IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/plo/pone00/0224924.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Pig farmers’ willingness to pay for management strategies to reduce aggression between pigs

Author

Listed:
  • Rachel S E Peden
  • Faical Akaichi
  • Irene Camerlink
  • Laura A Boyle
  • Simon P Turner

Abstract

When deciding whether to invest in an improvement to animal welfare, farmers must trade-off the relative costs and benefits. Despite the existence of effective solutions to many animal welfare issues, farmers’ willingness to pay for them is largely unknown. This study modelled pig farmers’ decisions to improve animal welfare using a discrete choice experiment focused on alleviating aggression between growing/finishing pigs at regrouping. Eighty-two UK and Irish pig farm owners and managers were asked to choose between hypothetical aggression control strategies described in terms of four attributes; installation cost, on-going cost, impact on skin lesions from aggression and impact on growth rate. If they did not like any of the strategies they could opt to keep their current farm practice. Systematic variations in product attributes allowed farmers’ preferences and willingness to pay to be estimated and latent class modelling accounted for heterogeneity in responses. The overall willingness to pay to reduce lesions was low at £0.06 per pig place (installation cost) and £0.01 per pig produced (running cost) for each 1% reduction in lesions. Results revealed three independent classes of farmers. Farmers in Class 1 were unlikely to regroup unfamiliar growing/finishing pigs, and thus were unwilling to adopt measures to reduce aggression at regrouping. Farmers in Classes 2 and 3 were willing to adopt measures providing certain pre-conditions were met. Farmers in Class 2 were motivated mainly by business goals, whilst farmers in Class 3 were motivated by both business and animal welfare goals, and were willing to pay the most to reduce aggression; £0.11 per pig place and £0.03 per pig produced for each 1% reduction in lesions. Farmers should not be considered a homogeneous group regarding the adoption of animal welfare innovations. Instead, campaigns should be targeted at subgroups according to their independent preferences and willingness to pay.

