IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/lauspo/v102y2021ics0264837720325631.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Evaluating the effects of European support measures for Italian organic farms

Author

Listed:
  • Casolani, Nicola
  • Nissi, Eugenia
  • Giampaolo, Antonio
  • Liberatore, Lolita

Abstract

Today, a model for an eco-friendly agricultural sector represents a necessity. Organic agriculture is a production system that tries to reach this goal. European programs encourage farmers into being more environmentally conscious: the funds for organic agriculture support producers that from conventional convert to, or maintain, organic farming practices. This paper analyzes the impact of European funds allocated to organic farms under the 2014–2020 Rural Development Program. The first stage, consisted in determining a score corresponding to the efficiency of organic farms in Italian Provinces and Regions through the Data Envelopment Analysis, using economic variables as input and output. The second stage, regards the impact of regional funding towards organic agriculture which was determined in relation to farms’ efficiency score with a Tobit regression. Measure 11 of the Rural Development Program and its relative sub-measures 11.1 (conversion from conventional farming to organic farming) and 11.2 (the maintenance of organic agriculture) strongly impact on organic farms’ score. The evidence found supports the European strategy, confirming the usefulness of having these two distinct measures, and supports organic farms into starting and consolidating an organic business.

Suggested Citation

  • Casolani, Nicola & Nissi, Eugenia & Giampaolo, Antonio & Liberatore, Lolita, 2021. "Evaluating the effects of European support measures for Italian organic farms," Land Use Policy, Elsevier, vol. 102(C).
  • Handle: RePEc:eee:lauspo:v:102:y:2021:i:c:s0264837720325631
    DOI: 10.1016/j.landusepol.2020.105225
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0264837720325631
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.landusepol.2020.105225?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Alfons Oude Lansink & Ky–sti Pietola, 2002. "Effciency and productivity of conventional and organic farms in Finland 1994--1997," European Review of Agricultural Economics, Oxford University Press and the European Agricultural and Applied Economics Publications Foundation, vol. 29(1), pages 51-66, March.
    2. Cisilino, Federica & Bodini, Antonella & Zanoli, Agostina, 2019. "Rural development programs’ impact on environment: An ex-post evaluation of organic faming," Land Use Policy, Elsevier, vol. 85(C), pages 454-462.
    3. Offermann, Frank & Nieberg, Hiltrud & Zander, Katrin, 2009. "Dependency of organic farms on direct payments in selected EU member states: Today and tomorrow," Food Policy, Elsevier, vol. 34(3), pages 273-279, June.
    4. Mirela Ionela Aceleanu, 2016. "Sustainability and Competitiveness of Romanian Farms through Organic Agriculture," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 8(3), pages 1-19, March.
    5. Dhungana, Basanta R. & Nuthall, Peter L. & Nartea, Gilbert V., 2004. "Measuring the economic inefficiency of Nepalese rice farms using data envelopment analysis," Australian Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics, Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society, vol. 48(2), pages 1-23.
    6. Charnes, A. & Cooper, W. W. & Rhodes, E., 1978. "Measuring the efficiency of decision making units," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 2(6), pages 429-444, November.
    7. de Ponti, Tomek & Rijk, Bert & van Ittersum, Martin K., 2012. "The crop yield gap between organic and conventional agriculture," Agricultural Systems, Elsevier, vol. 108(C), pages 1-9.
    8. Jouzi, Zeynab & Azadi, Hossein & Taheri, Fatemeh & Zarafshani, Kiumars & Gebrehiwot, Kindeya & Van Passel, Steven & Lebailly, Philippe, 2017. "Organic Farming and Small-Scale Farmers: Main Opportunities and Challenges," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 132(C), pages 144-154.
    9. Dimara, Efthalia & Pantzios, Christos J. & Skuras, Dimitris & Tsekouras, Kostas, 2005. "The impacts of regulated notions of quality on farm efficiency: A DEA application," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 161(2), pages 416-431, March.
    10. Seufert, Verena & Ramankutty, Navin & Mayerhofer, Tabea, 2017. "What is this thing called organic? – How organic farming is codified in regulations," Food Policy, Elsevier, vol. 68(C), pages 10-20.
