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Abstract

Sustainable intensification aims to minimise the negative impacts of the current
agricultural system while maintaining productivity and economic outputs. This study
demonstrates that contract farming is a potential mechanism to support many, but not
all, farmers in adopting sustainable intensification practices. A discrete choice
experiment on a hypothetical value chain contract introducing three sustainable
intensification practices, namely extended crop rotation, reducing agrochemicals and
planting flower strips, was conducted with a sample of 314 north-Italian wheat farmers.
The results show that permanently eliminating glyphosate from the plot under contract
is strongly resisted by farmers, while farmers have less strong preferences between
introducing legumes or oilseeds in rotation, and between temporary or permanent
flower strips. Findings also indicate that farmers who are more educated, are not
members of cooperatives and who generally prefer more flexible sales arrangements
are unlikely to be triggered to adopt sustainable intensification practices through
contract farming. Overall, this study indicates that while voluntary contract
arrangements can be a potential tool to increase uptake of sustainable intensification
practices, they will likely need to be complemented with more regulatory approaches in
order to bring sustainable intensification practices to scale.