An adapted influence diagram of risk conception of Flemish farmers

In the last decades, due to amongst others increasing cost involved in agricultural production, we have seen a trend in farms becoming bigger and more specialized. Together with some other recent developments like increased price volatility, extreme and unpredictable weather conditions and uncertain environmental regulation and subsidies, this causes farming to be an increasingly risky business. Hence, the management of these uncertainties, or risk management, becomes increasingly important. In order to improve risk management we need to understand the risk conception of the manager or decision maker. Cognitive mapping provides a useful tool to understand an individual’s risk conception. The methodology of influence diagrams, in particular provides a good starting point to increased understanding of individual’s risk conception.