IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/ags/aes026/397917.html

The Distribution of Farms in Ireland along both Economic and Environmental Dimensions

Author

Listed:
  • Loughrey, Jason

Abstract

The agricultural sector in Ireland is facing increasing societal pressures for improvements in environmental sustainability with emission targets based on progress from 2018 to 2030. In this context, the relationship between the farm income distribution and the distribution of emissions is underexplored. The Kakwani index is applied to compare the distribution of farm income and the distribution of greenhouse gas emissions in Ireland between 2018 and 2023. Concentration indices are used to measure inequality in emissions over the distribution of farm income. Data are based on the Teagasc National Farm Survey. Results show that farm income is more unequally distributed than greenhouse gas emissions. Concentration index curves show that low-income farms are accounting for a declining proportion of GHG emissions. For the dairy farming system, in particular, policy efforts need to continue to pursue widespread adoption of environmental technologies for the entire population of farms.

Suggested Citation

  • Loughrey, Jason, 2026. "The Distribution of Farms in Ireland along both Economic and Environmental Dimensions," 100th Annual Conference, March 23-25, 2026, Wadham College, University of Oxford, Oxford, UK 397917, Agricultural Economics Society (AES).
    • Handle: RePEc:ags:aes026:397917
    DOI: 10.22004/ag.econ.397917
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://ageconsearch.umn.edu/record/397917/files/Jason_Loughrey_The%20Distribution%20of%20Farms%20in%20Ireland%20-%20AES%202026.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.22004/ag.econ.397917?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
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Cathal O'Donoghue & Thia Hennessy, 2015. "Policy and Economic Change in the Agri-Food Sector in Ireland," The Economic and Social Review, Economic and Social Studies, vol. 46(2), pages 315-337.
    2. Cantore, Nicola & Padilla, Emilio, 2010. "Equality and CO2 emissions distribution in climate change integrated assessment modelling," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 35(1), pages 298-313.
    3. Lorraine Balaine & Doris Läpple & Emma J Dillon & Cathal Buckley, 2023. "Extension and management pathways for enhanced farm sustainability: evidence from Irish dairy farms," European Review of Agricultural Economics, Oxford University Press and the European Agricultural and Applied Economics Publications Foundation, vol. 50(2), pages 810-850.
    4. SOTO Iria & BARNES Andrew & BALAFOUTIS Athanasios & BECK Bert & SANCHEZ FERNANDEZ Berta & VANGEYTE Jurgen & FOUNTAS Spyros & VAN DER WAL Tamme & EORY Vera & GOMEZ BARBERO Manuel, 2019. "The contribution of precision agriculture technologies to farm productivity and the mitigation of greenhouse gas emissions in the EU," JRC Research Reports JRC112505, Joint Research Centre.
    5. John E. Ataguba, 2022. "A short note revisiting the concentration index: Does the normalization of the concentration index matter?," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 31(7), pages 1506-1512, July.
    6. Ollier, Maxime & De Cara, Stéphane, 2024. "Give and take: An analysis of the distributional consequences of emission tax-and-rebate schemes with an application to greenhouse gas emissions from European agriculture," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 219(C).
    7. Padilla, Emilio & Serrano, Alfredo, 2006. "Inequality in CO2 emissions across countries and its relationship with income inequality: A distributive approach," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 34(14), pages 1762-1772, September.
    8. Christian Stetter & Johannes Sauer, 2022. "Greenhouse Gas Emissions and Eco-Performance at Farm Level: A Parametric Approach," Environmental & Resource Economics, Springer;European Association of Environmental and Resource Economists, vol. 81(3), pages 617-647, March.
    9. Mary Keeney, 2000. "The Distributional Impact of Direct Payments on Irish Farm Incomes," Journal of Agricultural Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 51(2), pages 252-265, May.
    10. Maria Martinez Cillero & Miguel Tovar Reaños, 2023. "Farm technical and environmental efficiency and subsidy redistribution in Ireland: A simulation approach of possible performance and equity effects," Journal of Agricultural Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 74(2), pages 394-412, June.
    11. Adenuga, Adewale Henry & Davis, John & Hutchinson, George & Patton, Myles & Donnellan, Trevor, 2020. "Analysis of the effect of alternative agri-environmental policy instruments on production performance and nitrogen surplus of representative dairy farms," Agricultural Systems, Elsevier, vol. 184(C).
    12. Owen O’Donnell & Stephen O’Neill & Tom Van Ourti & Brendan Walsh, 2016. "conindex: Estimation of concentration indices," Stata Journal, StataCorp LLC, vol. 16(1), pages 112-138, March.
    13. Lucie Adenaeuer & James Breen & Peter Witzke & Monika Kesting & Anne Hayden & Trevor Donnellan, 2023. "The potential impacts of an EU-wide agricultural mitigation target on the Irish agriculture sector," Climate Policy, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 23(4), pages 495-508, April.
    14. Jason Loughrey & Thia Hennessy, 2022. "A Microsimulation Model for the Land Rental Market in Irish Farming," International Journal of Microsimulation, International Microsimulation Association, vol. 15(2), pages 77-101.
    15. Kakwani, Nanok C, 1977. "Measurement of Tax Progressivity: An International Comparison," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 87(345), pages 71-80, March.
