Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

Incentives For Best Management Practice Adoption Among Beef Cattle Producers And Effects On Upland Sediment Loss: A Case Study In Southeastern Tennessee, Laura Jane Medwid

Masters Theses

Federal programs incentivize livestock managers to adopt best management practices (BMPs), such as rotational grazing, water tank systems, stream crossings, and pasture improvement to prevent or reduce soil erosion. This thesis addresses the challenge of integrating socio-economic data on rotational grazing (RG) adoption behavior with hydrologic/biophysical models to analyze the association between incentives, BMP adoption, and changes in soil erosion. Using primary survey data of livestock producers in an East Tennessee watershed, the study estimates willingness to adopt BMPs among livestock producers. The propensity to adopt one or multiple management technologies, given an incentive, is estimated with a multivariate probit …