers or pay them an acceptable price due to low product prices (Bruce and Som Castellano 2017 ), while in some cases of organic rice farming in the Philippines, employment decreased because the children could take over tasks like weeding. These cases highlight the complex relationship between agroecology, SFW and the so-called labor market.

Relationships to non-humans and ecosystems (Dimension 3) is the second dimension of SFW that reaches beyond the farm level. Some of the case studies reported benefits of agroecology for biodiversity conservation and ecosystem services . For example, Indonesian farmers using organic practices to grow rice contribute strongly to higher carbon sequestration (Komatsuzaki and Syuaib 2010 ), leading to synergies between socioeconomic and environmental aspects of agroecology. Reduced demand for synthetic inputs produced from fossil fuels by organic farmers in the Philippines benefits the climate, while the abandonment of spraying at the same time supports a diverse fauna and improves air quality (Mendoza 2004 ). Abandonment of chemicals is also important for vegetable growers in Spain, who are aware of the critical conditions of the local aquifers (Medland 2016 ). Two studies mentioned an increase in environmental awareness and experience of agroecological farming families. The children of Filipino farmers became more environmentally conscious due to the change in their parent’s farming practices, which increased their willingness to participate in farm activities (Mendoza 2004 ). Alonso Mielgo et al. ( 2001 ) conclude that the more significant environmental consciousness of organic farmers is one reason that justifies the additional subsidies they receive. These cases highlight the perceived quality of nature contributing to meaningful work and the further-reaching implications for the ecological consciousness of farmers and their families.

SFW framework highlighting the positive and negative effects of contextual factors of each layer on outcome categories of each dimension from the ten case studies analyzed

Discussion and conclusions

Our research builds upon critical agroecological literature to provide theoretical insights into a holistic concept of SFW. We aim to move beyond a narrow focus that limits farm work to inputs such as workload and financial incomes. Instead, we believe that work can be seen as an interface between society and complex ecological processes and transformations (Rabhi 2017 ; Toledo 2022 ). Agroecological scholars have long recognized the importance of social, psychological, and ethical aspects (Jansen 2000 ; Dumont and Baret 2017 ; Timmermann and Felix 2015 ) in sustainable farming, which contribute constructively and offer valuable insights for conceptualizing SFW. We propose four dimensions of analysis: intrinsic quality of work, societal inclusiveness, relationships to non-humans and the ecosystems, and sustainable livelihoods. Furthermore, we have identified four layers of contextual factors and assessed their impact on SFW in a systemic manner. As recent holistic research in the field indicates, the sustainability of farm work is highly contextual and dependent on macro-economic and political drivers, as well as local social-ecological system dynamics (Bottazzi 2019 ; Dedieu 2022 ). To test the relevance of our framework in evaluating the role of agroecology on SFW, we analyzed ten empirical case studies from the literature. The findings discussed below indicate that agroecology has a high potential to contribute to SFW on multiple dimensions, while some cases exhibit critical trade-offs explained by their particular context. These results imply a strong link between agroecology and the holistic concept of SFW and demonstrate the necessity of a framework that guides the systematic consideration of the specific farming context.

Synergies and trade-offs between agroecological practices and sustainable farm work

One of the key positive outcomes is the enhancement of food sovereignty, which is one of the strongest arguments of scholars and social movements in favor of agroecology (Altieri et al. 2011 ; Addinsall et al. 2015 ). Agroecological practices can improve the quality, diversity, and accessibility of food, leading to a more resilient and self-sufficient food system. This improvement in food sovereignty can have significant implications for the overall well-being of farming communities and their ability to cope with external challenges (e.g., Mendoza 2004 ). Agroecological practices can also lead to better financial outcomes for farmers. By reducing input costs and enabling access to premium markets for ecological products, farmers can achieve more stable and secure income sources. This financial stability can provide a strong foundation for the long-term success and viability of farming operations (e.g., Dhar et al. 2018 ; Bezner Kerr et al. 2019 ). Conservation of soil and other ecosystem services improve sustainable livelihood assets. By adopting practices that focus on the long-term health and quality of the land, farmers can ensure that their operations remain productive and viable for generations to come. This focus on sustainability is essential for the overall resilience of farming systems and their ability to adapt to changing conditions and challenges (e.g., Spaling and Vander Kooy 2019 ). Agroecology can enhance environmental conservation and ecosystem services, benefiting farmers’ health and ecological sustainability. It may also raise environmental awareness among farmers and food system workers and even promote ecological behaviors among tourists through agro-ecotourism (Choo and Jamal 2009 ).

