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Springer, Climatic Change, 2(176), 2023

DOI: 10.1007/s10584-023-03484-6

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Farmers’ social networks and regional spillover effects in agricultural climate change mitigation

Journal article published in 2023 by Cordelia Kreft ORCID, Mario Angst ORCID, Robert Huber ORCID, Robert Finger ORCID
This paper is made freely available by the publisher.
This paper is made freely available by the publisher.

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Abstract

AbstractClimate change poses a severe threat to global agricultural production and rural livelihoods, and since agriculture itself is a significant source of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, it can also play an important role in climate change mitigation. This article investigates how farmers’ social networks influence the adoption of on-farm mitigation strategies. More precisely, we use a network autocorrelation model to explore the relationship between a farmer’s own mitigation behavior and the mitigation behavior and knowledge of his fellow farmers. The analysis is based on a regional case study in Switzerland and uses data obtained from personal network interviews combined with survey and census data of 50 farmers. Half of them are members of a local collective action initiative for agricultural climate change mitigation, while the others do not participate in the initiative. We find that, on average, farmers with a larger network adopt more mitigation measures, and furthermore, mitigation adoption is linked with the level of knowledge within farmers’ networks. Indeed, the likelihood that non-members will adopt mitigation measures increases if they are closely associated with members of the collective action, suggesting a local spillover effect. It follows that strengthening knowledge exchange among farmers and supporting local farmers’ initiatives can potentially contribute to the diffusion of agricultural climate change mitigation practices.