Suggested Citation

  • Rachel S E Peden & Faical Akaichi & Irene Camerlink & Laura A Boyle & Simon P Turner, 2019. "Pig farmers’ willingness to pay for management strategies to reduce aggression between pigs," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 14(11), pages 1-22, November.
    • Handle: RePEc:plo:pone00:0224924
    DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0224924
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0224924
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article/file?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0224924&type=printable
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1371/journal.pone.0224924?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Emily Lancsar & Jordan Louviere, 2008. "Conducting Discrete Choice Experiments to Inform Healthcare Decision Making," PharmacoEconomics, Springer, vol. 26(8), pages 661-677, August.
    2. Ladenburg, Jacob & Olsen, Søren Bøye, 2014. "Augmenting short Cheap Talk scripts with a repeated Opt-Out Reminder in Choice Experiment surveys," Resource and Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 37(C), pages 39-63.
    3. Hoyos, David, 2010. "The state of the art of environmental valuation with discrete choice experiments," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 69(8), pages 1595-1603, June.
    4. Greene, William H. & Hensher, David A., 2003. "A latent class model for discrete choice analysis: contrasts with mixed logit," Transportation Research Part B: Methodological, Elsevier, vol. 37(8), pages 681-698, September.
    5. David Revelt & Kenneth Train, 1998. "Mixed Logit With Repeated Choices: Households' Choices Of Appliance Efficiency Level," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 80(4), pages 647-657, November.
    6. Mickael Bech & Trine Kjaer & Jørgen Lauridsen, 2011. "Does the number of choice sets matter? Results from a web survey applying a discrete choice experiment," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 20(3), pages 273-286, March.
    7. Kelvin J. Lancaster, 1966. "A New Approach to Consumer Theory," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 74(2), pages 132-132.
    8. Carrington, Michal J. & Neville, Benjamin A. & Whitwell, Gregory J., 2014. "Lost in translation: Exploring the ethical consumer intention–behavior gap," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 67(1), pages 2759-2767.
    9. Jayson L. Lusk & F. Bailey Norwood, 2011. "Animal Welfare Economics," Applied Economic Perspectives and Policy, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 33(4), pages 463-483.
    10. Hensher, David A., 2010. "Hypothetical bias, choice experiments and willingness to pay," Transportation Research Part B: Methodological, Elsevier, vol. 44(6), pages 735-752, July.
    11. Laura O. Taylor & Ronald G. Cummings, 1999. "Unbiased Value Estimates for Environmental Goods: A Cheap Talk Design for the Contingent Valuation Method," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 89(3), pages 649-665, June.
    12. Michal Carrington & Benjamin Neville & Gregory Whitwell, 2010. "Why Ethical Consumers Don’t Walk Their Talk: Towards a Framework for Understanding the Gap Between the Ethical Purchase Intentions and Actual Buying Behaviour of Ethically Minded Consumers," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 97(1), pages 139-158, November.
    13. Hensher,David A. & Rose,John M. & Greene,William H., 2015. "Applied Choice Analysis," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9781107465923, January.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Thiermann, Insa & Schroeer, Daniel & Latacz-Lohmann, Uwe, 2022. "Are German farmers ready for ‘warm restructuring’ of the pig sector?," 96th Annual Conference, April 4-6, 2022, K U Leuven, Belgium 321201, Agricultural Economics Society - AES.
    2. Uehleke, Reinhard & Seifert, Stefan & Hüttel, Silke, 2020. "Animal welfare and production efficiency in German pork production," 60th Annual Conference, Halle/ Saale, Germany, September 23-25, 2020 305600, German Association of Agricultural Economists (GEWISOLA).
    3. Uehleke, Reinhard & Seifert, Stefan & Hüttel, Silke, 2020. "Animal welfare and production efficiency in German pork production," 94th Annual Conference, April 15-17, 2020, K U Leuven, Belgium (Cancelled) 303695, Agricultural Economics Society - AES.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. S. Ceolotto & E. Denny, 2024. "Putting a New ‘Spin’ on Energy Information: Measuring the Impact of Reframing Energy Efficiency Information on Tumble Dryer Choices in a Multi-country Experiment," Journal of Consumer Policy, Springer, vol. 47(1), pages 51-108, March.
    2. Alessandro Mengoni & Chiara Seghieri & Sabina Nuti, 2013. "The application of discrete choice experiments in health economics: a systematic review of the literature," Working Papers 201301, Scuola Superiore Sant'Anna of Pisa, Istituto di Management.
    3. Wan Norhidayah W Mohamad & Ken Willis & Neil Powe, 2019. "The Status Quo In Discrete Choice Experiments: Is It Relevant?," The Singapore Economic Review (SER), World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd., vol. 65(02), pages 507-532, March.
    4. Haghani, Milad & Bliemer, Michiel C.J. & Hensher, David A., 2021. "The landscape of econometric discrete choice modelling research," Journal of choice modelling, Elsevier, vol. 40(C).
    5. Mamine, Fateh & Fares, M'hand & Minviel, Jean Joseph, 2020. "Contract Design for Adoption of Agrienvironmental Practices: A Meta-analysis of Discrete Choice Experiments," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 176(C).
    6. Krah, Kwabena & Michelson, Hope & Perge, Emilie & Jindal, Rohit, 2019. "Constraints to adopting soil fertility management practices in Malawi: A choice experiment approach," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 124(C), pages 1-1.
    7. Faical Akaichi & Klaus Glenk & Cesar Revoredo‐Giha, 2022. "Bundling food labels: What role could the labels “Organic,” “Local” and “Low Fat” play in fostering the demand for animal‐friendly meat," Agribusiness, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 38(2), pages 349-370, April.
    8. Iván Pérez-Rubio & Daniel Flores & Christian Vargas & Francisco Jiménez & Iker Etxano, 2021. "To What Extent Are Cattle Ranching Landholders Willing to Restore Ecosystem Services? Constructing a Micro-Scale PES Scheme in Southern Costa Rica," Land, MDPI, vol. 10(7), pages 1-24, July.
    9. Admasu, Wubante Fetene & Van Passel, Steven & Nyssen, Jan & Minale, Amare Sewnet & Tsegaye, Enyew Adgo, 2021. "Eliciting farmers’ preferences and willingness to pay for land use attributes in Northwest Ethiopia: A discrete choice experiment study," Land Use Policy, Elsevier, vol. 109(C).
    10. Kanchanaroek, Yingluk & Termansen, Mette & Quinn, Claire, 2013. "Property rights regimes in complex fishery management systems: A choice experiment application," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 93(C), pages 363-373.
    11. Haghani, Milad & Bliemer, Michiel C.J. & Rose, John M. & Oppewal, Harmen & Lancsar, Emily, 2021. "Hypothetical bias in stated choice experiments: Part I. Macro-scale analysis of literature and integrative synthesis of empirical evidence from applied economics, experimental psychology and neuroimag," Journal of choice modelling, Elsevier, vol. 41(C).
    12. Chinedu, Obi & Sanou, Edouard & Tur-Cardona, Juan & Bartolini, Fabio & Gheysen, Godelieve & Speelman, Stijn, 2018. "Farmers’ valuation of transgenic biofortified sorghum for nutritional improvement in Burkina Faso: A latent class approach," Food Policy, Elsevier, vol. 79(C), pages 132-140.
    13. Carroll, James & Brazil, William & Howard, Michael & Denny, Eleanor, 2022. "Imperfect emissions information during flight choices and the role of CO2 labelling," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 165(C).
    14. Mohammed H. Alemu & Søren B. Olsen, 2017. "Can a Repeated Opt-Out Reminder remove hypothetical bias in discrete choice experiments? An application to consumer valuation of novel food products," IFRO Working Paper 2017/05, University of Copenhagen, Department of Food and Resource Economics.
    15. Milad Haghani & Michiel C. J. Bliemer & John M. Rose & Harmen Oppewal & Emily Lancsar, 2021. "Hypothetical bias in stated choice experiments: Part I. Integrative synthesis of empirical evidence and conceptualisation of external validity," Papers 2102.02940, arXiv.org.
    16. Nordmeyer, Eike Florenz & Danne, Michael & Musshoff, Oliver, 2023. "Can satellite-retrieved data increase farmers' willingness to insure against drought? – Insights from Germany," Agricultural Systems, Elsevier, vol. 211(C).
    17. Amilon, Anna & Ladenburg, Jacob & Siren, Anu & Vernstrøm Østergaard, Stine, 2020. "Willingness to pay for long-term home care services: Evidence from a stated preferences analysis," The Journal of the Economics of Ageing, Elsevier, vol. 17(C).
    18. Liebe, Ulf & Glenk, Klaus & von Meyer-Höfer, Marie & Spiller, Achim, 2019. "A web survey application of real choice experiments," Journal of choice modelling, Elsevier, vol. 33(C).
    19. Misal, Haleema & Varela, Elsa & Voulgarakis, Apostolos & Rovithakis, Anastasios & Grillakis, Manolis & Kountouris, Yiannis, 2023. "Assessing public preferences for a wildfire mitigation policy in Crete, Greece," Forest Policy and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 153(C).
    20. Stefano Ceolotto & Eleanor Denny, 2021. "Putting a new 'spin' on energy labels: measuring the impact of reframing energy efficiency on tumble dryer choices in a multi-country experiment," Trinity Economics Papers tep1521, Trinity College Dublin, Department of Economics.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:plo:pone00:0224924. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: plosone (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/ .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.