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Pakistan is an agriculture-based country, so the agricultural sector is known as the backbone of the national economy. Considering the national economy and the agricultural industry, it is necessary to focus on earnings through agricultural products export to improve the livelihood of local farmers. Therefore, the current study aimed to analyse the short-term and long-term factors affecting agricultural products export. The annual time series of 1976-2016 were collected from World Bank indicators, the Food and Agriculture Organization, and the Statistical Bureau of Pakistan. An autoregressive distributed lag, along with a vector error correction model, was employed. A cointegration test showed long-term associations between the selected variables. While the autoregressive distributed lag model confirmed the short-term correlation between area sown and crop production towards agricultural products export, there is no long-term relationship between the selected variables. In addition, the bidirectional correlation between employment in agriculture and agricultural products export was confirmed by the vector error correction model. Therefore, it is essential to increase agricultural production with the available natural resources to increase foreign earnings.

Tea is one of the most important cash crops and widely consumed beverages worldwide and plays a significant role in rural development, poverty reduction, and food security in many developing countries. Nevertheless, very few empirical studies have analysed the comparative advantage of the tea industry in developing countries. Taking Fujian Province, China, as the object of a case study, we carried out a spatiotemporal analysis of the determinants of the tea industry's revealed comparative advantage (RCA) during the period 2010-2018. The empirical analysis relied on a calculation of RCA and an estimation of a geographically and temporally weighted regression (GTWR) using data from 67 counties in Fujian. The results confirmed that the effect and significance of RCA determinants vary considerably across different spatial areas and over time. With the exception of 'disposable income', all other determinants had a positive and statistically significant effect on a region's RCA in the tea industry. Specifically, the results indicated that regional specialisation had the strongest positive effect on tea competitiveness. Local governments' sectoral strategies and institutional policies were essential elements in building and maintaining regional tea competitiveness. Infrastructure development, which traditionally went hand-in-hand with urbanisation processes, had a significant impact on tea competitiveness. These findings imply that competitiveness of the tea sector can be improved by adopting local polices that support producers and processors through fiscal investment, technology provision, and capacity building as well as measures to improve rural road infrastructure and link small farmers to other actors along tea supply chains.

Information and communication technologies are an essential source of success in the current information society. Effective exploitation of ICT requires expert knowledge in the areas of hardware, software, IT marketing and IT security. If the company does not want to be out of step with competition and information progress as well, it must react flexibly to the changes in the IT market. The aim of this article is to review the exploitation of information and communication technologies in agri-food sector companies and to find the appropriate combination of various ICT elements that their use will be effective in carrying out business activities and proposing concrete company solutions.

Having evaluated the situation in agriculture and rural areas, and having assessed the significance of new external and internal conditions, the European Commission has decided to reform the Common Agricultural Policy of the European Union. This article presents the essence of the part of the reform plan which affects the direct support system. The author of the article also examines the impact of the reform on the system's capacity to achieve the set goals, and on its efficiency. The research showed that the new legal framework proposed by the Commission would not directly improve the efficiency of the system, but the increased decision-making authority it grants to Member States provides an opportunity to reduce administrative outlays on the functioning of the scheme. Likewise, the effectiveness of a reformed direct support system in achieving the set goals will largely depend on decisions made by Member States, i.e. on the appropriate choice of instruments, and the accuracy of their form, as well as the equitable distribution of the available funds.

The persistent exploitation of natural resources and the consequent use of consumption are driving global food demand with the result that agricultural activity is becoming less and less environmentally friendly. The circular economy (CE) can become a valid alternative, inserting the economic-agricultural system into the harmonic process of material circulation. The corporate social responsibility (CSR) model is particularly interesting not only because of the ethical dimension of the company but also as a factor of strategic business improvement that combines the concepts of CSR and CE as possible solutions for developing sustainable business processes. The objective of the work is to highlight a detailed framework of how the small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) of the Italian agri-food industry can provide an adequate level of communication, circular strategies and social responsibility practices. The research methodology is based on a qualitative multiple study conducted on a sample of nine companies in the Italian territory. The study highlights the attention of companies on the issues of the CE for the achievement of the set sustainable objectives and the attention to CSR and CE practices. The work has several implications. It provides a further understanding of CSR and CE policies as enabling factors for the development of sustainable organizational performance in agriculture. Moreover, it better investigates the relationship between CSR and the CE. Finally, it analyses the SMEs state of the art in the CE field and strengthens the concept of CE by analysing corporate practices consistent with sustainability reports.

