Agri-environmental policy is modelled as a social welfare maximisation prob
lem that recognises the potential trade-off between increased environmental
benefit and increased cost of monitoring compliance. Moral hazard arises b
ecause monitoring does not detect all those who fail to comply with contrac
tual obligations. It is shown that if monitoring costs are negligible or fi
xed. or farmers are highly risk averse, the moral hazard problem can be eli
minated. However, if monitoring costs depend on monitoring effort and the d
egree of risk aversion is low, only a second-best solution can be obtained.
Numerical simulations suggest that optimal monitoring effort declines with
increasing farmer risk aversion.