A typology of European farmers' viewpoints on soil management and an investigation of their context-dependency

Fostering the uptake of sustainable soil management practices requires a good understanding of farmers' motivations and priorities. To comprehensively assess these priorities, we identify and describe archetypical viewpoints on soil management among European crop farmers. We analyse interviews conducted with 132 farmers from five case study regions using Q-Methodology, a mixed quantitative and qualitative method. In addition, we apply and compare three different approaches to Q-Methodology and investigate the context-dependency of the identified viewpoints. Our results demonstrate the existence of up to five archetypical viewpoints on soil management. They are distinct in their focus on soil health, farm economics, social sustainability, traditional farming values, and risk avoidance, respectively. We find that these viewpoints are partly—but by no means fully—context-dependent. This implies that farmers' needs do not only vary due to natural farming conditions or farm structural aspects, but also due to subjective worldviews. Knowledge about archetypical viewpoints can help policy makers and advisory services to support farmers in a tailored manner. • We create a typology of European farmers' viewpoints on soil management • Five types emerge: soil, economic, sustainability, practical, and risk-averse farmers • Most types are stable across different approaches to Q-Methodology • Regional, biophysical, and farm structural context influence viewpoints