Policy packaging can make food system transformation feasible
A new article on food system transformation by PhD Candidate at ETH Zurich Lukas Paul Fesenfeld, Postdoctoral Researcher at ETH Zurich Michael Wicki, Dr Yixian Sun from the University of Bath, and ETH Prof. Thomas Bernauer was published in Nature Food. This study examines how potentially effective policy instruments may be designed and combined so as to reduce public backlash and ensure political feasibility of transforming the food system.
Abstract
Redesigning food production and consumption is key to limiting global warming, soil erosion and biodiversity loss. Yet, transforming the food system may involve political feasibility problems, as potentially effective policy interventions interfere with citizens’ daily lives. Here, we show that policy packaging—the systematic bundling of different policy measures—can help to mitigate the potential trade-off between political feasibility and problem-solving effectiveness.
We use conjoint experiments with citizens from China, Germany and the United States to scrutinize support for different combinations of policies aimed at reducing food systems’ environmental impacts. Our results do not support the widespread claim that costly market-based or push measures per se receive less support than non-market-based or pull measures. Instead, they show that citizens are likely to support even costly policies, but this support varies by country and depends on the specific combination of policy measures, their stringency and revenue earmarking.
Policy packaging may open up room for political manoeuvre and enable policymakers to adopt environmental policies that are both strong (and thus effective) and politically feasible.Lukas Paul Fesenfeld, Michael Wicki, Yixian Sun & Thomas Bernauer
Article: "Policy packaging can make food system transformation feasible"
Nature Food (March 2020)
Authors: Lukas Paul Fesenfeld, Michael Wicki, external page Yixian Sun & Thomas Bernauer
- For more information and the full article, please visit the external page Nature Food homepage.
- You can also find an insightful external page article by external page Danielle Resnick reflecting on the publication.