However, despite these positive outcomes, there are trade-offs to consider. Previous reviews generally conclude that there is a trade-off between ecological benefits, similar or higher yields and profits, and higher workload (e.g., Jansen 2000 ; van der Ploeg et al. 2019 ; but see D’Annolfo et al. 2017). We found that workload at the farm level often increases with agroecological practices, and the workload per person may be affected by various factors like the specific practices employed or the availability of skilled workers. Excessive workload could conflict with family care, potentially undermining work motivations in the long run (Dumont and Baret 2017 ). How exciting or tedious work is can compensate for or aggravate high workloads (Bezner Kerr et al. 2019 ). Additionally, while agroecology can potentially improve farmers’ autonomy from markets or synthetic inputs, this outcome depends on available marketing channels (Medland 2016 ). Social inclusiveness outcomes are also subject to trade-offs, as increased workload may sometimes result in the exploitation of certain workers, such as sharecroppers (Komatsuzaki and Syuaib 2010 ). Employment creation is a central aspect of fostering rural community development, but the extent to which sustainable agriculture contributes to permanent and healthy jobs is not sufficiently understood yet (Orsini et al. 2018 ). In most parts of the world, increased labor demand leads to an increased number of people with a sufficient income and access to food. Employment creation, however, also depends on the most proximate socioeconomic layers as well as broader political and institutional contexts. Our results indicate that agroecology can positively and negatively affect employment creation, depending on many factors, including labor demand (Dhar et al. 2018 ) and financial outcomes (Bruce and Som Castellano 2017 ). While a socially embedded farming system such as traditional farming societies could absorb peaks of labor demand through their family ties and multiple local operators (with sometimes increased pressure on women), a productive system made by larger farms might report additional workload on their employers looking for productivity gains.

The critical role of contextual factors and the complexity of sustainable farm work

The socioeconomic context, including market demand for ecological products and support from society or NGOs, plays a crucial role in shaping the financial outcomes of agroecological farms (Van der Ploeg et al. 2019 ). In the case studies, this support came in various forms, such as assistance from NGOs or cooperatives, which help agroecological farms to access markets more easily (e.g., Mendoza 2004 ) and capitalize on the high demand for ecological products. Proximity to markets and available marketing channels are other known significant factors (Dupre et al. 2017 ) that affected SFW in complex ways in several of the case studies. Direct marketing, such as vegetable box subscriptions, can provide closer connections to customers and allow agroecological farmers to fetch higher prices. However, this approach can also increase competition and workload for marketing activities (Bruce and Som Castellano 2017 ). It has been found previously that political support for sustainable farming, for example in the form of subsidies (Crowder and Raganold 2015), can make a significant difference. Subsidies, price regulations, or access to credits or resources were essential in some of the case studies as well, significantly impacting felt political support and financial outcomes (Dumont and Baret 2017 ). Local food systems and demand also play a role in shaping the outcomes of SFW in agroecology. The demand for local organic products (Dhar et al. 2018 ) and the flexibility of marketing channels (Medland 2006) available to agroecological farms can critically affect their autonomy, financial outcomes, and overall sustainability. The recent COVID-19 pandemic has shown the importance of socioeconomic and political factors, such as the demand for organic products, which increased during the pandemic (Rosero et al. 2023 ), explaining short-term income benefits of organic farms. Labor availability and the presence of skilled workers are crucial for managing workload and determining the intrinsic quality of work in agroecological farms. The ability to hire skilled workers or engage in labor exchange with neighbors or family members can reduce the workload (e.g., Mendoza 2004 ), making it more manageable and ultimately affecting the overall success of agroecological practices. Finally, the local agroecosystem and agricultural practices employed can influence the effects on SFW, particularly in terms of food sovereignty and agroecological sustainability (Wezel et al. 2014 ; Addinsall et al. 2015 ; Rosa-Schleich et al. 2019 ). Our analysis showed that the specific agroecosystem and agroecological practices employed can considerably impact how these outcomes manifest.

Concluding remarks

In conclusion, the analysis of ten empirical case studies applying the SFW framework indicates that agroecological practices are strongly linked to SFW across various dimensions and categories, with contextual factors crucial in determining outcomes. This highlights the relevance of the SFW concepts and framework. Addressing critical themes and exploring future research directions will advance our understanding of agroecological practices and their role in fostering sustainable farming and rural livelihoods. Future research should focus on identifying ways to maximize the positive outcomes of agroecological practices in different contexts and addressing potential trade-offs between various SFW dimensions. Investigating the role of the broader agroecosystem, policies, and support systems in promoting agroecological practices that improve SFW and exploring factors influencing intrinsic quality of work and social inclusiveness in diverse agricultural communities are also essential steps to enhance our understanding of agroecological practices and their role in promoting sustainable farming and rural livelihoods.