Farms generally produce products with low differentiation. To reach an increase in the profit and sales, product differentiation is one of the potential strategies that could be successfully applied. This paper identifies "Intermediate Consumption/Total Output" as a simple and user-friendly indicator for farm product differentiation performance and comparison assessment in the Czech Republic, based on a two-step cluster analysis performed on 1 225 farms with different operating conditions and reproduction process characteristics in the Czech Republic. The data are sourced from Farm Accountancy Data Network (FADN CZ). Four farm clusters based on product differentiation levels are identified and described from the point of view of the production process and conditions. The resulting cluster profiles, in general, indicate the production conditions and process affecting the resulting product differentiation. Nevertheless, farms deliver extraordinary product differentiation values in fields with less favourable conditions and production processes. Those have the potential to be an inspiration for farms with lower product differentiation values. The result of this paper provides hope, less favourable conditions are not a limit for formidable performance. This paper result can be practically applied by anyone aiming to easily identify, evaluate, and compare farm product differentiation levels.

The EU has a historical deficit of plant protein and is heavily reliant on imports to sustain domestic livestock production. Using an economic model of global agricultural markets, this article investigates three policy drivers that could have an influence on the increased production of protein-rich crops in the EU, namely coupled payments for protein-rich crops, investment in research and development leading to higher yields, and phasing out of imported high indirect land-use change risk biofuel feedstocks. Results indicate that a one per cent annual increase in yields over the medium-term has a much larger effect on EU domestic protein production than additional coupled payments of EUR 75 per ha. Moreover, phasing out palm-based biodiesel only has a small impact on protein self-sufficiency. A significant unknown is how costly it will be to increase the yields on protein crops grown in the EU.

The main goal of the paper is to evaluate the impact of the Russian import ban on the development of agricultural exports from EU member states. The study is based on a time-series analysis of empirical statistical indicators. The analysed period is between 2009 and 2019. The source of data for individual analyses is UN Comtrade (2021). The evaluation of export performance is extended by hierarchical cluster analysis. The study quantifies the effects of the import ban on the EU and individual member states through two scenarios. Scenario 1 is based on the cumulative loss of the value of exports. Scenario 2 assumes a continuous development of the value of agricultural exports. Based on the results, it is possible to confirm that the application of the Russian food import ban had a significant impact on EU countries. The impact of sanctions varies across EU countries. Four specific clusters could be identified in the period under investigation. In the period after the ban, the distribution of individual countries among individual clusters changed significantly. The applied ban could be understood not only as an attempt at counter-sanctions. Import restrictions also aim to reduce Russia's dependence on food imports and promote national food security.

A choice experiment (CE) is a stated preference method to elicit the respondent's preference. The CE can predict consumer valuation for a hypothetical product's attributes. Many scholars have discussed the CE's design, analysis, reliability, and validity. Still, no scientific papers reviewed its application in agri-food studies in a broad spectrum, particularly in investigating food product categories and their attributes. Additionally, this review emphasises the technical aspects of CEs, such as the sample size, software, data analysis, and research implications. The result discovered that most CE studies are relevant to developed countries. Most reviewed studies observed wine and meat as objects in the CE studies, in the theme of health, food safety, origin, and sustainability. The future research trend was related to health benefits and natural ingredients. Thus, this review provides recommendations for future studies to explore consumer preference using CE in agri-food research.

