DDRIE: Farm to Fridge: Traceability and Quality Incentivizing in a Dairy Chain

提高农产品质量是我国从自给农业向现代商品农业转型的重要环节。无组织的农业价值链阻碍了质量激励向供应链中的农民的传递，特别是在农场门口没有观察到质量的情况下。如果没有价值链上有效的可追溯系统，农民将无法因生产高质量产品而获得奖励。该项目将通过在奶牛养殖中建立可持续的可追溯性和基于质量的支付系统，支持低收入农民发展更负责任的食品供应链。这一体系有助于提高产品质量，增加农民利润，改善消费者福利，不仅有可能推广到许多其他乳制品合作社，而且也有可能推广到其他农产品。这项研究将有助于美国通过更好地了解这些新兴市场，更有效地针对发展中国家的农业价值链制定援助政策。研究结果可以提高农产品质量，增加小农的收入，提高消费者的健康水平。该项目将在乳品合作社的收集中心层面采用随机对照试验（RCT），以评估建立牛奶质量可追溯系统的效果，并辅之以基于质量的牛奶质量支付，以及农民在质量升级方面的投资。这个实验有两个方面。首先，该项目实施了一个可追溯系统，在随机选择的收集中心之间跟踪整个价值链中的牛奶交付流程。将根据可追溯系统进行不同级别的牛奶检测，以确定农民是否有资格获得质量补贴。其次，该项目对符合条件的农民进行了随机补贴，并改变了补贴的范围。这一实验设计使项目负责人能够确定可追溯系统和基于质量的支付对牛奶质量和农民在质量升级方面的投资的因果影响。该设计可以适用于其他市场的研究，研究结果可以为经济学家更好地理解产品质量升级提供依据，对发展经济学文献有重要贡献。为该项目收集的数据将提供给未来的研究人员。研究结果可以提高农产品质量，增加小农的收入，提高消费者的健康水平。研究结果还将为美国农业价值链质量升级政策提供参考，并指导美国制定援助政策。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

Improving the quality of agricultural products is an important step in the process of structural transformation---moving farmers from subsistence farming to modern commercial agriculture. Disorganized agriculture value chains prevent the transmission of quality incentives to farmers in the supply chain, especially when quality is unobserved at the farm gate. Without an effective traceability system along the value chain, farmers will not be rewarded for producing high-quality products. This project will support low-income farmers to develop more accountable food supply chains by establishing a sustainable traceability and quality-based payment system in dairy farming. This system helps to improve products’ quality, increase farmers’ profit, and improve consumers’ welfare, which has the potential to be scaled up to not only many other dairy cooperatives, but also other agricultural commodities. This research would help the U.S. target its aid policies in agricultural value chains in developing countries more effectively with a better understanding of these emerging markets. The results of this research could improve agricultural product quality and increase the incomes of small-scale farmers as well as improve the health of consumers. This project will use a randomized controlled trial (RCT) at the collection center level within dairy cooperatives to evaluate the effect of establishing a milk quality traceability system, supplemented with a quality-based payment on milk quality, and farmers’ investment in quality upgrading. The experiment has two arms. First, the project implements a traceability system to track the flow of milk delivery throughout the value chain among randomly selected collection centers. Milk tests at different levels based on the traceability system will be conducted to determine farmers’ eligibility for quality subsidies. Second, this project randomizes the subsidy to be paid to eligible farmers as well as vary the range of subsidies to be given to farmers. This experimental design allows the PIs to identify the causal effects of traceability systems and quality-based payment on milk quality and farmers’ investment in quality upgrading. The design can be adapted to study other markets and the results could provide economists with a better understanding of product quality upgrading, and important contribution to the development economics literature. The data collected for the project will be made available to future researchers. The results of this research could improve agricultural product quality and increase the incomes of small-scale farmers as well as improve the health of consumers. The results will also inform US policies on quality upgrading in agricultural value chains as well as guide the formulation of US aid policies.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.