It is important to emphasize that considering the collection of contextual factors in a systemic manner is crucial. For instance, factors such as the lack of societal and political support, market competition, and limited distribution channels can collectively have significant impacts on the outcomes of agroecology that go beyond the effects of individual factors. When this interplay is better understood, targeted measures can be developed to support a sustainable agroecological transition. We hope that the framework contributes to initiating more comprehensive empirical studies. Such data can enable more robust comparisons between agroecology and conventional agriculture, potentially strengthening political support for a sustainable agroecological transformation.

Furthermore, the SFW concept was initially designed to assess the quality of work specifically for farm workers Footnote 2 , with considerations for other food system workers limited to social relations, justice, and rural employment. Expanding the framework to illuminate the quality of work for other food system workers, encompassing both economic and non-monetary aspects, would represent a valuable advancement of the framework. This expansion may require examining whether additional categories are needed and if different contextual factors are relevant.

Similarly, we would like to emphasize that a significant aspect of sustainability lies in ensuring that all farm workers experience the positive outcomes of agroecology (Gheaus and Herzog 2016 ; Timmermann 2018 ). As depicted in the results, the quality of work within farms varies between individuals and their roles, including the farmers, their families, various employees, or volunteers. Literature also suggests that a worker’s position in the agricultural production process and ownership of a farm or production factors are critical determinants of the quality of work (e.g., Milios and Dimoulis 2018 ). Dimension 2 of the SFW framework accounts for potential inequalities in the quality of work among workers within a farm and layer A considers the roles played by governance structures and the gendered distribution of tasks in such inequalities. Future research might want to account for differences among workers’ quality of work in more detail. The framework could differentiate the SFW outcomes for different groups of workers or individuals and consider factors like a worker’s position, ownership, personal characteristics, and values to explain these differences. Taking into account such personal characteristics and values is also essential to prevent self-selection bias when comparing agroecological and conventional farms. This bias can occur when agroecological practices are systematically applied by farmers that share particular values and the potential differences in quality of work among farms are inaccurately attributed to the farming approach when, in fact, the different values are the underlying reasons for variations.

Finally, we agree with D’Annolfo et al. ( 2017 ) and draw attention to the influence of individual values on the subjective weighting of all dimensions and categories of SFW. Future studies could consider this by assigning weights to categories (e.g., using the Q-method) when comparing SFW between agroecological and conventional farms to develop more robust policy recommendations.

Agroecological re-design practices as described in Wezel et al. ( 2014 ) include: (1) organic fertilizers (compost or manure; not only partly reduction or higher efficiency of chemical fertilizer use; not substitution with biofertilizers), (2) crop rotation (different crops in rotations at the same plot over a particular rotation time, including cover crops), (3) intercropping (different crops at the same time at the same plot) and agroforestry (alley intercropping with trees), and (4) direct seeding into living cover crops or mulch, residues (no-tillage) or reduced tillage (only shallow tillage without soil inversion).

Farm workers encompass the farm owner, family members, hired workers, and volunteers engaged in core agricultural tasks on the farm or under direct farm owner control, contributing to the early stages of food production. Their roles center on the farm’s premises and the production of raw agricultural goods, differentiating them from workers involved in broader food supply chain activities (food system workers).

Abbreviations

sustainable farm work

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Acknowledgements

The authors are thankful for the constructive comments from the reviewers and the support of the editor. They are also grateful to members of the AgroWork team for their valuable feedback. Special thanks also go to the Institute of Geography (GIUB) members at the University of Bern and the Centre for Development and Environment (CDE) - to Jeannine Winzer, Christoph Oberlack, and Aline Frank - for early general inputs related to the methodological approach. They would also like to thank Eva Hubschmid for contributing to the paper as a double-coder and second screener. However, none of these persons reviewed the finished manuscript. The final study design, the analysis, and all discussions remain thus solely within the responsibility of the two authors. The analysis of the ten research articles included in the review did occur without contact with the original authors. This research was fully funded by the Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF), Grants Number 176736 and Number 206127 “AgroWork”.