The war in Ukraine has shown that the worldwide food security can be easily shaken. This article focuses on an evaluation of European Union (EU) wheat producers on the world market. Would EU producers maintain their competitive position without direct payments? What changes need to be introduced to improve the position of EU producers on the world market? To answer these questions, a data envelopment analysis has been applied. It is indicated that the competitive position of EU wheat producers is still strongly dependent on direct payments and that mechanisation costs are a key area for improved efficiency in wheat production in Europe.

A mathematical sector model has been formulated to optimize the cropping pattern in Saudi Arabia aiming at maximizing the net annual return of the agricultural sector in Saudi Arabia and ensuring the efficient allocation of the scarce water resources and arable land among the competing crops. The results showed the potential for Saudi Arabia to optimize its cropping pattern and to generate an estimated net return equivalent to about 2.42 billion US$ per year. The optimized cropping pattern in Saudi Arabia has been coupled with about 53% saving in the water use and about 48% reduction in the arable land use compared to the base-year cropping pattern. Comparable weights was given to different crop groups by allocating about 48.4%, 35.4%, 13.1%, and 3.2% to grow cereals, fruits, forages, and vegetables, respectively. These findings were in line with the national strategy to rationalize the cultivation of water-intensive crops in favour of highly water-efficient crops.

The world economic crisis that, since 2008 has also struck the real economy, cannot be attributed only to the United States bubble which in 2007 involved the mortgage credit market, but it is the result of a series of factors among which the imbalance of the financial market, of the public accounts of the main economies and the real sector. Also agriculture, which has always been considered an anti-cyclic sector, has seen a strong slowdown with a plunge in the trade flows. This paper analyses the changes which happened to the competitive position in the world market of some Mediterranean countries and of France, Italy, Spain and Turkey in particular trying, moreover, to understand the vulnerability of the countries belonging to the EU concerning their integration into an economic and monetary union. The results show how much the crisis has involved all the countries bringing, on the whole, a reduction of the competitive potential in the international market which has been less strong in Turkey, the country characterized by a low per capita income and a low public debt. It can be seen, in particular, how the sectors with a strongest commercial specialization have showed a better resistance to the pressure of the recessive trend.

Farming is treated as one of the riskiest businesses. Political decisions, especially these related to the agricultural sector, may be treated as of a great importance. As a consequence, farm owners seek to diversify their sources of income and run other strategies aiming to stabilize their earnings i.e. by off-farm activities. The paper selected key groups of the determinants of the off-farm income with the aim to evaluate the current state and to propose further steps of the detailed analysis. The authors identified the mechanisms how the particular instruments influence farmers' decisions on generating the off-farm income. It may be concluded that the significance of direct payments is still very high. Subsidies generally discourage farmers from the non-agriculture employment. The influence of socio-demographic characteristics is significant, however, the strength of this impact is determined by the additional factors like the situation in the labour market. In case of environmental determinants, it should be noted that there is a limited group of factors that may be out of control by the farm operators. The value added of the article is an attempt to identify the mechanisms how the particular instruments may influence farmers' decisions on generating the off-farm income. The article finishes with the authors' recommendations for further empirical studies.

This paper is part of a broader study which aims to investigate the success factors of agricultural enterprises. It attempts to present the partial results of a questionnaire survey whose goal was to determine the quality of HRM (Human Resource Management) departments in basic agricultural enterprises. Studies focusing on the HRM of basic agricultural enterprises have been published in many countries. In the Slovak Republic, experts and academics from the Slovak University of Technology in Nitra, and the Slovak Research Institute of Agricultural and Food Economics have arrived at perceptive conclusions on the current state of human capital in the agri-food sector and have proposed innovative directions for further development. Surprisingly, however, academia still fails to perceive HR management as a partner in an enterprise, rather than simply a service unit in the organisational structure of the agricultural enterprise. Therefore, an in-depth analysis of the role of HRM departments is missing and this paper aims to fill that gap. The methodology of research is based on Ulrich's model of the mixed roles of HR departments (2009), which is used as a framework to determine the quality levels of role performance, defined by the model, of HRM departments. The survey sample consists of 70 basic agricultural enterprises.

