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In the European Union, the support of Less Favoured Areas (LFA) has a long tradition as a part of the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP). Above all, it is the objective of the subsidies to maintain the agricultural production in LFAs, but also to consider the environmental aspects in LFAs and its funding schemes. Investigations of the latter are subject of this article. After having discussed the theoretical possibilities to influence environmental impacts by the funding scheme, several analyses are compiled and complemented by own calculations. The research has shown that agricultural practices within Less Favoured Areas are more environmentally friendly than in other areas. Environmentally friendly in this regard means e.g. a lower use of fertilisers and pesticides, but also a higher participation rate in agri-environmental measures. In addition, the crop structures of farms are analysed, e.g. the share of maize and wheat in farms inside and outside the LFAs. While the results presented in this paper relate mainly to Germany, the information on the European level is also taken into consideration. Finally, based on these investigations, recommendations for the revision of the funding programmes following 2013 are given.

New requirements regarding agriculture production together with the increased pressure on environmentally friendly practices leave almost no space for the routine agriculture production. Innovations that include environmental changes are therefore essential. Agricultural research faces various challenges associated with the quality and effectiveness of agriculture production and recently also with the environmental and sustainability issues. The paper provides a case study focused on the environmental and social evaluation of a biological asset that constitutes an agricultural innovation. This paper also shows a concrete example of how the social and environmental reporting can be constructed and implemented by providing an evaluation of a Bumblebee Nest. As a result, the total value consisting of the market, ecosystem and aesthetic value is provided. Although the market value comprises the largest proportion of the total value, it does not exceed 64%.

For more than a century, and almost everywhere in the world, rural areas suffered a steady decline, due to the decrease of the real income from the agricultural activities, the lack of serious economic alternatives, and demographic issues. Rural tourism could contribute to the rural sustainable development through small local businesses valorising the natural, cultural and ethnographic resources. However, most of them need the financial support from private creditors (banks). The survey-based research conducted among banks' representatives has identified several strengths of small rural ventures, such as the small scale and the associated risks, the endurance to external shocks, the openness to market opportunities, as well as some of their weaknesses: e.g. a poor management experience, seasonality etc. We have also identified the actions necessary to be performed by these firms to attract financial resources from the banks' side, i.e. the diversification of income sources, the association and the adherence to recognized brands and maintaining a reasonable leverage ratio. It was found that the bank's size does not matter, but the nature of the bank's capital does: the private domestic banks are more willing to finance such businesses. The banks' involvement in co-financing the EU projects could be a way to foster and strengthen the rural businesses.

With development of the market economy, the views concerning the importance of ethical norms in business activity are developing. Ethical orientation in economics, has been popularized for several decades by e.g. French centre "Economie et Humanisme"¹, established by a renowned Dominican, L.J. Lebret. Tourism, including rural tourism, represents an economic activity which has its specific ethical dimension. The goals of this paper are to characterize the basic values that are voluntarily accepted and used in tourism in rural areas in Poland and to identify the ethical norms that guarantee the realization of these values. The authors adopted the basic values-goals that should be recommended in rural tourism. They also formulated specific professional and ethical norms that support realization of the values, which include: humanity and standards for realizing the principle of humanity; the cultural and material conditions of living in rural areas; economic activity, including tourist activity that improves rural living conditions; innovative attitudes towards modernization and improving the quality of rural tourist services; and values that support the development of sustainable tourism in rural areas. The theoretical investigations concerning axiological problems were supplemented with the results obtained from a national-level empirical survey that was conducted in rural areas in Poland.

The Agricultural Economics Research Institute has launched a research project with the aim to analyse the Hungarian land market and the changes occurred since the EU accession as well as to present the tendencies of the development. The statistical data on the land market is rather deficient and cannot be considered representative, therefore, we also included some empirical experiments summarising experts' opinion referring to all the counties of Hungary. In our paper, we provide our statements and conclusions. The survey shows that the landed property market in Hungary is in a state of anticipation. Demand is primarily for outstanding and good quality land of favourable location in certain countries or larger plots of arable and forestry land. Characteristically, the poorer quality, less accessible land of less favourable location in the neighbourhood of the depopulated, cul-de-sac villages is in oversupply. Scattered, wedged properties of small size or of unclear ownership (undivided common land) are difficult to sell. Many of the vendors are older people with subsistence worries or people who obtained the title by compensation but do not wish to get involved in cultivation. Increasingly more buyers are well capitalised farmers, who wish to increase their holdings, or to unite their property (by land swap). Another significant group of buyers wish to invest into landed property located in the neighbourhood of larger cities, at popular sites, next to main roads or motorways. According to our survey, in the immediate years before the EU accession land and lease prices increased significantly, many fold in relation to quality. Increases in land prices are due to a process of convergence to the EU prices intending to take advantage of the projected unified land market. Increases in lease prices are due to apportioning of the projected land based support between owner and lease holder. According to land sale experts (estate or realty agents) the land market will in the 5-10 years liven up resulting in increases in land and lease prices, although the extent of this cannot yet be prognosticated.

