Center for Environmental Economics - Montpellier - Next events feed

EE Seminar : Valuing soil natural capital in agriculture: Evidence from a double flexible cost function

Thu, 08 Oct 2026 11:00:00 +0200

Speaker: Serge Garcia
Address: UMR CEE-M Institut Agro de Montpellier / INRAE - Bat. 26 - Centre de documentation Pierre Bartoli 2 Place Viala 34000 Montpellier

Soil natural capital is a fundamental input in agricultural production, yet its economic value as a productive asset remains poorly quantified. This study develops an integrated framework to value soil natural capital by combining soil science and production economics. We adopt a two-step approach. First, structural equation modelling (SEM) is used to construct a latent index of soil natural capital from multiple biophysical soil indicators. Second, this latent measure is incorporated into a double flexible multi-output cost function that jointly accounts for variable and quasi-fixed inputs. This framework allows us to estimate the shadow value of soil natural capital, analyse input substitution patterns, and assess potential cost complementarities between agricultural production and ecosystem services. The empirical analysis relies on an unbalanced panel of 20,957 observations from 3,354 French crop farms drawn from the Farm Accountancy Data Network (FADN), combined with detailed soil information from the French Soil Quality Measurement Network. Results yield four main findings. First, soil natural capital significantly reduces production costs, confirming its role as a cost-reducing productive asset. The estimated shadow value of soil natural capital is approximately €63 per hectare and per unit of the soil natural capital index. Second, the estimated marginal cost of soil carbon storage is approximately €42 per tonne, providing an economic valuation of the climate regulation service supplied by agricultural soils. Third, soil natural capital mainly acts as a substitute for hired labour, suggesting that better soil conditions reduce labour requirements and improve production efficiency. By contrast, its relationship with intermediate inputs is negative but not statistically significant. Fourth, we find no significant cost trade-offs between crop production and soil carbon storage, suggesting that climate-oriented soil management practices can be implemented without systematically increasing production costs.

BEE Seminar : Does Discussion with Affected Others Influence Competitiveness?

Thu, 15 Oct 2026 11:00:00 +0200

Speaker: Astrid Hopfensitz
Address: UMR CEE-M Université Montpellier - Faculté d'économie, room C414 195 Rue Vendémiaire, 34960 Montpellier

A large experimental literature documents gender differences in competitiveness. Yet most existing work conceptualizes competitiveness as an individual decision made in isolation. In contrast, real-life career decisions, such as applying for a promotion, are frequently discussed with others. These discussions may matter because others, may hold different preferences, and may offer perspectives that shape how risks and competitive incentives are evaluated. Despite their prevalence, the causal role of such discussions remains largely understudied. In this paper, we investigate how discussion with a male partner and responsibility for that partner’s earnings affect women’s willingness to compete. In a first study, we implement a 2×2 laboratory experiment that varies whether women’s competitiveness decision affects only their own earnings or also those of the other, and whether prior to taking their decision they discuss their choise with another or not. On average, neither responsibility for another’s earnings nor discussion lead to an average shift in competitiveness. However, discussion relevance leads to larger absoluate changes in competitiveness. This could be driven by two mechanisms. First, women may retain their own preferences but place greater weight on their partner’s preferences, or second, discussion may shift women’s own risk preferences toward those of their partner. To disentangle these mechanisms, we conduct a second study, in which participants engage in a relevant discussion without knowing whether the subsequent competitiveness decision will affect only the woman or both participants. Our findings show that discussion leads to preference transmission, i.e. women’s competitiveness changes even for decisions that only affect themselves. Overall, our study highlights the importance of discussions with affected but imperfectly informed others, and shows that these can fundamentally reshape how competitive decisions are formed. (co-authors : Quentin Cavalan and Fabio Galeotti )

CEE-M Lunch Talk : Social Preferences and Sustainable Behavior: A Day Reconstruction Method

Thu, 15 Oct 2026 16:30:00 +0200

Speaker: Danièle Fares
Address: UMR CEE-M Université Montpellier - Faculté d'économie, Salle du Conseil, 195 Rue Vendémiaire, 34960 Montpellier

We study whether laboratory measures of prosociality predict sustainable behavior in the field. We measure prosociality among a representative sample of the Italian adult population using two games: (i) a public goods game, which captures individuals’ willingness to cooperate in a setting with positive externalities for others, and (ii) an externality game, which measures aversion to generating negative externalities for personal gain. The same participants subsequently complete a 14-day evening diary based on the Day Reconstruction Method (DRM; Kahneman et al., 2004; Navarro Martínez et al., 2023), providing detailed information on their daily behaviors. These behaviors are categorized into three key domains of sustainable action: mobility, household energy use, and food consumption. For mobility, we record whether participants travel to work or study and the modes of transportation used. Household energy use is assessed through reported heating, showering, washing machine use, and other energy-related practices. For food consumption, we collect data on meal composition and whether meals are predominantly plant-based. This study aims to link experimentally measured social preferences with real-world sustainable behaviors, thereby contributing to a better understanding of the behavioral determinants of environmental sustainability and informing future research and policy design in this area.

EE Seminar : The Global Allocation of Extractive Windfalls

Fri, 16 Oct 2026 11:00:00 +0200

Speaker: Ninon Moreau Kastler
Address: UMR CEE-M Institut Agro de Montpellier / INRAE - Bat. 26 - Centre de documentation Pierre Bartoli 2 Place Viala 34000 Montpellier

The extraction of oil, gas, and minerals generates large economic rents, yet it remains unknown how commodity price windfalls are distributed across the internal networks of multinational enterprises (MNEs) that dominate production in most resource-rich countries. We study this question by combining administrative records covering the worldwide profits, revenues, and employees of large MNEs across all jurisdictions, with comprehensive data on their physical extraction activity at the affiliate level. Extractive MNEs have a substantial presence in countries in which they do not extract: downstream and consumption countries, as well as low-tax jurisdictions. Combining differences in firms' commodity specialization with heterogeneous market price changes in a shift-share design, we find that windfall profits are partly diverted to low-tax jurisdictions. For every additional euro of consolidated windfall profit, 0.8 euros accrues to extractive affiliates, 0.2 euros to tax havens, and nothing to the rest of the group. This diversion intensifies during booms: the share of profits booked in tax havens rises by one percentage point for every 10% increase in group profitability.