THE ABILITY OF THE BOTTLED WATER SECTOR TO MEET THE NEEDS OF CONSUMERS IN BOSNIA AND HERZEGOVINA

Bottled water sector in B&H becomes more significant economically with media pressure and expectations. This paper aims to determine factors important for the consumers while choosing bottled water products and in that way try to, by comparing the results to the sectors abilities, determine sector’s ability to meet the consumer’s needs. Small research among (97) respondents was carried out, and the results indicate that the sector is unable to meet the needs of the customers, since the trade balance is negative and domestic market share low. Customer profile suggests almost only young consumers, which indicates that for the stronger results further research is needed

Validation and calibration of various reference evapotranspiration alternative methods under the climate conditions of Bosnia and Herzegovina

In Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH), the number of weather stations (WS) that are monitoring all climatic parameters required for FAO-56 Penman-Monteith (FAO-PM) equation is limited. In fact, it is of great need and importance to achieve the possibility of calculating reference evapotranspiration (ET0) for every WS in BiH (around 150), regardless of the number of climate parameters which they collect. Solving this problem is possible by using alternative equations that require less climatological data for reliable estimation of daily and monthly ET0. The main objective of this study was to validate and determine, compared to the FAO-PM method, a suitable and reliable alternative ET0 equations that are requiring less input data and have a simple calculation procedure, with a special focus on Thornthwaite and Turc as methods previously often used in BiH. To fulfill this objective, 12 alternative ET0 calculation methods and 21 locally adjusted versions of same equations were validated against FAO-PM ET0 method. Daily climatic data, recorded at sixteen WS, including mean maximum and minimum air temperature (°C), precipitation (mm), minimum and maximum relative humidity (%), wind speed (m s−1) and sunshine hours (h) for the period 1961–2015 (55 years) were collected and averaged over each month. Several types of statistical indicators: the determination coefficient (R2), mean bias error (MBE), the variance of the distribution of differences (sd2), the root mean square difference (RMSD) and the mean absolute error (MAE) were used to assess alternative ET0 equation performance. The results, confirmed by various statistical indicators, shows that the most suitable and reliable alternative equation for monthly ET0 calculation in BiH is the locally adjusted Trajkovic method. Adjusted Hargreaves-Samani method was the second best performing method. The two most frequently used ET0 calculation methods in BiH until now, Thornthwaite and Turc, were ranked low.publishedVersio

Strengthening the levels of food companies' market orientation - the road towards strengthening the competitiveness of agribusiness in Bosnia and Herzegovina

High level of trade deficit indicates low competitiveness in B&H agribusiness, which brings the question whether its low competitiveness is mirroring its low market orientation, i.e. capability to apply integrated business philosophy which ensures adequate competitive advantages and sustains development of companies. To answer that, a survey was conducted through a MKTOR scale for measuring market orientation, on fifty food companies in the period May – December 2013. Statistical analysis was done using SPSS, and it included reliability test, exploratory factor analysis and confirmatory factor analysis, along with the tests of statistical significance and descriptive statistics. B&H food companies are only partly market-oriented, 3.430 (max 5.0), with Crombach’s Alpha of 0.943. Factor analysis revealed three market orientation factors: intelligence generation (0.393), intelligence dissemination (0.503) and responsiveness (0.522). Level of market orientation in small (3.511) and large (3.364) was statistically different, meaning that the smaller companies are less capable of understanding the market. Also, small and big companies have significantly different performances on the basis of all three market orientation factors. However, we may say that for both types of companies, intelligence generation and intelligence dissemination are a weak link, whereas responsiveness is better than total average. Results show that food companies in B&H have low ability of collecting key information about the market. Furthermore, omissions in internal organization and lack of knowledge about marketing are barrier to use efficiently the collected, often disorganized data on market necessities. Therefore existing, collected data are not utilized to enhance creative communication and building of added value that will make difference on market place and enable B&H food companies to develop sustainable competitive advantages

Covid-19 pandemic effects on food safety - Multi-country survey study

This study provides an important insight into the response of food safety systems during the first months of the pandemic, elevating the perspective of preventing Covid-19 within conventional food safety management systems. A multi-country survey was conducted in 16 countries involving 825 food companies. Based on the results of the survey, it is obvious that the level of maturity of a food safety system in place is the main trigger in classifying companies and their responses to the pandemic challenge. Staff awareness and hygiene are the two most important attributes in combating Covid-19, opposed to temperature checking of workers in food establishment and health protocols from the World Health Organization, recognized as attributes with limited salience and importance. Companies confirmed implementation of more restrictive hygiene procedures during the pandemic and the need for purchasing more additional personal protective equipment. Retailers were identified as the food supply chain link mostly affected by the pandemic opposed to food storage facilities ranked as least affected. During this challenging period, all companies declared that food safety has not been compromised at any moment. It is important to note that less than a half of the food companies had documented any emergency plans associated with pandemics and health issues in place