Trajectories of French Field Crop Farmers Moving Toward Sustainable Farming Practices: Change, Learning, and Links with the Advisory Services

Abstract

Criticism of field crop farming based on the intensive use of pesticides and fertilizers is growing. Yet, the processes of change toward the ecologization of farming practices are inadequately described in the literature. This article analyzes the trajectories of several innovative field crop farmers in order to gain an understanding of the long-term processes of change in farming practices. This article also looks at how these relate both to the evolving ways in which farmers are informed and learn, and to the role of the technical agricultural advisory services. Our methodology for analyzing the trajectories of 50 field crop farmers from two French field crop study areas combined an agronomical and a sociological approach, and applied a common framework to classify the strategies of change in practices. Our findings show that farmers’ trajectories are mostly a series of changes that are the result of a mix of various technical practices, and of ongoing adjustments to the political, social, and economic context. The transition toward more sustainable practices requires the use of a variety of sources of information, and a diversification of the ways of learning. Some implications of the progressiveness of the processes of change for agricultural policies, for agronomists and for advisory services, are highlighted.