Research

Research of the Agricultural Economics and Policy Group improves the understanding of linkages between policies as well as the environment and production and risk management decisions taken in the agricultural sector. Our mission is i) to better understand the decisions taken by farmers, ii) to contribute to evaluation and design of agricultural policies and risk management instruments, iii) contribute to resilient and sustainable agricultural and food systems.

Our research is based on i) quantitative analysis and ii) microeconomic foundations, strengthens the development and use of iii) interdisciplinary approaches, focusses on iv) Swiss and European agriculture and fulfils highest standards on v) transparency and openness.  

Our research activities cover a wide range of topics related to agricultural practices and sustainable and resilient agricultural systems, especially focussing on the evaluation and design of agricultural policies and agricultural risk management. Focal thematic areas are the economics and policy of agricultural pollutants as well as climate change and climate risks in agriculture. We use different methodological approaches including econometric analysis, farm-level and agent based models as well as experimental methods.