This study measures changes in total factor productivity of agriculture for 25 European Union (EU) member states in 2004-2016 using the Färe-Primont index. It also attempts to answer the question whether in the analysed period the levels of total factor productivity in this sector were convergent between member states. To this end, panel unit root tests were used. The study indicates that in new EU member states the level of total factor productivity (TFP) was relatively lower than in most EU-15 states. It was also found that convergence occurred in agricultural productivity almost in all EU member states (except Belgium and the United Kingdom). The research shows that in new EU member states the process of making up differences in the productivity of agriculture was stronger than in old EU member states.

The paper incorporates manufacturing and agricultural pollution into a three-sector general equilibrium model with pollution externalities both on agricultural production and labour health. Manufacturing generates pollution that affects agricultural production and health, while agriculture employs the pollutant as a factor for production that only affects health. Under the framework, this paper investigates the impacts of environmental protection policies and a rise in the self-mitigation cost of skilled and unskilled labour on wage inequality. A larger environmental tax expands wage gap if partial elasticity of substitution between labour and dirty input in the urban unskilled sector is small enough. More restrictive agricultural pollutants control narrows down the wage gap. The impact of an increase in the self-mitigation cost of skilled labour on wage inequality is ambiguous, depending on the factors substitution in agriculture and the elasticity of manufacturing pollution on agricultural production, while a larger self-mitigation cost of unskilled labour brings down the wage gap.

European agriculture is widely shaped under the compelling effects of international migration, both economic (labour) immigration and the refugee crisis. This complex endeavour could lead to significant spillover effects also upon the agricultural sectors in neighbouring locations, with different overall economic performances for migrant receiving countries. The research is thus set to assess the outcomes of the European agriculture under the impact of economic and humanitarian migration, focusing on the results achieved by ten EU Member States (most targeted by migrants), during 2000-2016. A balanced panel comprising a complex set of indicators was configured in order to provide accurate credentials for the methodological endeavour that consists of spatial analysis and structural equation modelling (SEM). Estimations show that the agricultural sector will be mainly shaped by economic immigration and less by the humanitarian flows. Major effects are induced through the value added by the agricultural sector, increases in exports of basic foods and agricultural raw materials (spatial analysis). However, a fail to properly manage the EU labour mobility for the following years could lead to a negative downturn on agricultural productivity (SEM).

This paper represents a wider research aimed at the examination of innovative approaches to management and their impact on the competitiveness and success of companies in a globalised world economy. Its main objective is to evaluate perceived importance of these approaches with emphasis on soft factors in agribusiness companies in Slovakia in terms of methods and tools used in the implementation of individual management functions, as well as in terms of the frequency of their applications, and their impact on the efficiency of these companies. However, a research gap has been identified in the existing literature on primary agribusiness companies. To improve their position, farmers should not only passively respond to many external factors that are of course important in this sector but should also be proactive and innovative in their management methods and practices. A questionnaire research has been conducted in agribusiness companies in Slovakia. The obtained results highlight the significance of hard factors in the utilisation of management tools. Moreover, soft factors have positively affected economic results. Innovativeness has been identified in leadership functions, where a significant link has been found between the transformation style of leadership and the importance of soft factors in transformational management.

This study assessed the change in productivity and environmental efficiency of agriculture for nine East Asian countries for the time period from 2002 to 2010. Data were collected and then analysed by data envelopment analysis (DEA) approaches, including Malmquist total factor productivity (TFP) index and slacks-based measure (SBM) with the consideration of undesirable outputs. The results showed that there existed relatively large differences in productivity growth and environmental performance in the agricultural sector between countries in the sample. Overall, the countries examined in the present study experienced a decline in TFP due to decreases in technical efficiency. Taiwan, Japan, and Korea were found to show growths in productivity and fully efficient environmental performances throughout the study period, while Thailand was identified as having the lowest environmental efficiency score. Therefore, agriculture production and operation models in Taiwan, Japan, and Korea could serve as good references for the other six countries.

