The impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on Austrian agriculture and forestry: representative telephone survey among farmers

ABSTRACT

This study quantified the consequences of the Covid-19 pandemic for the agricultural sector and derived long-term options to make agricultural and forestry enterprises more resilient. Almost one in five farm households had at least one person affected by a SARS-CoV-2 infection by March 2021. The psychological stress in farming families was comparable to that in the population as a whole. Economically, negative impacts of the pandemic clearly outweighed the positive ones, with large differences among farm sectors. Around one in four farms considered strategic changes in consequence of the Corona crisis, with direct marketing being the most frequent strategy in this context. Austrian farmers consider their farms quite crisis-proof, although they heavily depend on public funds and respondents rated their cuts as the greatest potential threat. Finally, the study suggests that the impact of the Corona crisis on Austrian agriculture and forestry was still manageable, at least until March 2021, and motivated farmers to make isolated adjustments only.