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Volken, S., Bottazzi, P. Sustainable farm work in agroecology: how do systemic factors matter?. Agric Hum Values (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10460-024-10539-6

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Government of Canada partners with civil society organizations to create new sustainable agriculture research network

From: Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada

News release

Investment in research is key to driving better outcomes for the agricultural sector and positioning Canada to seize the economic opportunities of a net-zero future.

March 19, 2024—Ottawa, Ontario—Social Sciences and Humanities Research  Council

Today, the Honourable François-Philippe Champagne , Minister of Innovation, Science and Industry, and the Honourable Lawrence MacAulay , Minister of Agriculture and Agri-Food, announced an investment of  $1.9 million  in the Common Ground Canada Network project led by Karen Foster, Canada Research Chair in Sustainable Rural Futures for Atlantic Canada, at Dalhousie University.

This investment, made through the  Social Sciences and Humanities Research Network on Sustainable Agriculture in a Net-Zero Economy  initiative, supported by Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada, will focus on the development of this new national research network while also working to advance sustainable agricultural sectors and food systems to support a just transition to net-zero in Canada.

Producers are already taking action to make their operations more sustainable, efficient and profitable: for example, by adopting no-till approaches, cover cropping and precision agriculture. This knowledge sharing network will help amplify the work already underway and increase adoption of these best practices. The expertise from Canadian farmers will inform and support net-zero research produced through the Common Ground Canada Network.

The Common Ground Canada Network is intended to promote collaboration and partnerships between academic institutions, research institutes, Indigenous communities, non-governmental organizations, industry and producers. The project will bring together academics from different disciplines across the country, partner organizations including the Arrell Food Institute, Food Secure Canada and the National Farmers Union, and civil society organizations such as the JustFOOD Action Plan Halifax, Food Communities Network, Food for All NB, the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives, Humane Society International, and Farm to Cafeteria Canada.

“Developing a sustainable and competitive economy while helping to achieve Canada's climate goals requires partnerships like the one announced today between the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council and Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada. This collaboration between researchers and the agricultural sector will accelerate the development of new practices that will help fight climate change and provide quality food for Canadians.” —The Honourable François-Philippe Champagne , Minister of Innovation, Science and Industry

“The Common Ground Canada Network will connect our hard-working farmers with a network of researchers to develop and share best practices that will make the sector more resilient. I encourage researchers from across Canada to get involved in this initiative, so we can continue producing the high-quality, sustainable food that Canadians and folks around the world are looking for.” – The Honourable Lawrence MacAulay , Minister of Agriculture and Agri-Food

“Research on sustainable agriculture, particularly within the social sciences and humanities, is key to developing productive agricultural practice that can also help protect the environment. This is why we are pleased to partner with Agriculture and Agri-food Canada in funding world-leading experts across our country who will help drive the goal of reaching net-zero greenhouse gas emissions as agriculture expands to meet growing domestic and international demand.” — Ted Hewitt , President, Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council

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The new Common Ground Canada Network builds on the  recent announcement of a partnership  between the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council and the  Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council , in collaboration with  Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada . 

Budget 2022  provided the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council and the  Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council  with $100 million in funding for sustainable agriculture research.

In the agricultural sector, Canada has committed to reducing emissions from fertilizer use by 30% below 2020 levels by 2030, and to support the Global Methane Pledge to reduce global methane emissions by 30% below 2020 levels by 2030.

The Government of Canada commits to reducing greenhouse gas emissions by 40-45% below 2005 levels by 2030 and to reaching net-zero emissions by 2050.

Budget 2022 included a commitment for immediate action toward climate mitigation and to support the  2030 Emissions Reduction Plan: Canada’s Next Steps for Clean Air and a Strong Economy  to support farmers as partners in building a clean, prosperous future.

Audrey Champoux Press Secretary and Senior Communications Advisor Office of the Minister of Innovation, Science and Industry [email protected]

Media Relations Innovation, Science and Economic Development Canada [email protected]

Media Relations Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council [email protected]

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New research shows unintended harms of organic farming

Organic farming is often touted as a more sustainable solution for food production, leveraging natural forms of pest control to promote eco-friendly cultivation.

But a new study published in Science on Thursday finds that expanding organic cropland can lead to increased pesticide use in surrounding non-organic fields, offsetting some environmental benefits.

These harmful "spillover effects" can be mitigated if organic farms are clustered together and geographically separated from conventional farms , the researchers found.

"Despite policy pushes to increase the amount of organic agriculture, there remain key knowledge gaps regarding how organic agriculture impacts the environment," said lead author Ashley Larsen, of the University of California, Santa Barbara.

