Farming for the environment and climate: Why farmers in the German-French border region adopt agri-environmental practices

Empirical evidence on why farmers adopt agri-environmental practices remains fragmented, particularly regarding behavioral responses to incentives under the European Union's Common Agricultural Policy (CAP). We adapt the COM-B behavioral model into a four-dimensional framework, Capability, Opportunity, Motivation, and systemic Context, and apply it to 62 semi-structured interviews with farmers living along the German-French border and receiving CAP support under divergent 2023-2027 national strategic plans. We show that barriers to adoption substantially outweigh promoting factors (71% vs. 28%), driven mainly by Opportunity factors (administrative complexity, contract rigidity, monitoring requirements) and Context factors (retail-sector power, trade exposure, limited societal recognition). Motivation is the only dimension where promoting factors dominate: intrinsic values and stewardship outweigh economic considerations on both sides of the border. We argue that agri-environmental support functions for most respondents as recognition and stabilization of practices already embedded in farm management rather than as catalysts of new behavior, yielding low additionality but high permanence. The cross-border comparison clarifies that what differs between France and Germany is less farmer motivation: the French approach bundles support into a single farm-wide commitment, while the German individual-measure approach reaches a broader population but leaves advisory support optional rather than embedded in the scheme. Scaling agri-environmental practice will depend less on paying more than on paying better: distinguishing measures that genuinely induce behavior change from those that recognize existing practice, preserving intrinsic motivation through simpler rules and more continuous advisory support, and aligning policy with the trade, market and societal conditions on which green farming livelihoods depend.