Call for Papers: Coping with risks in agriculture: what challenges and prospects?
Gerrit Hoogenboom
CALL FOR PAPERS
February 22-23, 2018
Collège des Bernardins, Paris, France
Coping with risks in agriculture: what challenges and
prospects?
CHALLENGES AND CONTEXT
Agriculture is a particularly complex sector due to multiple risks
and uncertainties farmers face at different levels (farm level,
international level…). Farmers are confronted to risks whose
likelihood and frequency increase:
• Price volatility is a major issue for farmers with the
liberalization of agricultural markets and the CAP reform;
• Quality and price requirements of the agri-food, mass retailing
sectors, and an increasingly restrictive legislation reduce
farmers’ room to maneuver and their bargaining power;
• Global warming represents a substantial challenge in developed
and developing countries. This phenomenon causes an increase in
the frequency of extreme events (floods, drought…) which lead some
countries to offer crop insurance (e.g. France) or other
instruments (microfinance…);
• Agriculture adopts new technologies (robots, GMOs,
nanotechnologies, big data…) that can represent new risks and
opportunities for farmers.
OBJECTIVES
The objective of this international symposium is to bring together
international researchers in social sciences (economics,
management, law, sociology, anthropology, history, geography,
political science, philosophy, agronomy…) and agricultural
professionals (farmers, agricultural chambers, cooperatives,
ministries and other public authorities, insurance companies,
agricultural experts, unions, banks, agribusiness firms…) to
answer several questions that arise in agriculture. What is the
offer and demand of risk management instruments? How do farmers
perceive risks today? What different strategies do they develop to
handle risks (on-farm instruments or market instruments such as
insurance or futures markets)? How do farmers manage risks ex ante
(diversification, marketing and production contracts, insurance…)
and ex post (adaptation strategies following the occurrence of an
event)? How can farms become more robust and resilient to overcome
extreme events? What should the role of agricultural policy as
regards agricultural risk management be? What do we make of the
past agricultural policies in various countries of the globe?
This symposium will allow an update on the state-of-the-art in
risk management in agriculture, with the feedback and experience
of agricultural professionals and research results from
international academics of the social sciences. The goal of this
conference is to contribute to a joint reflection on the
challenges farmers are facing today in terms of risks and how they
cope. This symposium aims at providing guidance to farmers and
policy-makers for a more viable and resilient agriculture. The
conference will be in English and French languages (simultaneous
interpretation service will be available for the plenary
sessions).