TEVENART Camille

Hidden costs limit the reduction of GHG emissions associated to agricultural productions. Uncertainty is inherent in farmers’ production decisions, and impact them through different drivers: beliefs, risk, information, ambiguity, are just as many elements that can limit the spread of mitigation practices in the agricultural sector. In this thesis, we first present a complete literature review about agri-environmental measures and the diverse approaches of uncertainty in microeconomics and agricultural economics. We then develop a model of adoption decision showing that 3 hidden costs associated to uncertainty can prevent new practices’ adoption in a non-additive way and coexist (option value, risk premium, informational externalities), so that the regulator must socialize them in order to reduce GHG emissions. Then, we implement a land conversion model and extent it in an empirical estimation strategy of the impact of herb yields volatility on the shadow value of grasslands in the French forage mix. The multinomial logistic model is estimated through an instrumental approach using meteorological data. Finally, we make a survey of a sample of farmers in order to measure their attitudes towards risk and ambiguity (Multiple price list) and estimate their impact on nitrogen fertilization decisions, according to the whole application and the splitting practice.

Hidden costs limit the reduction of GHG emissions from agricultural production. Uncertainty is inherent to farmers' production decisions, and impacts them through various channels: beliefs, risk, information, ambiguity, are all barriers that can limit the diffusion of mitigation practices in the agricultural sector. In this thesis we first present a comprehensive literature review on agri-environmental measures and on the different useful approaches to uncertainty in microeconomics and agricultural economics. We then develop an adoption decision model showing that 3 hidden costs related to uncertainty can limit the adoption of new practices in a non-additive way and coexist (option value, risk premium, informational externalities), so that the regulator has to socialize them in a GHG emission reduction objective. Then, we adopt a land conversion model and derive an empirical strategy to estimate the impact of the volatility of grassland yields on the implied values of grasslands in the French forage mix. The multinomial logistic model is estimated by an instrumental approach using meteorological data. Finally, we conduct a survey on a sample of farmers in order to measure their attitudes towards risk and ambiguity (Multiple price list) and to estimate their impact on nitrogen fertilization decisions, in terms of total application and splitting.

Carbon neutrality? An unreachable goal without strong involvement of agriculture.