Reasons to travel and to visit concrete destinations in the Czech Republic are especially the nature and cultural/historical sightseeing. The presented paper specializes on the first reason and it studies the specific landscape features together with the primary tourism potentials. It focuses on the protected landscape area of Kokořínsko, which is divided into 6 landscape units according to their landscape character. In these landscape units, the authors study the primary tourism potential and the elements of natural, cultural-historical and aesthetical characterization of landscape. The relation between the tourism potential and the landscape features is measured by the Spearman´s coefficient. Moreover, the expert's evaluation of landscape characteristics is confronted with the the landscape perception of tourists which were questioned in the PLA Kokořínsko.

This paper examines the productivity of hired and family labour and determinants of technical inefficiency of fish farms in Ghana. A modified Cobb-Douglas stochastic frontier production function which accounts for zero usage of family and hired labour is employed on cross-sectional data of 150 farmers collected in 2007. The results reveal that family labour, hired labour, feed, seed, land, other costs and extension visit have a reasserting influence on fish farm production. Findings also show that family and hired labour used for fish farming production in Ghana may be equally productive. The combined effects of operational and farm specific factors (age, experience, land, gender, pond type and education) influence technical inefficiency although individual effects of some variables may not be significant. Mean technical efficiency is estimated to be 79 percent. Given the present state of technology and input level, the possibility of enhancing production can be achieved by reducing technical inefficiency by 21 percent through adoption of practices of the best fish farm.

Web technology is a major element of the Internet. The various and inexpensive possibilities to use this technology allow for the minimisation of differences between rural and urban areas. This article focuses on the use of www technology for creating web sites. It outlines theoretical starting points for planning web sites, as well as practical methods, which are utilised for setting up the web presentation of a farm.

A disadvantageous tendency of resigning from milk production by small and medium sized farms has been observed in the recent years in the provinces of Southern Poland. It results from the low profitability of milk production on these farms and therefore the difficulties in reaching the income parity. It leads to a decline in the bovine population not compensated by an increase in the yield per animal and it poses a serious hazard to protecting the natural resources which is the function dairy farms perform in this region. The problem is serious since in the analyzed region, milk is acquired from 75% of farms keeping herds of up to 10 cows. Moreover, grasslands constitute a notably high share in the arable land structure, and for maintaining them cow keeping is a crucial condition. Hitherto functioning system of EU payments proved insufficient; therefore the Polish government intends to provide an additional financial support for dairy farms. The authors intended to reason that despite the hardly important participation of the analyzed regions in total milk production in Poland, an additional support for small and medium sized dairy farms from the state budget is socially necessary, in the first place because of the additional functions fulfilled by these farms.

Recent information campaigns of media and the ongoing substantive discussions of experts have been more and more devoted to the climate change issue and its impacts that could affect our future and threaten the sustainable and balanced development of the planet Earth. However, the categorical apparatus as presented at the above mentioned events is not always used correctly and the same is true about the objective interpretation of the very nature of the processes. Also the explanations of realistic options of governance to mitigate and streamline the effects associated with climate variability in order to achieve the least possible damage of global environment are not always given appropriately. Because of a lack of specific statistical data on climate variability, which are usually at the sole disposal of professional climate scientists, and owing to the attention the public pays to these phenomena only at times of climatic anomalies (floods, extreme heat and drought, etc.), the issue is still on the edge of a broader awareness of people and academic research. This paper is in essence an overview of scientific works, which aims to contribute to the understanding of the issue of climate change by the means of summarizing the main approaches and use of categories, defining their substance and especially clarifying the phenomena in relation to possibilities of global governance.

Data collection, data processing, data presentation and data application in the System of Precision farming guarantee a success of this system in the market. Difficulties of technologies, which are currently and continually involved in this system, argue against its practical using by farmers. In this case, service company wants to create a suitable environment not only for data collection, but also for the high quality of the information distribution to customers. One of such tools is the MapServer placed on Internet web sites.