    11. Mercedes Beltrán & Ernest Reig, 2014. "Comparing conventional and organic citrus grower efficiency in Spain," Working Papers 1406, Department of Applied Economics II, Universidad de Valencia.
    12. Wood, Richard & Lenzen, Manfred & Dey, Christopher & Lundie, Sven, 2006. "A comparative study of some environmental impacts of conventional and organic farming in Australia," Agricultural Systems, Elsevier, vol. 89(2-3), pages 324-348, September.
    13. Amemiya, Takeshi, 1984. "Tobit models: A survey," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 24(1-2), pages 3-61.
    14. Kaufmann, Peter & Stagl, Sigrid & Franks, Daniel W., 2009. "Simulating the diffusion of organic farming practices in two New EU Member States," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 68(10), pages 2580-2593, August.
    15. Torben Tiedemann & Uwe Latacz-Lohmann, 2013. "Production Risk and Technical Efficiency in Organic and Conventional Agriculture – The Case of Arable Farms in Germany," Journal of Agricultural Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 64(1), pages 73-96, February.
    16. Eugenia Nissi & Massimiliano Giacalone & Carlo Cusatelli, 2019. "The Efficiency of the Italian Judicial System: A Two Stage Data Envelopment Analysis Approach," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 146(1), pages 395-407, November.
    17. R. D. Banker & A. Charnes & W. W. Cooper, 1984. "Some Models for Estimating Technical and Scale Inefficiencies in Data Envelopment Analysis," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 30(9), pages 1078-1092, September.
    18. Stolze, Matthias & Lampkin, Nicolas, 2009. "Policy for organic farming: Rationale and concepts," Food Policy, Elsevier, vol. 34(3), pages 237-244, June.
    19. Terry Marsden & Jo Banks & Gillian Bristow, 2002. "The Social Management of Rural Nature: Understanding Agrarian-Based Rural Development," Environment and Planning A, , vol. 34(5), pages 809-825, May.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Song, Xiaoqing & Wang, Xiong & Hu, Shougeng & Xiao, Renbin & Scheffran, Jürgen, 2022. "Functional transition of cultivated ecosystems: Underlying mechanisms and policy implications in China," Land Use Policy, Elsevier, vol. 119(C).
    2. Anna Mazurek-Kusiak & Bogusław Sawicki & Agata Kobyłka, 2021. "Contemporary Challenges to the Organic Farming: A Polish and Hungarian Case Study," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(14), pages 1-14, July.
    3. Alba Linares Quero & Uxue Iragui Yoldi & Oriana Gava & Gerald Schwarz & Andrea Povellato & Carlos Astrain, 2022. "Assessment of the Common Agricultural Policy 2014–2020 in Supporting Agroecological Transitions: A Comparative Study of 15 Cases across Europe," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(15), pages 1-23, July.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Natalia Brzezina & Katharina Biely & Ariella Helfgott & Birgit Kopainsky & Joost Vervoort & Erik Mathijs, 2017. "Development of Organic Farming in Europe at the Crossroads: Looking for the Way Forward through System Archetypes Lenses," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 9(5), pages 1-23, May.
    2. Kenichi Kashiwagi & Hajime Kamiyama, 2023. "Effect of adoption of organic farming on technical efficiency of olive-growing farms: empirical evidence from West Bank of Palestine," Agricultural and Food Economics, Springer;Italian Society of Agricultural Economics (SIDEA), vol. 11(1), pages 1-28, December.
    3. Anirban Nandy & Piyush Kumar Singh & Alok Kumar Singh, 2021. "Systematic Review and Meta- regression Analysis of Technical Efficiency of Agricultural Production Systems," Global Business Review, International Management Institute, vol. 22(2), pages 396-421, April.
    4. Lakner, Sebastian & Breustedt, Gunnar, 2015. "Efficiency analysis of organic farming systems- a review of methods, topics, results, and conclusions," 2015 Conference, August 9-14, 2015, Milan, Italy 212025, International Association of Agricultural Economists.
    5. Natalia Brzezina & Birgit Kopainsky & Erik Mathijs, 2016. "Can Organic Farming Reduce Vulnerabilities and Enhance the Resilience of the European Food System? A Critical Assessment Using System Dynamics Structural Thinking Tools," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 8(10), pages 1-32, September.