    16. Barnes, A.P. & Soto, I. & Eory, V. & Beck, B. & Balafoutis, A. & Sánchez, B. & Vangeyte, J. & Fountas, S. & van der Wal, T. & Gómez-Barbero, M., 2019. "Exploring the adoption of precision agricultural technologies: A cross regional study of EU farmers," Land Use Policy, Elsevier, vol. 80(C), pages 163-174.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    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. Nguyen, Duyen Thuy & Donnelly, Michael & Van Hoang, Minh & O'Neill, Ciaran, 2023. "The case for individualised public health interventions: Smoking prevalence and inequalities in Northern Ireland 1985-2015," Health Policy, Elsevier, vol. 135(C).
    2. Ackermann, Ivan & Radulescu, Doina, 2026. "Unveiling the energy price tag - Assessing the burden of household energy expenditures among European countries," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 208(C).
    3. Juan Antonio Duro & Jordi Teixidó-Figueras & Emilio Padilla, 2014. "The causal factors of international inequality in co2 emissions per capita: a regression-based inequality decomposition analysis," Working Papers 2014/20, Institut d'Economia de Barcelona (IEB).
    4. Yoonchae Yoon & Jina Park, 2022. "Equitable City in an Aging Society: Public Transportation-Based Primary Care Accessibility in Seoul, Korea," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(16), pages 1-17, August.
    5. Juan Antonio Duro & Jordi Teixidó-Figueras & Emilio Padilla, 2017. "The Causal Factors of International Inequality in $$\hbox {CO}_{2}$$ CO 2 Emissions Per Capita: A Regression-Based Inequality Decomposition Analysis," Environmental & Resource Economics, Springer;European Association of Environmental and Resource Economists, vol. 67(4), pages 683-700, August.
    6. Duro, Juan Antonio, 2012. "On the automatic application of inequality indexes in the analysis of the international distribution of environmental indicators," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 76(C), pages 1-7.
    7. Narjinary, Glory & Goli, Srinivas, 2024. "Diverging destinies: How children are faring under demographic transition," Economics & Human Biology, Elsevier, vol. 55(C).
    8. Behnam Ata & Parisa Pakrooh & Ayoub Barkat & Ramzi Benhizia & János Pénzes, 2022. "Inequalities in Regional Level Domestic CO 2 Emissions and Energy Use: A Case Study of Iran," Energies, MDPI, vol. 15(11), pages 1-26, May.
    9. Pan, Xunzhang & Teng, Fei & Wang, Gehua, 2014. "A comparison of carbon allocation schemes: On the equity-efficiency tradeoff," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 74(C), pages 222-229.
    10. Salahuddin, Mohammad & Gow, Jeff, 2014. "Economic growth, energy consumption and CO2 emissions in Gulf Cooperation Council countries," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 73(C), pages 44-58.
    11. Tachega, Mark Awe & Chen, Yanjiao & Wang, Junjian & Agbanyo, George Kwame & Xu, Haohan & Ning, Zexin & Yang, Pei, 2025. "CO2 emissions inequality in Africa: Regional analysis and strategies for climate justice," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 320(C).
    12. Laura Rossouw & Hana Ross, 2021. "Understanding Period Poverty: Socio-Economic Inequalities in Menstrual Hygiene Management in Eight Low- and Middle-Income Countries," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 18(5), pages 1-14, March.
    13. Ge Wang & Juan Yang & Dinghua Ou & Yalan Xiong & Ouping Deng & Qiquan Li, 2019. "Temporal-Spatial Variations and Regional Disparities in Land-Use Efficiency, and the Response to Demographic Transition," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 11(17), pages 1-22, August.
    14. Koangsung Choi & Francesco Renna & Chung Choe, 2024. "The impact of Covid-19 on the Korean and US labour markets," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 56(38), pages 4529-4543, August.
    15. Caspar Sauter & Jean-Marie Grether & Nicole A. Mathys, 2015. "Geographical Spread of Global Emissions: Within-country Inequalities Are Increasing," IRENE Working Papers 15-01, IRENE Institute of Economic Research.
    16. Nicola Cantore & Emilio Padilla, 2009. "Emissions distribution in post–Kyoto international negotiations: a policy perspective," Working Papers wpdea0907, Department of Applied Economics at Universitat Autonoma of Barcelona.
    17. Schaffartzik, Anke & Duro, Juan Antonio & Krausmann, Fridolin, 2019. "Global appropriation of resources causes high international material inequality – Growth is not the solution," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 163(C), pages 9-19.
    18. Chen, Jiandong & Cheng, Shulei & Song, Malin & Wu, Yinyin, 2016. "A carbon emissions reduction index: Integrating the volume and allocation of regional emissions," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 184(C), pages 1154-1164.
    19. Athina Raftopoulou & Joan Gil Trasfi, 2024. "Income-related inequality in obesity and its determinants in Spain: What happens beyond the obesity threshold?," International Journal of Health Economics and Management, Springer, vol. 24(1), pages 135-153, March.
    20. Mussini, Mauro & Grossi, Luigi, 2015. "Decomposing changes in CO2 emission inequality over time: The roles of re-ranking and changes in per capita CO2 emission disparities," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 49(C), pages 274-281.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ;

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    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:ags:aes026:397917. 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: AgEcon Search (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/aesukea.html .

    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.