Trade-offs between economic, environmental and social sustainability on farms using a latent class frontier efficiency model: Evidence for Spanish crop farms.

Amer Ait Sidhoum,K Hervé Dakpo,Laure Latruffe,László Vasa

doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0261190

Abstract

This article studies trade-offs of farms in terms of economic sustainability (proxied here by technical efficiency), environmental sustainability (proxied here by farmers’ commitment towards the environment) and social sustainability (proxied here by farmers’ contribution to on farm well-being and communities’ well-being). We use the latent class stochastic frontier model and create classes based on three separating variables, representing farms’ environmental sustainability and social sustainability. The application to a sample of Spanish crop farms shows that more environmentally sustainable farms are likely to have lower levels of technical efficiency. However, improvements in social concerns, both towards own farm and the larger community, may lead to improved technical efficiency levels. In general, our study provides evidence of trade-offs for farms between economic sustainability and environmental sustainability, but also between environmental sustainability and social sustainability.

Highlights

A resource-efficient, resilient and productive food system is seen as a fundamental vehicle for contributing to sustainable development [1]
Farms of this class have a higher perception of environmental sustainability, while farms in the other class have a higher perception of social sustainability
We present an innovative approach to study trade-offs of farms in terms of economic sustainability, environmental sustainability and social sustainability

Summary

Introduction

A resource-efficient, resilient and productive food system is seen as a fundamental vehicle for contributing to sustainable development [1]. Implementing such a transition involves the optimisation of a number of economic, environmental and social objectives, from increasing agricultural yields, reducing pollution to improving farmers’ well-being. These objectives, are not independent and they interact with one another. The transition towards an agricultural system that balances different sustainability objectives requires identifying the goals, assessing these interactions, and designing and implementing effective management practices within heterogeneous farming environments [2].

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Conclusion