2022 - Frick

"Evidence-based agricultural and food policy - Role of research for policy making"

Agricultural policy is under pressure: Societal demands on agriculture are high, and the diverse goals in the areas of food production, environmental protection and animal welfare often cannot be achieved simultaneously with the currently used policies and measures. The restrictive corset of a sector policy is currently difficult to reconcile with the vision of a comprehensive food policy. Research can and must make an important contribution to the further development of agricultural and food policy. For example, by providing ex-ante and ex-post evaluations of agricultural policy instruments and programmes, but also by identifying impact mechanisms. Robust research designs are necessary for evidence-based agricultural and food policy. In addition to advancing agricultural and food policy measures and programmes, we would also like to discuss rigorous and innovative research methods for policy design at the Annual Meeting. We would like to bring together scientists and people from politics, administration and practice on this topic at the annual conference of the Swiss Society for Agricultural Economics and Agricultural Sociology 2022.

Media Release (german), 29. April 2022: Die Schweizerische Gesellschaft für Agrarwirtschaft und Agrarsoziologie diskutiert an ihrer Jubiläum-stagung die Rolle der Forschung für die Politikgestaltung

Communiqué de presse, 29 avril 2022: La Société Suisse d’Economie et de Sociologie rurale discute du rôle de la recherche dans l’élaboration des politiques lors de son congrès anniversaire

We are looking forward to the following keynote speakers:

• Marianne Lefebvre, Professor in Economics at Angers University and member of REECAP board
• Daniel Hasler, Co-Präsident der Schweizer Junglandwirtekommission
• Rachael Garrett, Professor of Environmental Policy at ETH Zurich
• Loredana Sorg, Mitglied der Geschäftsleitung Biovision

At the conference, current scientific findings and practical experiences on evidence-based agricultural and food policy will be presented and discussed:

• Ex-ante and ex-post evaluations of agricultural, environmental and food policy measures
• Quantitative and qualitative analyses of agricultural and food policy relevant measures and programmes
• Design and evaluation of innovative instruments for agricultural and food policy (e.g. outcome-based measures)
• Rigorous impact evaluation and robust research designs to generate causal evidence and identify mechanisms of impact (e.g. using experimental and quasi-experimental methods, econometric approaches, optimisation and simulation models, replication studies, meta-analyses)
• Collaboration and dialogue between research and stakeholders (including policy makers) for evidence-based policy making
• farmer and consumer decisions for the transformation towards a sustainable food system
• other relevant agricultural economic or agricultural sociological issues

In addition to the exchange of different actors from Switzerland, international exchange is an important goal, which is why we are also very happy to welcome participants from abroad.
The conference languages are German, French and English. There will be no translation.
At the conference, we will award the best poster and the best presentation.

On the occasion of the 50th anniversary of the SGA in 2022, a Special Issue "Evidence-Based Agricultural and Food Policy - Role of Research for Policy Making" will be published in the journal Q Open (European Association of Agricultural Economists). Authors of abstracts from the SGA Annual Meeting but also other authors are invited to submit a paper for the Special Issue. Details on the Call for Papers can be found here: Call for Papers | Q Open | Oxford Academic (oup.com).

Contact persons of the Board of the Swiss Society for Agricultural Economics and Agricultural Sociology (SGA) for questions about the conference:
Dr Nadja El Benni (nadja.el-benni(at)agroscope.admin.ch), Agroscope, Research Division Competitiveness and Systems Evaluation
Prof. Dr Robert Finger (rofinger(at)ethz.ch), ETH Zurich, Agricultural Economics and Policy Group
Dr Christian Grovermann (christian.grovermann(at)fibl.org), FiBL, Socioeconomics

Venue: Forschungsinstitut für biologischen Landbau (FiBL), Frick