Agricultural Economics, 2017 (vol. 63), issue 11

Intensity of ICT use by managers of agricultural enterprisesOriginal Paper

Luboslav SZABO, Anita ROMANOVA, Vladimir BOLEK, Michal ZELINA

Agric. Econ. - Czech, 2017, 63(11):485-492 | DOI: 10.17221/132/2016-AGRICECON  

The growing importance and relevance of ICT in business increases the dependence of business entities on ICTs, to which the managers of agricultural enterprises need to pay the necessary attention. The penetration of ICTs also affects the companies that do business in the area of agriculture. High quality and accessible information today has a strategic economic and social importance for the management of this sector; therefore, the use of ICTs by the company managers is becoming an essential part of their daily lives. In their work, the managers of agricultural enterprises most often use a personal computer. The intensity of the laptop use is increasing...

Diversification of marketing strategies among small farms: empirical evidence from family farms in TaiwanOriginal Paper

Pei-An LIAO, Hung-Hao CHANG, Junlin HE, Kannika SAELIW

Agric. Econ. - Czech, 2017, 63(11):493-501 | DOI: 10.17221/148/2016-AGRICECON  

Farm marketing has been recognized as an important factor for a successful farm business. Due to the increasing interest of consumers in food safety, direct marketing of farm products to consumers in the local farmers' markets has become very popular. Compared to traditional farm marketing channels, relatively little is known about the use of direct-to-consumer marketing strategies by farmers. This paper aims to provide a more comprehensive picture of farmers' choices among available farm marketing channels using the case study of Taiwan. Using a population-based survey of 5600 family farms in Taiwan in 2014, in this study we quantify the extent to...

Competitiveness and innovation of the Polish food industryOriginal Paper

Krzysztof FIRLEJ, Anna KOWALSKA, Arkadiusz PIWOWAR

Agric. Econ. - Czech, 2017, 63(11):502-509 | DOI: 10.17221/111/2016-AGRICECON  

Agribusiness is the biggest production sector in the European Union taking into account both the value of turnover and the creation of added value as well as employment size. In this context, the food industry deserves a special distinction. In the publication, the analyses of the food industry competitiveness in Poland are presented. For analysing and assessing competitiveness of the Polish food industry, the following factors were used: the orientation of export (OE), covering of import by export (TC), the import penetration (MP) and the revealed comparative advantages according to the Balassa (RCA) and Lafay (LFI). The study also presents the findings...

Application of the DEA on the performance evaluation of the agricultural support policy in ChinaOriginal Paper

Xiaolin TANG, Jieqiong WANG, Biao ZHANG, Lingxian ZHANG

Agric. Econ. - Czech, 2017, 63(11):510-523 | DOI: 10.17221/120/2016-AGRICECON  

The paper utilizes the data envelopment analysis (DEA) method based on the OECD policy classification to evaluate the performance of the agricultural support policy at the provincial and agricultural commodity levels from the respective viewpoints of agricultural input and output. The analysis at the provincial level mainly focuses on the similarities and differences in the performance of the agricultural support policies between the primary grain-producing areas and the secondary grain-producing areas; at the agricultural commodity level, 17 representative Chinese agricultural commodities are selected and their performance compared. The results are...

The influence of national culture on changes in R&D expenses among agrochemical firmsShort Communication

Michal JIRASEK

Agric. Econ. - Czech, 2017, 63(11):524-530 | DOI: 10.17221/230/2016-AGRICECON  

Research and development (R&D) represents a significant expenditure and investment into the future competitiveness of a given firm. The behavioural theory of the firm assumes that these expenditures are subject to changes caused by performance feedback. This paper builds upon these assumptions and extends them by considering the possible effect of national cultures on the nature of these responses to the performance feedback. The research follows 119 firms from nine countries over the period 2001-2015 and analyses their behaviour using generalized linear mixed models. The findings mostly support an effect of national cultures, measured by Hofstede's...