Scaling up supply chains in the interest of cost-effectiveness has led to an increasing disconnection between producers and consumers in today's globalised food system. This paper assesses the agricultural and territorial drivers that influence the development of Alternative Food Networks (AFNs), where consumers and producers act together, by implementing an Ordinary Least Squares (OLS) regression. The analysis was carried out at a municipal scale in Lombardy, in northern Italy. The territorial characteristics of the local areas were less important in explaining the level of consumer and producer participation in the alternative food networks, rather than the specific factors related to the agricultural sector.

The present paper aims to investigate the impact of coffee exports on long-term economic growth in an open economy for 32 countries exporting coffee over the period of 1994-2013. The study applied a dynamic panel Auto-Regressive Distributive Lag (ARDL) modelling approach with estimators. All variables involved in the specified model were found to be stationary of order I (1) at a first difference. The Pooled Mean-Group (PMG) long-run results suggest the presence of a significant positive effect of coffee exports on economic growth. The empirical findings of the study suggest policy implications, promoting the coffee sector to boost the countries' economy.

Border inspections by developed nations are an essential export barrier to developing countries. Import refusals, in particular, not only exhibit dynamic impacts on exporters' performance in the refused destination but may also spill over into exports toward third markets. Using a panel structural vector autoregression model, the complete dynamics of China's agricultural export in response to United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA) import refusals is estimated at the monthly level. Despite notable heterogeneities across sectors, negative and positive reactions that last mostly less than a year are revealed respectively for the quantity and price of China's exports to USA on average. The impact of idiosyncratic component dominates that of common component in the refusal shock, highlighting the sensitivity of exports to sector-specific border inspections. Relative to other refusal charges, larger export contractions tend to follow adulteration charges. The trade effect of FDA refusals spills over into other main export destinations of China. While non-adulteration charges result in trade deflections on average, a contagious export reduction is observed in most non-US markets. These results provide insights for exporters to make strategies with a focus on specific sectors, charges, third markets and especially on the short run to cope with import refusals.

Nowadays, scholars, entrepreneurs and policy makers focus their attention on food-related health challenges, nutritional value and food safety. Among these themes, the use of processed animal protein developed from insects as alternative food source is increasingly debated. The main goal of this paper is to contribute to filling this gap with an empirical analysis focused on the willingness of Italian potential consumers to eat insect-based food. By applying the conjoint analysis technique, the study identifies the cause of consumers' reactions to novel food based on cultural bias rather than on 'neophobia in itself' or on knowledge about the product. In this new scenario, the companies operating in the food sector could reduce this bias by devising effective marketing strategies that are oriented to underline the link between consumption of insect-based food and the associated nutritional benefit. In other terms, consumption based on cultural elements can be seen as the result of a strategic dynamic process.

Farmers' markets have been booming in recent years and are becoming an important alternative food network. They enable farmers to sell their products directly to customers and thus shorten the supply chain. Market organisers must meet the needs of both consumers and vendors by ensuring customer satisfaction while maintaining profitability for vendors. The present study identified four basic segments at farmers' markets, as follows: (1) product-oriented customers; (2) personal social responsibility-oriented customers; (3) entertainment and emotional-oriented customers; (4) alternative food-oriented customers. These segments were analysed using Structural Equation Modeling in relation to the amount of money spent on average at a farmers' market. The results indicate that most money was spent at farmers' market segments that are oriented at entertainment and emotional-oriented and product-oriented customers. This indicates that farmers' markets are no longer just a place to purchase fresh, high-quality food, but also a place that people visit for its atmosphere, for the food that can be eaten on-site, and to buy products not for direct consumption (e.g. flowers). It also proved the negative moderation effect of entertainment-oriented motivation on the amount of money spent with connection to product-orientation, which suggests that entertainment-orientated customers spend more than product-oriented customers.