There exists no energy policy in the European Union, but rather a whole series of long-term goals setting its strategic orientation. Until 2000, when the Green Book named "Towards the European Strategy of Energy Supplies Securing" was accepted, no real debate on the strategy of energy was held in the EU. The Green Book represents a key document of the European energy policy and it originated as a consequence of the fears of the European Committee regarding the growing energy dependence on the energy resources imports, from the politically not stable parts of the world. Among the three key points of the energy strategy, there belong stable supply of energy, acceptable energy prices and environment protection. With regard to the deepening European integration and interconnection of the individual member states economies, the decisions of one country also have an energy impact on the other states. Therefore, the cooperation among the individual members is necessary.

Latin America has very good conditions for microfinance; the macroeconomic growth which Latin America had shown in the recent years created favourable conditions for the microfinance institutions' favorable conditions and its development. Profitability of the microfinance sector presents an attractive market for the financial institutions which already have a have strong position in the market. The purpose of this work is to focus on the current situation and performance of the microfinance sector while identifying some of the reasons that affect the microfinance institutions in this region. The work also provides a view on the microfinance industry development to get a better description of the sector. The microfinance institutions are earning an undeniable importance in the process of the regional development and represent an important factor in the alleviation of poverty and insecurity for large segments of the population. The work is based on information from relevant sources that allow us to identify the current status of microfinance in Latin America, especially in these times when the crisis affects also the region's economic dynamism.

In identifying perceptions and attitudes relevant to consumer acceptance of goods originating in different countries, it would be extremely helpful for marketers to have a meaningful and consistent measure that they could apply. This study examines to what extent consumer ethnocentrism as measured by the CETSCALE singularly, as well as in concert with selected demographic and psycho-graphic variables, can predict consumers' evaluation of domestic versus foreign produce. The findings indicate that consumer ethnocentrism is a strong and significant predictor of consumer product evaluations. Including the ethnocentrism variable in a set of demographic and psycho-graphic variables significantly improves the predictive ability of the set. Potential applications of the concept include identification of market segments that react more favourably to domestic or foreign produce, developing effective marketing communication strategies, and supporting location decisions for retail outlet sites.

www technologies are developing very fast. The new technologies make possible the easier creation of the web applications, which support business activities. Small and medium size enterprises, which serve as the driving force for innovations and thus for economic development, can utilize these technologies for the creation of relatively inexpensive applications, which can be tailor-made for the given enterprise by using the open source software (OSS). This contribution presents several practical examples of how to create - update - the web site of an enterprise and how to supplement it with an e-shop option. Examples from the area of flower selling have been selected.

The article is focused on the importance of using the variant calculation methods in the management of companies' performance under the conditions of multifunctional agriculture. It mentions the difference between the calculations formed for the needs of valuating the production in the financial statements and the managerial calculations. Attention is paid to overhead costs in agriculture, their development is depicted with tables and graphs. The development of overhead costs during the time period of 1997-2006 is presented in crop production and outputs of wheat and rapeseed, in livestock production in Slovakia and in the outputs of cattle (6-24 months) and pigs (1-12 months). The fastidiousness of market environment of the globalized economies requires a gradual transformation from the classical calculation system into the managerial calculation system, which provides a multidimensional insight into the product as well as the market. The sequence of establishing the variant calculation methods is also introduced together with the reasons of under-valuating calculations in the managerial practice.

The Velvet Revolution in November 1989 in the former Czechoslovakia opened the way to the renewal of the democratic political system. One of the most visible aspects of the Czech political development consisted in the renewal of the essential functions of elections and political parties. On the local level, however, the political process - as well as in other post-communist countries - continued to be for a long time influenced by the remains of the former centralized system wherein the local administration used to be subjected to the central state power. Municipal elections took hold in these countries, however, the local government remained in the embryonic state and a certain absence of real political and economic decision-making mechanism on the local level continued to show. The public administration in the Czech Republic had to deal with the changes in the administrative division of the state, the split of the Czechoslovak federation as well as the fragmentation of municipalities whose number increased by 50 percent. Decision making mechanisms on the local and regional level were suffering from the incomplete territorial hierarchy of public administration and from the unclear division of power between the state administration and local administration bodies. Only at the end of the 1990s, the public administration in the Czech Republic started to get a more integrated and specific shape. Citizens participation in the political process represents one of the key issues of representative democracy. The contemporary democracy has to face the decrease in voter turnout and the low interest of citizens to assume responsibility within the political process. The spread of democratising process following the fall of the iron curtain should not overshadow the risk of internal weakness of democracy. The solution should be looked for in more responsible citizenship and citizens political participation. The degree of political participation is considered (together with political pluralism) to be the key element of representative democracy in general terms, as well as of democratic process on the local and regional level. The objective of this paper is to describe the specifics of citizens local political participation in the Czech Republic and to show the differences between rural and urban areas. The paper concentrates on voting and voter turnout but deals also with other forms of citizens political participation.

