Are there spatial spillovers in the adoption of clean technology? The case of organic dairy farming

Abstract

This paper examines spatial spillovers associated with the adoption of organic dairy farm- ing. We hypothesize that neighboring farmers can help to reduce the uncertainty of organic conversion by lowering the fixed costs of learning about the or- ganic system. A spatially explicit 10-year panel da- taset ofmore than 1,900 dairy farms in southwestern Wisconsin is used as input into a reduced-form econo- metric model of the decision to convert to organic production. Using an identification strategy that ex- ploits the panel aspect of the micro dataset, we find evidence that the presence of neighboring organic dairy farms affects the conversion decision.

Brian E Robinson

Associate Professor

My research interests include land systems, social-ecological policy, and statistics.