Models and methods of spatial econometrics are gaining more and more popularity. Their advantage is the opportunity to examine the interrelationships between individual territorial units. These methods, apart from the own potential of the region, take into account the impact of neighbouring objects and location in space. The aim of the study is to examine the relationship between the potential and the level of competitiveness of individual European Union countries in the field of slaughter cattle production. In addition, the paper attempts to determine the specialisation of individual EU countries in the production of slaughter animals by sector. The analysis covered the years 2010-2016, using Eurostat data. The obtained results allow indicating countries in which there is a strong concentration of income potential (Sweden, Spain, Great Britain, France and Belgium). Countries in which the highest values of the potential quotients in the entire European Union are distinguished (Poland, Finland and Belgium).

In Catalonia, agroecological cooperativism is part of a set of alternatives that appeared as a response to the current hegemonic food consumption model, controlled by large commercial establishments. It is defined by its promotion of short food supply chains (SFSCs), operates under the values of the social and solidarity economy (SSE) and holds a strong political commitment. This article, on the one hand, studies the setup of agroecological cooperativism understood as the outcome of a network of producers, intermediaries and consumers and, on the other hand, examines the impact of information and communication technologies (ICT) in the development of this consumption model. The data has been obtained through on-site interviews and online research on the 56 consumer groups and cooperatives present in Barcelona. Descriptive statistics and correlation analysis have been used to study them. The results prove the salient role that ICT has as a facilitator in the relational network established between the agents that take part in it, thus becoming a key characteristic element of the new agroecological consumer cooperativism.

Land redistributive policies can be viewed as effective tools for reducing rural poverty mainly because agriculture continues to be a major source of rural livelihood and a contributor to rural economic growth. For the structural changes and economy-wide impacts, including behavioural changes of rural land distribution, to be assessed and captured through time, a South African Social Accounting Matrix can be used as a database to construct a dynamic computable general equilibrium simulation model to simulate the potential impact on household welfare in South Africa. This study seeks to assess how government redistributive policies may affect household welfare in short- and long-run, focusing on poverty and income distribution in South Africa by applying a dynamic computable general equilibrium microsimulation model. The results showed that rural land distribution increases poor household income through an increase in factor by an average of 0.828. However, for most macroeconomic variables, the impact is negative in the short-run with a gradual increase in the long-run. The results support the claim that rural land distribution coupled with agriculture investment and government support can be effective in improving household welfare.

This article analyses the competitiveness of dairy farms in Poland in relation to selected EU countries. The competitive advantage of dairy farms was evaluated and compared based on remuneration for family labour. Two variants of the above indicator were calculated: (1) Remuneration for family labour (FL1) as the relationship between farm net income and the farmer's unpaid labour input, and (2) Remuneration for family labour (FL2) as the relationship between farm net income minus the opportunity costs of own land and capital to the farmer's unpaid labour input. The calculations were performed based on EU FADN (European Union Farm Accountancy Data Network) data for an average dairy farm in 2005, 2010 and 2016. The study revealed the highest average remuneration for family labour (FL1) in Irish and German dairy farms. The value of the second indicator (FL2) was also highest in Germany, followed by France. The analysis produced interesting results regarding dairy farms in Denmark and the Netherlands which were characterised by the highest scale of production in the evaluated period (high net value added), but very low farm incomes and remuneration for family labour. The study revealed that Polish dairy farms were characterised by average competitiveness relative.

Agricultural holdings select goals in various areas when setting their strategic objectives. Economic objectives tend to be viewed as strategic because of the requirement to maximise economic profit for the owners. Since there is significant interaction between agricultural holdings and the environment, it is also important to monitor the environmental aspects of farming. The article seeks to draw on unique multicriteria assessment to compare the compatibility of economic and environmental objectives at 1 189 agricultural holdings in the Czech Republic, broken down by farming specialisation and economic size on the basis of figures from the Farm Accountancy Data Network (FADN). A trade-off between environmental sustainability and economic performance occurs primarily among farming specialisation categories, where we found two extremes - intensive field cropping with high economic performance and low environmental sustainability, and, at the other end of the scale, extensive cattle farming with lower economic performance and high environmental sustainability. Within the farming specialisation categories, however, there was no significant correlation, with the exception of milk production, where the use of soil organic matter, a higher proportion of soil improving crops (for fodder) and greening made a positive contribution to the higher economic performance of farms.