LAUSR

Abstract Macro and micro institutions have received considerable attention from institutional theory in the analysis of organizational performance. The role played by meso-institutions has hardly been addressed. This article draws on recent institutionalist approaches which introduce meso-institutions as a third layer of the analysis. Meso-institutions on the adoption of environmental technologies is the focus of attention. The Brazilian policy on climate change offered an opportunity for this investigation. Different meso-institutions were created or adjusted to accelerate and monitor the actions and targets of the Brazilian Low Carbon Agriculture Plan. The effects of these meso-institutions on both farmers’ decision to adopt Integrated Crop-Livestock Systems (ICLS) and farms performance were estimated through a Simultaneous Equation System (SES). The analyses were based on a survey sample of 175 farmers from the state of Sao Paulo, Brazil. Our main results corroborate the hypothesis that meso-institutions are of utmost importance to improve resource utilization by the farmers. Economic incentives, risk reduction, capacity building and knowledge sharing provided by meso-institutions had significant impacts on the probability of adopting ICLS and on farms performance. These results suggest that meso-institutions can foster a favorable environment for the adoption of more sustainable technologies at farm-level. The paper innovates in the use of SES to investigate the impacts of meso-institutions on resource allocation decisions of Brazilian cattle farmers. Our empirical findings can contribute to the research agenda on meso-institutions and sustainable technology adoption.