This paper deals with problems of sustainable tourism. The goal of this work is to point out the current situation, possibilities and approaches to ecological certification in tourism in the Czech Republic. A survey was conducted among accommodation providers - it was targeted on assessing the level of conversancy with ecolabels that already exist in the Czech Republic as well as in Europe. The results of this survey are included in this paper. Furthermore, the attitudes of providers towards obtaining ecolabels were being found out.

Bulgaria faced and still is facing many challenges in the accession process to the EU. Free movement of capital, and especially the development of the land market, is one of them. Although the progress is made, the market is still developing and the land prices are still below the average prices in EU. There are different reasons for this: very fragmented land after the restitution process, chaotic transactions, lack of bank credits for agricultural purposes, unrealistic expectations after the accession to the EU, etc. The land lease continues to be the preferred way for land cultivation instead of buying of land. All those problems are studied in the current paper. A concept for e-service that could contribute to solving the problems is introduced; relevant e-services are summarized and a particular solution is presented that uses results of the eTen project Bizmap.net. It is described how this solution could be used in the Bulgarian land market.

PATRIA Kobylí, Inc. is one of the traditional wine-growers and producers of quality wines based in southern Moravia. Farming on 152 hectares, PATRIA Kobylí supplies the market with more than 1 million litres of wine per year. It offers an assortment of 14 whites and 6 blue wines. The company focuses on wines designed for gastronomes and distributed to selected specialized wine-merchants. But since 2003, the sales of the company's wines have been declining. The sales in the individual months of 2006 were the lowest for the last 6 years. But the aim of the company will not be to increase the sales volume but the wine quality and services and sales techniques and so to maintain its position in the market. The company started to analyze its strengths and weaknesses and extended its portfolio of Saint Martin wine and special wines and sparkling wines.

Research and historical development showed that market economy with social orientation is more effective than without it. Emerging from these facts, the paper is focused on the need of monitoring the social information in managerial accounting and in managerial information systems in enterprises. Since the social situation and the living standard of agriculture in the Slovak Republic are lagging behind, the above mentioned issues are documented in comparison with other branches of national economy. The method of Balanced Scorecard is characterized in brief as well as a new model of economy, called the Economy of Communion that draw attention towards the social aspect of entrepreneuring. The main spheres of social information are mentioned that are necessary for operating at the level of an enterprise and at a broader level. Measures in the field of operating and its information assurance are offered in order to improve the social situation and living standard in agriculture.

The paper focuses on rural immovable cultural heritage as a part of the infrastructure for certain forms of tourism. Using the secondary analysis method, it compares data about the support of rural cultural heritage in the pre-accession period (2002) and after the Czech Republic joined the EU (2004-2006). Conclusions include a broader issue of animation of cultural heritage for the purpose of rural development.

The image of a shop is the perception of the attributes of trade chains which are stated by consumers or the target market. The part of the shop image can be the assortment, the production quality and price, services of the shop, organization, the location and atmosphere of the shop, advertising and the shop reputation. The basis for conceiving this paper was an assumption that the image of a shop is one of the determining factors of the shopping place choice. The individual attributes of a shop can affect the perception of a consumer and therefore affect his decision about the choice of a shop and buying goods. The image analysis of trade chains was processed on the basis of a 5-point scale which shows the respondents' attitude toward each and every of 29 attributes of the researched trade chains. The basic data were gained by the means of a questionnaire research in the field of Slovak consumers' behaviour and the results were analysed by the means of the semantic differential method. The shop image analysis hands out information which can be a starting point for understanding the importance of the attributes of the trade chains from the point of view of the consumer perception and attitude. Based on the image analysis of the foreign trade chains in the Slovak market, we can say that the consumers are satisfied with the opening hours, shops location, cleanliness and appearance of shops and the sufficient number of shopping trolleys. Minuses were noticed in the field of promotion activities and the waiting time at the registers.

