Problems of farm succession in the post-Soviet space: insights from the Republic of Moldova. Issue 6 (2nd November 2018)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Piras, Simone; Botnarenco, Svetlana
• Is Part Of: Journal of land use science. Volume 13:Issue 6(2018)
• Page Start: 631
• Page End: 644
• Publication Date: 2018-11-02
• Subjects: Family farm -- farmer motivation -- intergenerational gap -- land inheritance -- smallholders -- post-socialist agriculture; Land use -- Periodicals; 333.7313
• DOI: 10.1080/1747423X.2019.1603332
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 1747-423X

Abstract

ABSTRACT: In post-Soviet countries, the breakdown of collective agriculture generated large numbers of subsistence-oriented smallholders. Two decades later, most land recipients are reaching old age. We inquire the perspectives for farm succession using a mixed-method survey with 126 smallholders and a pilot survey with 19 children of smallholders carried out in the Republic of Moldova in 2015. We find that many land recipients lack a successor and are thus selling their plots to corporate farms or abandoning them. The children recognise the symbolic value of food self-provisioning and land ownership but are more open to non-farm livelihoods than their parents. A timely introduction of policies to incentivise the takeover of the farms by young people and farm modernisation is thus key to promote an agricultural sector of mid-sized family businesses.