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Evaluating farmers’ likely participation in a payment programme for water quality protection in the UK uplands

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Abstract

Maintaining drinking water quality is essential to water companies and their customers, and agricultural non-point source pollution is a major cause of water quality degradation. In this paper, we examine the potential use of payments financed by a water company as incentives for farmers to adjust their agricultural land management practices in order to protect water quality. We use a choice experiment (CE) to measure farmers’ minimum willingness to accept (WTA) requirements to adjust agricultural land management practices in Nidderdale and the Washburn valley (Yorkshire, UK) under a potential local payment for ecosystem services (PES) programme. Latent class analysis of farmers’ CE responses was used to quantify the size and spread of farmers’ preferences and minimum WTA values for compensation payments, and to investigate potential drivers of preference variation. Analysis suggested that the emphasis on sheep or cattle/dairy production within mixed farming businesses in this area provides a partial explanation for the considerable observed heterogeneity in preferences and minimum WTA requirements for participation in a potential PES programme.

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Notes

  1. Supporting services are typically not valued directly to avoid potential for double counting.

  2. An example here is incentives that encourage environmentally sensitive management of field boundaries to increase biodiversity. These management practices are likely to increase delivery of supporting services and cultural services by enhancing insect diversity and abundance with positive consequences for both pollination and for populations of farmland birds.

  3. Ruto and Garrod’s (2009) findings related to a range of different AESs across Europe. Espinosa-Goded et al.’s (2010) results related to participation in an AES to promote nitrogen-fixing crops in Spain. Christensen et al.’s (2011) findings related to participation in an AES to promote pesticide-free buffer zones around hedgerows to deliver biodiversity benefits.

  4. An assumption was made that there were no significant interaction effects. Main effects typically account for 70–90% of explained variance (Dawes and Corrigan 1974, reported in Louviere et al. 2000).

  5. Random parameter logit (RPL) models were also estimated, but the latent class models produced a better fit to the data, so the RPL results are not reported here.

  6. For example, aversion to the shift from BAU comprises 55 and 30% of Segment 2 farmers’ overall aversion to reducing fertiliser and manure applications by 25 and 50%, respectively.

  7. For example, the Entry Level Stewardship Scheme for Upland Areas offers payments of £25 per acre on non-moorland area in return for compliance with particular pro-environmental practices, whereas the Single Farm payment scheme for the same land types offers around £42 per acre (Defra 2011).

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Acknowledgments

This work was funded by Yorkshire Water.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Sustainability Research Institute (SRI), University of Leeds, Leeds, UK

    Nesha Beharry-Borg, Mette Termansen & Klaus Hubacek

  2. Department of Environment, University of York, York, UK

    James C. R. Smart

  3. Department of Environmental Science, Aarhus University, Aarhus, Denmark

    James C. R. Smart & Mette Termansen

  4. Department of Geography, University of Maryland, College Park, MD, USA

    Klaus Hubacek

Authors
  1. Nesha Beharry-Borg
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  2. James C. R. Smart
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  3. Mette Termansen
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  4. Klaus Hubacek
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Correspondence to Nesha Beharry-Borg.

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Beharry-Borg, N., Smart, J.C.R., Termansen, M. et al. Evaluating farmers’ likely participation in a payment programme for water quality protection in the UK uplands. Reg Environ Change 13, 633–647 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10113-012-0282-9

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