Does experience sharing affect farmers’ pro-environmental behavior? A randomized controlled trial in Vietnam

• Published in: World development Vol. 136; p. 105062
• Main Authors: Vu, Ha Thu, Tran, Duc, Goto, Daisaku, Kawata, Keisuke
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Oxford Elsevier Ltd 01.12.2020; Elsevier Science Publishers; Pergamon Press Inc
• Subjects: Agricultural subsidies; Agronomy; Analysis; Asia; Certification; Clinical trials; Decision making; Economic incentives; Environmental behavior; Environmental behaviour; Farmers; Incentives; Information; Information dissemination; Information treatment; Observational studies; Organic farming; Organic fertilizers; Prices; Pro-environmental behaviors; Production; Public finance; RCT; Subgroups; Subsidies; Subsidy treatment; Sustainable agriculture; Tea; Vietnam; Vietnam; RCT; Vietnam; Information treatment; Pro-environmental behaviors; Subsidy treatment; Asia
• ISSN: 0305-750X; 1873-5991
• DOI: 10.1016/j.worlddev.2020.105062

•We examine the effect of an information treatment via “peer farmers” and a 50% price subsidy treatment on organic fertilizer adoption.•We conduct a randomized controlled trial with 1287 tea-cultivating farmers in Vietnam.•Both treatments have significant impacts on farmers’ adoption of organic fertilizer.•The information treatment is approximately one-third as effective as the subsidy treatment.•The information treatment performs well for members of certification groups. Encouraging farmers to adopt pro-environmental production is vital to the promotion of sustainable agriculture. Previous observational studies emphasize the importance of economic incentives and information access to farmers’ decision-making processes; however, due to endogeneity issues, little strong causal evidence is available. This study makes an original contribution by experimentally examining the impacts of the 50% price subsidy and information treatments on farmers’ adoption of organic fertilizer. A short video sharing the experience of farmers who have applied organic fertilizer is selected as our information treatment. We analyze data from a randomized controlled trial (RCT) conducted with 1287 small-scale tea farmers in Vietnam. We find significant impacts of both the information and 50% price subsidy treatments. Moreover, the effect of the former is approximately one-third that of the latter. Subgroup treatment analysis also reveals that the information treatment performs well for members of certification groups. Thus, to induce farmers to adopt pro-environmental production behaviors, information treatment can partially substitute for subsidies to reduce the burden on the public budget.