La eficiencia productiva de la agricultura ecológica: el caso del sector de la uva en Cataluña

Abstract

Knowledge about productivity and efficiency differences between conventional and organic farms has important implications for the evaluation of the economic viability of these two agricultural practices. The main purpose of this study was to compare the efficiency ratings of organic and conventional grape farms in Catalonia. To do so, we fit a stochastic production frontier to cross sectional, farm-level data collected from a sample of 141 Catalan farms that specialize in grape growing. Results show that organic farmers, on average, are more efficient than their conventional counterparts (efficiency ratings are on the order of 0.80 and 0.64, respectively). Apart from adoption of organic practices, experience is also found to improve technical efficiency. Conversely, technical efficiency tends to decrease with the relevance of unpaid family labor, farm location in less favored areas, and farmers' strong environmental preservation preferences.Additional key words: Spain; stochastic production frontier; technical efficiency. ResumenLa eficiencia productiva de la agricultura ecológica: el caso del sector de la uva en CataluñaConocer las diferencias de productividad y eficiencia entre la agricultura convencional y la ecológica tiene implicaciones importantes para la evaluación de la viabilidad económica de estas dos prácticas agrícolas. El principal objetivo de este estudio fue comparar la eficiencia técnica de las explotaciones de uva ecológicas y convencionales en Cataluña. Para ello utilizamos el modelo de la frontera de producción estocástica. El análisis se basó en datos de corte transversal de una muestra de 141 explotaciones catalanas especializadas en la producción de uva. Los agricultores ecológicos fueron, de promedio, técnicamente más eficientes que los convencionales (los ratios de eficiencia fueron 0,80 y 0,64, respectivamente). Además de la adopción de técnicas ecológicas, la experiencia también incrementa la eficiencia técnica. En cambio, las explotaciones con una mayor proporción de trabajo no remunerado, que se encuentran en una zona desfavorecida y/o que tienden a tener fuertes preferencias por preservar el medio ambiente, son generalmente menos eficientes.Palabras clave adicionales: eficiencia técnica; España; frontera estocástica.

The Economic Consequences of Supporting Organic Farms by Public Funds: Case of Poland

“…Return on equity in Czech organic farms in 2001 was slightly lower than in conventional farms, but in 2005, the value of this index was similar for both farm groups and was only slightly above 10% (Redlichova 2007). Other studies indicate that economic results of organic farms are more favourable than the conventional farms (Brožová 2011;Guesmi et al 2012;Patil et al 2014). But it should be taken into account that economic results depend on the type of farms (Franckes, Latacz-Lohmann 2008).…”

“…This method of production first of all presents a chance of development for the poorer farms, provides management of surplus labour and improves the food supply in the local market, support economic development in rural communities (O'Hara, Parsons 2013). Organic farms are the object of study of many authors; however, most papers are focused on comparative analysis of production and economic results against the background of conventional farms (Lansink et al 2002;Redlichova 2007;Offerman et al 2009;Gardebroek et al 2010;Nachtman 2010;Brožová 2011;Guesmi et al 2012;Patil et al 2014). The author of this article also conducted these types of studies (Koloszko-Chomentowska 2011).…”

Labour Use on Organic Farms: a Review of Research since 2000

“…Five studies indicate a higher production elasticity of labour on organic than conventional farms [8,9,19,23,32], whereas five other studies found a lower value of elasticity on organic farms [15,16,20,21,28]. This might seem to be somewhat counterintuitive, given that organic farming is traditionally thought to be more labour-intensive than conventional farming, and we would expect output to be more sensitive to changes in labour on organic than conventional farms.…”

“…Overall we found only six studies [8][9][10][11][12][13] comparing labour use per hectare or head of livestock on organic and conventional farms that include a breakdown by farm type. These studies suggest that labour use depends on farm structure, in particular farm type and size.…”

“…Studies that present results on labour use per hectare or per head of livestock for different farm types are mainly based on FADN data, with Offermann and Nieberg [12] presenting data published before 2000. Lobley et al [10], Tzouvelekas et al [8] and Guesmi et al [9] used primary data gathered through farm surveys.…”