New research explores how public programmes shape farmers’ adoption of sustainable agriculture, in Mexico and the United States
Recent research at the Department of Land Economy examines the performance of public programmes on farmers’ adoption of sustainable agricultural practices, spanning climate-smart agriculture in the U.S. and agroforestry coffee cultivation in Mexico. The former is co-authored by Mr Callum Alexander, Dr Aiora Zabala and Prof. Andreas Kontoleon. The latter is co-authored by Dr Aiora Zabala and led by scholars at The Institute of Ecology, Mexico, funded by The Rufford Foundation.
The U.S. study, published in the Journal of Rural Studies (link), analyses more than 160,000 USDA conservation contracts between 2006 and 2023 to understand what drives the adoption of climate‑smart agriculture (CSA) practices. Using a probit model, the authors find that state‑level financial incentives play a decisive role: the presence of carbon‑trading schemes increase the likelihood of CSA adoption by 6.9 percentage points, while crop‑insurance premium discounts increase it by 4.3 points. Adoption is also more likely in states dominated by row and specialty crops, and less likely on larger farms. By contrast, uptake slowed after USDA introduced “climate‑smart” terminology in 2015, pointing to the influence of policy language and broader political‑economy dynamics. These findings highlight how financial incentives, framing, and structural factors interact in shaping farmers’ behaviour.
In parallel, the study in Mexico, led by Mr Milton Javier Rubiano-Guzmán and Dr Tlacaelel Rivera-Núñez and published in Land Use Policy (link) assesses the performance of two flagship national programmes for development and environment— Sembrando Vida (SV) and Producción para el Bienestar (PPB)— focusing on the Indigenous coffee‑growing region of the Sierra de Zongolica (video of the research case). Through a combination of Q‑methodology, field‑based sustainability assessments, and Sentinel-2 forest‑cover analysis, the research shows that farmers hold diverse and experience‑based views of public programmes, from defenders to absolute critics. Sustainability performance was generally high across both public‑programme and traditional agroforestry systems, reflecting the strength of longstanding local management. Forest‑cover loss was observed in the first year of SV and then stabilised, suggesting a mix of programme adjustments and farmers’ adaptive agroforestry practices. Key contrasts emerged in programme design: SV offers substantial monthly transfers and promotes alternatives to the use of agro-toxic inputs, but requires substantial labour and insufficiently considers local knowledge and practices, while PPB provides modest payments but stronger reciprocal technical support platforms and a more gradual agroecological transition that allows for better consideration of local conditions.
Both cases largely lie at two extremes of types and scales of farming, yet across both contexts, the studies underscore the importance of aligning policy instruments with farmers’ realities. Financial incentives can be powerful motivators, and the effectiveness of sustainability programmes also depends on policy framing and adaptability, as well as on trust and the extent to which local knowledge and conditions are incorporated. These findings have implications for agricultural policy, showing that sustainable practice adoption emerges from economic incentives, and from social, institutional, and cultural dynamics that programmes must meaningfully engage with.
Photo by Jeffrey Eisen on Unsplash - Coffee, Puerto Vallarta, Jalisco, Mexico
The original article was published on the Department of Land Economy website on 2 March 2026: