Environmentally Friendly Agriculture: Development Issues in Latvia

Organic farming as the method and organic food nowadays play more and more important role in supplying sustainable and environmentally friendly practices, support a high level of biodiversity, utilize natural processes and ensure appropriate animal welfare standards. The paper analyzes the development and issues of perspectives of organic farming in Latvia. Some findings on organic agriculture development are given, estimating the primary information on organic farming in Latvia regarding the trends of organic farms' number, utilized organic agricultural land and share of organic land in the total agricultural land. Furthermore, the state policy and support for organic farming have been analyzed and compared with that of European Union (EU) and its Member States. The influence of Latvia's accession to the EU on the organic farming development is assessed. Some issues of further perspectives of development of Latvian organic agriculture are evaluated

Issues of sustainable food production in Latvia

The article presents main results of the first in Latvia study addressing the issues of the development of Latvia’s sustainable food production. For detailed research two main themes for Latvia’s agri-food sector’s sustainability were chosen: 1) the issues related to further development of the organic farming and processing; where the special attention has been paid to organic milk processing; and obtaining of organic pigmeat and beef in different Latvia’s regions; 2) quality and environment management systems enforcement - mandatory and voluntary and the trends of implementation of the international management standards (ISO 9001, ISO 22000; HACCP DS 3027:2002; ISO 14001). The publications, legal documents and databases of Latvia’s governmental and nongovernmental institutions were used as materials and the qualitative and quantitative research methods were applied for this empirical research. The assessment of present situation and the proposals for further development has been given

DEVELOPMENT AND FUTURE PERSPECTIVES OF ORGANIC FARMING IN LATVIA

Nowadays the organic farming as method and organic food takes important role for the sustainable and environmental friendly agricultural and food production. The paper analyzes the development and issues of future perspectives of organic farming in the Latvia. Some findings of organic agriculture development are given, estimating the primary information on organic farming in Latvia regarding the trends of the organic farms’ number, utilized organic agricultural and share of organic land in the total agricultural land. Besides, the state policy and support for organic farming have analyzed and compared with European Union (EU) and it’s Member States. The influence of Latvia’s accession to the EU on the organic farming development is assessed. Some issues of further perspectives of development of Latvian organic agriculture are evaluated

Organic farming in Latvia: development and economics

Organic agriculture plays an important role in the sustainable and environment-friendly agricultural production. The authors paper analyse the development and economic is¬sues of organic farming in Latvia. The primary information on organic farming in Latvia regarding the trends, the number of farms and land use, support payments as well as a short description of the structure of organic farming are provided. The influence of Latvia’s accession to the European Union on the organic farming development is assessed. The results of an analysis of the economic performance (net value added) of organic farms and a comparison with conventional farming are presented

REPRODUCTION OF FARMS’ LONG–TERM ASSETS IN LATGALE

Agriculture is an important integral part of Latvia’s economy. Recently it has suffered a significant decline due to a price disparity, out–of–date technology, and stiff competition with cheap imported agricultural products, inflation and long–lasting unsuccessful structural reforms. At present most farms work with losses or low profitability and therefore can not provide the reproduction of fixed assets which is a vital prerequisite of efficient agricultural production. The comparative analysis of reproduction of farms’ fixed assets in Latgale and in Latvia is performed in the paper. In contrast to the previously done research, the focus is on analysis of various derived indicators such as net investments per European size unit, total utilised agricultural area and livestock unit. Special attention has been paid to the subsidies on investment as a gratis external source of finance and their proportion in gross investments