Although organic agricultural practices generally improve environmental conditions such as soil and water quality , the trade-offs aren't very well understood.

For example, organic fields could harbor more beneficial species that prey on insects, such birds, spiders and predatory beetles and fewer pests. Or, the lack of chemical pesticides and genetically modified seeds could mean they harbor more pests.

To find out, Larsen and colleagues analyzed data on some 14,000 fields in Kern County, California, across seven years.

Kern County produces high-value crops including grapes, watermelons, citrus, tomatoes, potatoes and much more, making it one of the most valuable crop producing regions in the United States.

The team paired digitized maps of fields and the crops grown on them with records of pesticide applications and whether a field had an organic certification.

"Surrounding organic agriculture leads to an increase in pesticide use on conventional fields, but also leads to a larger decrease on nearby organic fields," said Larsen, with the effect manifesting primarily in insecticides, which specifically target insects.

The level of pesticides in conventional fields decreased the further away they were from organic fields.

But the situation could be completely remedied if organic fields were grouped together, the researchers found, based on a less-detailed national level analysis they also carried out.

"Spatially clustering organic fields and spatially separating organic and conventional fields could reduce the environmental footprint of both organic and conventional cropland," the team concluded.

Writing in a related commentary, Erik Lichtenberg of the University of Maryland said that the authors had shown farmers' decisions about pesticide are influenced by the presence of nearby organic fields—but it's not fully clear why.

The value of the crops, their susceptibility to pests, and farmers' personal risk tolerances likely all play roles.

"Which mobile pests are involved, where they originate in the landscape, or how and why they move across the landscape are poorly understood," said Lichtenberg, calling for more research in this area.

Erik Lichtenberg, Collateral impacts of organic farming, Science (2024). DOI: 10.1126/science.ado4083

Journal information: Science

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Python Meat Could Be a Sustainable, Nutritious Food Source, Scientists Say

M ove over, lab-grown meat : Python could be the food of the future. These scaly reptiles may be one of the most sustainable animals to farm on the planet, according to new research published last week in the journal Scientific Reports .

And as climate change threatens global food security , python farming could be one possible way to produce a source of protein with a relatively small environmental footprint, the researchers report.

“We really are running out of resources, whilst at the same time, the demand for high quality nutrients is going up,” says study co-author Patrick Aust , a conservation scientist at the nonprofit People for Wildlife, to ABC News ’ Julia Jacobo.

Diners already eat snake meat in some regions of the world, including parts of Africa, Latin America and Asia. In Hong Kong, for instance, snake soup is a popular dish, particularly during the winter. To help meet this demand, commercial python farms have been popping up in recent years.

“Reptile meat is not unlike chicken: high in protein, low in saturated fats and with widespread aesthetic and culinary appeal,” write the scientists in the paper.

Researchers were curious to know how farm-raised python stacked up against other types of livestock: How much food did pythons need to eat to produce a pound of meat for humans? This metric is known as the food conversion ratio.

After studying more than 4,600 Burmese and reticulated pythons on commercial farms in Vietnam and Thailand, they found the snakes had a more efficient food conversion ratio than salmon, pigs, cows, chicken and crickets. The snakes went long periods without eating but did not lose much of their body mass as a result; they also required very little water. On top of all that, they ate food that would not have been used otherwise, known as waste meat, such as wild-caught rodents and stillborn pigs.

“A python can live off the dew that forms on its scales. In the morning, it just drinks off its scales and that’s enough,” says co-author Daniel Natusch , director of the consulting firm EPIC Biodiversity and a herpetologist at Macquarie University in Australia, to the Washington Post ’s Rachel Pannett. “Theoretically, you could just stop feeding it for a year.”

The fact that pythons can fast for long periods without any apparent consequences could help farmers hedge against future supply chain disruptions, which are becoming increasingly common amid climate change . During the Covid-19 pandemic, for instance, some swine farmers had to euthanize their pigs , because it had become too expensive to feed them or because meatpacking facilities were shut down.

“At the time we thought, ‘If only they were farming pythons,’” Natusch tells New Scientist ’s Michael Le Page.

When it comes time to butcher them, pythons are easy to fillet and produce very little waste, since they don’t have limbs. Snake meat—which can be used in soups, curries, sauteed on skewers, dried into jerky and barbecued—is similar in flavor and texture to chicken.

Pythons are also easy to farm. They get along with each other and are mostly sedentary when they don’t need to hunt for their own food. They also seem to tolerate small, confined spaces, and they seldom get sick with the viruses that affect livestock and poultry.

