In-depth case studies of the conversion process

Summary

This report was presented at the UK Organic Research 2002 Conference. A number of agricultural disciplines including agricultural economics are concerned with farmer decision-making and change processes on farms regarding both technical and financial efficiency through surveys of representative samples and modelling. The paper presents an alternative approach in which longitudinal case studies were used to gain a better understanding of a complex change process on farms, the conversion process to organic milk production. The aim was to develop and apply an integrated approach to analyse both personal and farm-specific changes in a qualitative way and to identify important factors that influence the conversion process.