Professor John FitzGerald:

The evidence suggests beef farmers could make more money already by moving into increasing woodland. They are not doing so. It is not because farmers are stupid but rather that the scheme or schemes are not meeting the needs of farmers. Professor Esther Duflo, who won the Nobel prize for economics on Monday, has a very good paper on the economist as a plumber. One of the reasons she won the Nobel prize was that instead of designing great schemes, she argues that economists need to get their hands dirty in understanding why schemes do not work. They are dealing with real people, who can be different. We need to look at why the schemes that are there, which look great in a spreadsheet, are not working.