Farm Household Income: Towards Better Informed Policies (OECD, October 2004) SS Economics of Food Markets Kevin Lynch 23 rd October 2007 Trinity College, Dublin
Why is information needed? Wanted: A new household model of rural and farm families. New classification : business/ household characteristics not commodity Two household farm problem Policy evaluation in times of reform Variety of households (panel data)
What information is available? No comprehensive or consistent measure of rural household incomes Micro/macro problems, international & intertemporal comparisons FADN: data on size, composition & costs Tax reciepts: different provisions Household Surveys: not enough farms
Obstacles to collecting this information Administrative: costs (speed of revision), privacy, burden on participants Technical: representation, wealth, panel composition Political: non-compliance, vested interests
How can these be overcome? Accountability of public funds Counting costs from programme budgets Cost: IT, multiple use, wider scope and applications – private sector? Best practice: IT, standardised estimators
How would such information help policy makers? To assess the nature, cause and extent of income problems. Farm/non-farm income Measurable targets for policy New policy design for specific problems Policy evaluation Better national models Replacing incomplete irrelevant data
Summary and Outlook Reliable data needed to measure policy effectiveness Survey costs<policy costs Technical problems are relatively minor Co-operation between agents and countries is essential