@article{Zhang:150729,
      recid = {150729},
      author = {Zhang,   Wendong and Irwin,   Elena G.},
      title = {From Farmers' Management Decisions to Watershed Water  Quality: A Spatial Economic Model of Land Management  Choices},
      address = {2013},
      pages = {22},
      year = {2013},
      abstract = {Non-point source sediment and nutrient runoff from  upstream agricultural production is known to impair  downstream ecosystem functions and services. Despite  adoption of agricultural best management practices (BMPs)  by some farmers, there are still many cropland parcels with  a high need for additional conservation treatment to reduce  soil erosions and runoffs. Despite the well documented  environmental benefits of BMPs, significant uncertainty  still remains regarding the effectiveness of policies that  promote these practices. The realization of environmental  benefits through improved BMPs is most constrained by our  limited understanding of how farmers respond to policies  and the differences in responses across different types of  farmers. Previous studies of agricultural management  decisions are either not spatial or omiting farmer  characteristics. We will improve on these approaches by  combining a model of farmer behavior with a spatial model  of land management across all parcels in the watershed. In  this research we develop a spatially explicit behavioral  model of farmers’ BMP choices that accounts for both  farmers’ socioeconomic characteristics and spatial  variations of land parcels. We apply this model to the  Maumee River Watershed and to three BMPs – crop rotations,  conservation tillage and Conservation Reserve Program  enrollment. With this model, we can simulate BMP outcomes  for each parcel across the entire watershed under baseline  and alternative policy scenarios. The spatial behavioral  model is expected to outperform a historical trend model  and allows us to evaluate a broader range of potential  policies in terms of their simulated impacts on farmer  behavior, BMP decisions, and downstream ecosystem  conditions.},
      url = {http://ageconsearch.umn.edu/record/150729},
      doi = {https://doi.org/10.22004/ag.econ.150729},
}