This paper deals with the problems of destination management. It focuses on describing the crucial principles of destination management and consecutively on proving the functionality of these principles in practice in an area with a high potential for tourism development. In the selected South-Moravian region (JMK), we have explored whether an existing organization of destination management can be found in this region (DMC Destination Management Company) and to which extent it participates in the management and efficient development of tourism. To reach the set targets, we have used a secondary analysis of current data, a depth interview with a destination agency manager and an orientation questionnaire survey among business subjects. The results have shown that the level of cooperation between the destination agency in the JMK and the subjects of tourism is not on such a level and not as intensive as proclaimed by the South-Moravian Tourist Authority (CCRJM - the organization established with the aim of destination management in the JMK). For example, 50% of the addressed subjects have not been aware of the existence of this organization and only 10% of the companies have been addressed to cooperate with the CCRJM. The insufficient cooperation of public and private sectors appears to be the weakest segment. This causes an inconsistent presentation and isolation in preparing projects for the region development. It is the task for destination management, a new organization of tourism, to find the way how to cope with these difficulties and how to make the JMK a unified and quality destinations that would be attractive for tourists.

This article deals with modern approaches to the web applications analysis and design. Many methodologies specialized on web applications analysis and design have been developed, but have not reached mass usability yet, because differences between conventional and web applications are decreasing and requirements for the methodologies of the web applications analysis and design have been changed radically. The main goal of this article is to classify web applications and describe specific analysis and design requirements for each of these classes.

The enhanced use of information and communication technologies (ICT) has a strong impact on business-to-business (B2B) and business-to-consumer (B2C) relationships as well as the way the key business processes are conducted. It can save costs and time, enable businesses to reach a wider market and to respond more quickly to the customer demands. These benefits open up new ways of doing international business. The policy objective is to encourage the integration of e-business into normal business by promoting the take-up of e-business services. Information and communication technologies are necessary to be seen as a tool for the increase of prosperity and competitiveness.

This article presents some partial conclusions from the solution to the Research Project QF 4142 Higher exploitation of non-food production in the industry. The funding and supporting programmes of the growing of short rotation coppices (SRC) are described. The establishment of short rotation coppices and the subsequent exploitation of wood mass are promising trends of diversification of farmers' activities in the rural space. Plot sizes in ha and financial support to the establishment of the SRC plantations are given for 2001-2004, when a total of 166 ha of supported short rotation coppices was established. The establishment support is paid at a single installment while the amount paid for the establishment of the SRC production plantation is 60 000 CZK/ha and the amount paid for the establishment of mother plantation (reproduction plantation) is 75 000 CZK/ha.

Farm-sale, also known as direct sale, provides major opportunities to farmers in the future. This kind of sale is of increasing popularity in Europe, but farmers have to be familiar with the regulations concerning processing and sales. Mainly small and medium farmers prefer direct sale. In this activity, they must compete with an increasing number of hypermarkets, supermarkets and wholesale markets. When talking about direct sale, it means that farmers sell their products directly to customers. There are more options: (i) sale in their own shop, (ii) through a catalogue and (iii) delivery to restaurants and shops. It has to be mentioned that the development of special local products means the products representing a common local value and principally those that can be associated with a specific village due to their historical heritage or tradition. There is no standard or official definition for special local products that includes all the possible factors. Efforts of marketing and rural development experts are needed to identify and market these special products to the appropriate consumers. Meanwhile it has to be noticed that, mainly in Europe, the definition and the possibilities of product regulation concerning geographical origin, are clearly defined and well-known. However, the "protection of geographical origin" is not the same issue as "special local products" mentioned above. In a wider sense, these can be described from a marketing point of view as "local product, common product" that interconnect and integrate villages, people and approaches, but are not regulated and protected legally. These products mentioned above reach the consumer in relatively small quantities, through direct sale, and they are often attached to the services of rural tourism. The local products are also developed to ensure high quality products for the consumer or to attract tourists. People can be proud of them since they cannot be bought anywhere else. Advisers are also helping farmers choose the right sales channels to diversify their marketing activities.

To determine the countryside, different criteria can be used from the simplest one - the population density - to more complex ones like the economic indicators or the combination of factors characterizing the particular types of municipalities or regions. Generally, it is possible to divide these indicators into subjective and objective ones and further to categorize them according to other properties. The objective of this article is to collect as much information as possible about the methods of defining the borders of rural areas used in the Czech Republic and to set these criteria into a system. We would like to evaluate the applicability of these criteria and to state the advantages and disadvantages of their use. The article also compares statistical data related to the selected features characterizing countryside.

The aim of the paper is the evaluation of the present sale of the chosen organic products in the condition of the Czech Republic. The sale analysis is made according to the structure of plant and animal products with the help of both qualitative and quantitative evaluation parameters as for example the amount of production and their prices, sales conditions and the used distribution channels. The part of the paper is also analyses of present state of demand for chosen organic foodstuff and of the consumer's interest in organic foodstuff. The attention is paid mainly to the recognition of the consumer's interest in organic foodstuff, for the consumer's interest is the limit factor of the demand for organic products.