B.M. Gramig and N.J.O. Widmar. "Estimating Farmers' Willingness to Change Tillage Practices to Supply Carbon Emissions Offsets." Paper presented at the World Congress of Environmental and Resource Economists. Istanbul, Turkey. 2014.
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ABSTRACT: Wide-reaching international agreements like the Kyoto Protocol have thus far failed to achieve the global greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions reductions agreed to by the international community. No successor to Kyoto with binding emissions limits has emerged and a more decentralized approach with individual states, countries or regions enacting GHG emission limits or imposing a carbon tax to incentivize less use of fossil fuels and development of renewable energy technologies. One common element present in voluntary and regulatory carbon markets has been the inclusion of emission offsets that can be sold by entities outside emission caps or not subject to a carbon tax. One particularly low cost means of sequestering atmospheric carbon involves reducing or eliminating tillage of agricultural soils. This research conducts a choice experiment with corn and soybean farmers in Indiana, USA to measure farmers' willingness to change tillage practices to supply carbon offsets by estimating their willingness to pay or willingness to accept payment related to different attributes of active and proposed carbon markets around the world. Understanding farmers' preferences is vital to ensuring that farmers will participate in such schemes so that carbon abatement efforts around the globe can be achieved in the most cost-effective ways possible.