Bioenergy Resources in Latvia

The paper presents results of study aimed to evaluate issues of current development of bioenergy in Latvia, taking into account restrictions, which may affect future progress of main biomass sources. These restrictions are based on latest European Union (EU) regulations and recommendations; and worldwide concerns of scholars on sustainability, particularly environmental (e.g. biodiversity, ecosystem resilience, carbon sequestration) of bioenergy (biomass) development. The appropriate qualitative and quantitative research methods have been used in the process of study. The results of examination suggest that biomass possesses one of the greatest potentials for further increasing renewables production, particularly in Latvia. The characteristics and perspectives of main biomass sources’ development are assessed for compliance with the EU latest regulations, recommendations and policies, particularly Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) 2014-2020, and they demonstrate    [reveal?] several limitations. The restrictions under the CAP regulations’ so-called ‘greening’ requirements mainly affect the production of energy crops, limiting monocultures’ growing. For some types of biomass production (e.g. energy cultures, wood biomass), several limitations or restrictions are considered, in particular, those related to environmental issues such as biodiversity, soil properties, agro-ecosystems and landscape. Forest origin, non-food plants (e.g. perennial grasses) and different kind of residues and waste could be the most important, perspective and sustainable biomass sources in Latvia. Besides, the dominance of a single bioenergy source would be unsustainable in the long run, and diversifying of the energy system is preferred

DEVELOPMENT OF TOURISM IN LATVIA: ISSUES AND POTENTIALITIES

Tourism is recognized as one of the most important economic sectors or industries in the world and many countries see tourism as the main instrument for economic and regional development. The paper provides a short theoretical framework for tourism and its role or impact, discussing the definition of tourism and some aspects of the tourism sector. The paper presents results of studies devoted to some issues of tourism development in Latvia. Comparison of some indicators of tourism sector’s development between the Baltic States is presented. The results show that long–term development of Latvia’s tourism sector is less successful than in other Baltic States, particularly in Estonia. The trends of Latvia’s tourism sector development are indicative of recovery from crisis (2008–2009). Besides, opinions and impressions of foreign tourists have been analyzed with an aim to recognize the most important issues hampering the foreign tourists’ flow to Latvia

Kvalitates vadiba un tas ekonomika partikas razosanas primaraja un sekundaraja sfera

The hypothesis of the research. Food quality can be managed in a targeted way in the primary and secondary sphere of production, taking into account the interests of sustainable development, environmental protection and the public. The goal of the research. To study opportunities for quality management, along with problems, solutions and economic aspects of same in the primary and secondary sphere of food production and to work out proposals for solutions of problems. The tasks of the research. 1. To evaluate the theoretical, methodological, organisational, legal and institutional aspects of food quality; 2. To identify the problems with food quality development in the primary sphere and to design economically rational solutions to those problems; 3. To study quality improvement problems and opportunities in the initial treatment phase related to agricultural output; 4. To analyse food quality further development opportunities, methods, types, and mechanisms in the secondary sphere; 5. To study the potential economic effect of food quality development and control. Results of studies have been arranged in 5 chapters. The first chapter is devoted to a historical, theoretical, agroeconomical and methodological aspects of food quality. The second chapter provides a more detailed analysis of legal, organizational and institutional system of food quality assurance and control in Latvia. The third chapter arranges results of studies of possibilities and problems of food quality development in the primary sphere - agricultural enterprises and farms. The fourth chapter provides results of studies of food quality further devepolment on secondary sphere - preliminary treatment, particularly stressing out the influence of pre-slaughter and slaughtering processes on animal carcass and meat quality. The fifth chapter devoted to results of studies on economical effect of food quality development and management, particularly, to eliminate pork and beef production and milk obtaining and studies of losses due to unsafe food. In the final part the main conclusions, problems and solutions have been given. The scope of dissertation is 168 pages, containing 47 tables, 34 figures. The number of legislative acts, regulations, normative and informative documents, articles and publications are 406 denominations, 264 of them are in foreign languages.Abstract in Latvian, English, Russian. Separate summary in Latvian, English, 78 p.Available from Latvian Academic Library / LAL - Latvian Academic LibrarySIGLELVLatvi

Tourism and comparison of some development aspects in the Baltic region

Tourism is recognized as one of the most important economic sectors of industry in the world and for many countries tourism is seen as the main instrument for economic and regional development. The paper provides a short theoretical framework for tourism and its role or impact, discussing the definition of tourism and some aspects of the tourism sector. The paper presents the results of studies on some issues of tourism development in the Baltic States. The paper presents the results of studies on some issues of tourism development in the Baltic States. Comparison of some indicators of tourism sector development among the Baltic States is presented. The results show that long-term development of Latvia's tourism sector is less successful than in other Baltic countries, particularly in Estonia. The tourism sector in the Baltic States sees recovery after the crisis