ENERGY INTENSITY DECOMPOSITION IN EU AGRICULTURE, USING A DEMAND ANALYSIS - Economics of Sustainable Energy in Agriculture - page 53

Chapter 5
ENERGY INTENSITY DECOMPOSITION IN EU
AGRICULTURE, USING A DEMAND ANALYSIS
Joaquín A. Millan
1. INTRODUCTION
There are two seemingly separate strings of studies concerning sector
energy use: the intensity approach and the demand approach. Both kinds of
studies indicate substantial differences in the growth of energy inputs
between countries and within countries for different time periods. In this
chapter, a suggestion is made about how to link the intensity and the
demand approaches, estimating globally well-behaved technology in
intensity form (input to output ratio). The empirical part of the chapter is
the comparison of the results from the estimation of intensities for the
agricultural sectors of the EU countries in the 1974-96 period, according to
the demand approach.
The use of energy lies behind much of the increase in agricultural
output in recent times, and there is a growing literature on energy usage in
agriculture. Although the importance of energy and energy based
consumption in developed agricultures is recognised, little systematic
evidence on the use of energy inputs in EU agriculture and or international
comparisons with respect to input demands and intensities have been
presented so far. Previous studies show substantial differences in the growth
of energy use among countries, or even in a given country. In this context, an
interesting issue arises about the comparative study of the evolution of inputs
demand and intensity for the different agricultural sectors of the EU countries
using a common methodology. If there are common patterns in the use of
energy and energy-based inputs in EU agriculture, then general proposals for
agricultural and environmental policies are advisable. If it is the case that
environmental and agricultural developments concerning energy are
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