Computing at SuperB

Domenico Del Prete*, Fabrizio Bianchi, Vania Boccia, Vincenzo Ciaschini, Marco Corvo, Guglielmo De Nardo, Andrea Di Simone, Giacinto Donvito, Armando Fella, Paolo Franchini, Francesco Giacomini, Alberto Gianoli, Giuliano Laccetti, Stefano Longo, Steffen Luitz, Eleonora Luppi, Matteo Manzali, Leonardo Merola, Silvio Pardi, Alejandro Perez, Matteo Rama, Guido Russo, Bruno Santeramo, Roberto Stroili, Luca Tommasett

The (Nano-)Discrimination of Consumers for Nano-Inside Technologies

We explore how consumers’ willingness to buy is driven by perceptions on potential risks and potential benefits for different types of nano-inside applications. Our empirical approach follows a two-stage estimation: the first stage focuses on consumers’ perceptions toward risks and benefits; the second stage quantifies how perceived benefits and risks influence the willingness to buy. We found that perceived benefits are major drivers of the willingness to buy, whereas the fear of potential risks has a limited impact: we found stronger results for younger and more educated respondents, who should be targeted by marketing and information campaigns. Notably, the beliefs are very similar across nano-inside applications. The studies on consumers perceptions toward benefits and risks of nano-applications in the food industry fall short of providing evidence on consumers’ attitudes toward nano-inside applications in several national contexts. Our analysis fills this gap and allows us to conclude on the Italian market

Assessing the role of regional labels for consumers

The article aims at consolidating the state of academic research in the region-of-origin (RoO) literature. In fact, several authors have investigated the RoO effect on consumers' attitude toward horticultural products, and agri-food products in general: findings suggest different levels of importance for RoO, relative to other products' attribute under consumers' judgement. We systematically review the literature on RoO and build an ad hoc indicator to measure the relative importance of RoO. We conduct a meta-analysis to account for potential publication selection bias and explain heterogeneity in the relative importance of RoO across studies. From our analysis emerges that the relative importance of RoO, although not biased by publication selection, is highly dependent on structural characteristics of studies and, to a lower extent, on issues related to the publication process. In particular, the attitude of consumers toward RoO appears to be product- and origin-specific. Managerial implications are also provided

Emerging trends in European food, diets and food industry

Understanding how an adequate food security may be determined, how nutritional intakes evolve over time and are influenced by global dynamics are few of the questions scholars are trying to answer. In addition, a great interest is devoted to the changes in consumers' preferences and expectations as well as to the analysis of food innovations and their impact on the global market. We review the recent and emerging trends in food supply chains of selected sectors (fruits and vegetables, meat, and seafood), and deepen on emerging trends in the food industry. By presenting the evidence provided by the literature and emphasizing the unresolved research questions, we offer a critical view of future directions that should be followed by research agenda

Innovative quality-based strategies for the agri-food sector

The article investigates technical and economic factors affecting the decision of horticultural and agri-food producers to adopt quality-based branding strategies. The focus of the study are quality schemes approved by the European Union: protected designation of origin (PDO) and protected geographic indication (PGI). Focus groups discussions and thematic analysis are performed. The inclusion criteria for focus group discussions ensure to have participants representative of the study area and of the major agri-food supply chains. A preliminary literature review allows for a set of semi-structured and open-ended questions for focus group discussions, and for interpretation and validation of themes and factors from data analysis. From our analyses emerges that, although the balance between costs and benefits of quality schemes is positive, the overall impression is that much of the price premium for products under quality schemes is eroded by higher production and processing costs. In addition, the financial support provided by regional policies in favor of quality schemes does not encourage the adoption of quality-based strategies