Understanding and inﬂuencing behaviour change by farmers to improve water quality K.L. Blackstock a, ⁎, J. Ingram b, 1 , R. Burton c , K.M. Brown a , B. Slee a a Socio-Economics Research Group, Macaulay Land Use Research Institute, Craigiebuckler, Aberdeen, AB15 8QH, United Kingdom b Countryside and Community Research Institute, University of Gloucestershire Dunholme Villa, The Park, Cheltenham, GL50 2RH, United Kingdom c Agresearch, Invermay Agricultural Centre, Puddle Alley, Private Bag 50034 Mosgiel 9053, New Zealand abstract article info Article history: Received 7 January 2009 Received in revised form 15 April 2009 Accepted 20 April 2009 Available online 22 May 2009 Keywords: Agriculture Management Environment Culture Extension Diffuse pollution Diffuse pollution from agriculture remains a signiﬁcant challenge to many countries seeking to improve and protect their water environments. This paper reviews literature relating to the provision of information and advice as a mechanism to encourage farmers to mitigate diffuse pollution. The paper presents ﬁndings from a literature review on inﬂuencing farmer behaviour and synthesises three main areas of literature: psychological and institutional theories of behaviour; shifts in the approach to delivery of advice (from knowledge transfer to knowledge exchange); and the increased interest in heterogeneous farming cultures. These three areas interconnect in helping to understand how best to inﬂuence farmer behaviour in order to mitigate diffuse pollution. They are, however, literatures that are rarely cited in the water management arena. The paper highlights the contribution of the ‘cultural turn’ taken by rural social scientists in helping to understand collective and individual voluntary behaviour. The paper explores how these literatures can contribute to the existing understanding of water management in the agricultural context, particularly: when farmers question the scientiﬁc evidence; when there are increased calls for collaborative planning and management; and when there is increased value placed on information as a business commodity. The paper also highlights where there are still gaps in knowledge that need to be ﬁlled by future research — possibly in partnership with farmers themselves. Whilst information and advice has long been seen as an important part of diffuse pollution control, increasing climate variability that will require farmers to practice adaptive management is likely to make these mechanisms even more important. © 2009 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved. 1. Introduction There has been increasing attention to how agricultural manage- ment affects both water quality and quantity in recent years, particularly as point-source pollution controls have failed to resolve all water quality problems (see Macleod et al., 2007). This paper makes a contribution to the broader literature on Integrated Water Resource Management, which emphasises stakeholder involvement, multiple forms of knowledge and sustainable practices (Mitchell, 2005), through the paper's focus on farmer behaviour. 2 This paper takes the position that the farmer is an important decision maker to inﬂuence when managing agricultural diffuse pollution to the water environ- ment. Understanding the reasons for their decisions and behaviour is therefore critical to an integrated approach to mitigating agriculture's impact on water quality. There is, however, little published on adaptive agricultural water management that takes a cultural and behavioural perspective and this paper seeks to ﬁll this gap through bringing together disparate literatures. Farmer behaviour can be inﬂuenced using various institutional mechanisms: legal instruments, economic rewards, provision of advice and voluntary collective actions (Wondolleck and Yaffee, 2000). Indeed, information and advice work in tandem with these other institutional mechanisms, as a cross cutting theme. This paper focuses on voluntary action, behavioural change and the provision of advice. Both the water management and agricultural extension literatures increasingly recognise the need for voluntary action by farmers to protect water resources due to the ever increasing burden of litigation, economic sanctions and government subsidies (Sabatier et al., 2005). Furthermore, it is argued that behaviour change leading to voluntary action will persist over time as it is more likely to become embedded in social norms (Ayer, 1997). Attempts to incite voluntary action require an understanding of existing behaviours, and how advice can help inﬂuence behavioural change. Managing common pool resources such as water generally requires action on a catchment or collective scale so this paper focuses attention both on individual and group behaviour. Science of the Total Environment 408 (2010) 5631–5638 ⁎ Corresponding author. Tel.: +44 1224 395291. E-mail addresses: k.blackstock@macaulay.ac.uk (K.L. Blackstock), jingram@glos.ac.uk (J. Ingram), robjfburton@gmail.com (R. Burton). 1 Tel.: +44 1242 714134/4122. 2 We use ‘farmer’ to refer to all land managers and land owners who manage agricultural land. 0048-9697/$ – see front matter © 2009 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.scitotenv.2009.04.029 Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Science of the Total Environment journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/scitotenv