“They display few of the complex animal welfare issues commonly seen in caged birds and mammals ,” the researchers write in the paper.

But many questions about farm-raised pythons remain unanswered. Perhaps the biggest one is whether Westerners would ever actually eat snake meat. It may be a “long time” before python burgers end up on menus in places like Australia, North America and Europe, says study co-author Rick Shine , a natural scientist at Macquarie University, in a statement .

Scientists also say more research needs to be conducted on the nutritional content of snake meat, as well as the broader environmental implications—and potential ripple effects—of commercial python farms.

For example, feeding them pest rodents may be sustainable, but “if a whole industry develops around this as a feed source, it will create perverse incentives to maintain ‘rat problems’—and the implications for local communities could of course be vast,” says Kajsa Resare Sahlin , a sustainable food researcher at the Stockholm Resilience Center who was not involved in the study, to New Scientist .

The new paper is a good first step toward exploring python meat as a sustainable food, but “you need to complement that with a whole bunch of additional studies to look at these other aspects before you can really say, ‘Yeah, that’s an option,’” says Monika Zurek , a food systems scientist at the University of Oxford in England who was not involved with the paper, to Scientific American ’s Meghan Bartels.

Transforming wood waste for sustainable manufacturing

A detailed look at lignin disassembly on path to replace petroleum with renewables.

Lignin, a complex organic polymer, is one of the main components of wood, providing structural support and rigidity to make trees strong enough to withstand the elements. When transforming wood into paper, lignin is a key ingredient that must be removed and often becomes waste.

Marcus Foston, associate professor of energy, environmental & chemical engineering in the McKelvey School of Engineering at Washington University in St. Louis, is exploring how to add value to lignin by breaking it down into small molecules that are structurally similar to oxygenated hydrocarbons. These renewable chemicals are key components in many industrial processes and products, but they are traditionally sourced from non-renewable petroleum.

Foston's study of lignin disassembly, done in collaboration with Sai Venkatesh Pingali, a neutron scattering scientist at Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ONRL), was published Jan. 17 in Sustainable Chemistry & Engineering .

"Lignin's structure actually looks a lot like what we get from petroleum," said Foston, who is also the director of WashU's Synthetic Biology Manufacturing of Advanced Materials Research Center (SMARC). "In current manufacturing processes, we spend time making petroleum look like the elements of lignin. Instead, I'm using a catalyst to break lignin down more easily and in such a way that it produces specific chemicals. Once we can produce chemical from lignin in a form we want, then we can make more efficient use of lignin, which is an abundant byproduct of pulping wood into paper."

With collaborators at ORNL, Foston used neutron scattering to study how lignin interacts with solvents and catalysts during its disassembly under reaction conditions, including high temperature and pressure. ORNL's advanced facilities allowed researchers to observe the reaction process in real time to improve their catalyst and further streamline reaction systems for lignin depolymerization. This direct, molecular-level view is critical, Foston said, to figure out how the catalyst and lignin behave in solution and to ensure the lignin doesn't recondense into a polymer with bonds scientists can't easily break.

"In this study, we're specifically thinking about how we can take the large amount of lignin that gets produced during biofuel or paper production and use it to make renewable chemicals that replace some of the chemicals we currently get from petroleum," Foston said. "More broadly, the same depolymerization principles we're exploring with lignin could be used in other applications. For example, the same lessons from this study apply to plastic waste scenarios, where one approach is to deconstruct plastic waste into small molecules that could be used to make plastic or other useful products."

"Ultimately, we want to take a bunch of chemicals that are coming from petroleum and figure out how we can make those renewably," Foston added. "Everything we're learning about lignin will apply to other spaces as well."

• Agriculture and Food
• Biotechnology
• Environmental Science
• Energy and the Environment
• Sustainability
• Hazardous Waste
• Renewable energy
• Energy development
• Petroleum geology
• Alternative fuel vehicle
• Tropospheric ozone
• Hydroelectricity

Story Source:

Materials provided by Washington University in St. Louis . Original written by Shawn Ballard. Note: Content may be edited for style and length.

Journal Reference :

• Jialiang Zhang, Zhi Yang, Aditya Ponukumati, Manjula Senanayake, Sai Venkatesh Pingali, Marcus Foston. Structural Evolution of Lignin Using In Situ Small-Angle Neutron Scattering during Catalytic Disassembly . ACS Sustainable Chemistry & Engineering , 2024; 12 (6): 2241 DOI: 10.1021/acssuschemeng.3c06368

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