    6. Laure Latruffe & Céline Nauges, 2014. "Technical efficiency and conversion to organic farming: the case of France," European Review of Agricultural Economics, Oxford University Press and the European Agricultural and Applied Economics Publications Foundation, vol. 41(2), pages 227-253.
    7. Perrigot, Rozenn & Barros, Carlos Pestana, 2008. "Technical efficiency of French retailers," Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, Elsevier, vol. 15(4), pages 296-305.
    8. Breustedt, Gunnar & Latacz-Lohmann, Uwe & Tiedemann, Torben, 2011. "Organic or conventional? Optimal dairy farming technology under the EU milk quota system and organic subsidies," Food Policy, Elsevier, vol. 36(2), pages 223-229, April.
    9. Thuzar Linn & Broos Maenhout, 2019. "The impact of environmental uncertainty on the performance of the rice supply chain in the Ayeyarwaddy Region, Myanmar," Agricultural and Food Economics, Springer;Italian Society of Agricultural Economics (SIDEA), vol. 7(1), pages 1-29, December.
    10. Isidoro GUZMÁN & Narciso ARCAS, 2008. "The Usefulness Of Accounting Information In The Measurement Of Technical Efficiency In Agricultural Cooperatives," Annals of Public and Cooperative Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 79(1), pages 107-131, March.
    11. Alboghdady, Mohamed Altabei, 2014. "Nonparametric Model For Measuring Impact Of Inputs Density On Egyptian Tomato Production Efficiency," International Journal of Food and Agricultural Economics (IJFAEC), Alanya Alaaddin Keykubat University, Department of Economics and Finance, vol. 2(4), pages 1-10, October.
    12. Breustedt, Gunnar & Latacz-Lohmann, Uwe & Tiedemann, Torben, 2010. "Organic Or Conventional? Optimal Dairy Farming Technology Under The Eu Milk Quota System And Organic Subsidies," 50th Annual Conference, Braunschweig, Germany, September 29-October 1, 2010 93934, German Association of Agricultural Economists (GEWISOLA).
    13. Frija, Aymen & Chebil, Ali & Speelman, Stijn & Buysse, Jeroen & Van Huylenbroeck, Guido, 2009. "Water use and technical efficiencies in horticultural greenhouses in Tunisia," Agricultural Water Management, Elsevier, vol. 96(11), pages 1509-1516, November.
    14. Chebil, Ali & Frija, Iheb & Bahri, Walid, 2014. "Irrigation water efficiency in wheat production in Chbika (Tunisia):Parametric versus Nonparametric Comparisons," Agricultural Economics Review, Greek Association of Agricultural Economists, vol. 15(1), pages 1-14.
    15. Sana Sadaf & Khalid Riaz, 2012. "Does Access to Modern Marketing Channels Improve Dairy Enterprises’ Efficiency? A Case Study of Punjab, Pakistan," Lahore Journal of Economics, Department of Economics, The Lahore School of Economics, vol. 17(1), pages 63-82, Jan-June.
    16. Irwa Issa & Ulrich Hamm, 2017. "Adoption of Organic Farming as an Opportunity for Syrian Farmers of Fresh Fruit and Vegetables: An Application of the Theory of Planned Behaviour and Structural Equation Modelling," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 9(11), pages 1-22, November.
    17. Benjamin Tetteh Anang & Stefan Bäckman & Antonios Rezitis, 2016. "Does farm size matter? Investigating scale efficiency of peasant rice farmers in northern Ghana," Economics Bulletin, AccessEcon, vol. 36(4), pages 2275-2290.
    18. Shoaib Akhtar & Azhar Abbas & Muhammad Faisal & Muhammad Haseeb Raza & Abdus Samie & Mark Yu & Ashley Lovell, 2023. "Roles of Personal, Household, Physical, and Institutional Factors on Farmers’ Efficiency of Hybrid Maize Production: Implications for Food Security," Agriculture, MDPI, vol. 13(9), pages 1-13, September.
    19. Rebecca Buttinelli & Raffaele Cortignani & Gabriele Dono, 2021. "Financial sustainability in Italian Organic Farms: An analysis of the FADN Sample," Economia agro-alimentare, FrancoAngeli Editore, vol. 23(3), pages 1-32.
    20. Watkins, K. Bradley & Hristovska, Tatjana & Mazzanti, Ralph & Wilson, Charles E. Jr & Schmidt, Lance, 2014. "Measurement of Technical, Allocative, Economic, and Scale Efficiency of Rice Production in Arkansas Using Data Envelopment Analysis," Journal of Agricultural and Applied Economics, Southern Agricultural Economics Association, vol. 46(1), pages 1-18, February.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:lauspo:v:102:y:2021:i:c:s0264837720325631. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Joice Jiang (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.journals.elsevier.com/land-use-policy .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.