Consumer stated preferences for dairy products with carbon footprint labels in Italy

Abstract Carbon footprint (CF) labels on agri-food products represent one of the most important tools to convey information to consumers about the greenhouse gases emissions associated with their purchase behaviour. Together with the growing interest of consumers in CF labels, the subject has gained attention also in the scientific literature, and formal evaluations of consumer response to carbon labelling have been published. Studies in this area aim at analysing consumers' preferences for buying products with a lower CF label or their willingness to pay (WTP) for these products. The objective of this paper is twofold. First, the study proposes a review of the literature that so far has analysed consumer WTP for CF label, focusing on Italian consumers. Second, it uses the results of two surveys of consumers' attitudes towards dairy products with a lower CF label to analyse the factors determining a positive stated WTP. Results point out that a positive WTP for lower CF products is more likely to be declared by respondents who believe that buying products with less environmental impact can combat climate change. Conversely, highly price-sensitive consumers are less likely to be willing to pay more for CF-labelled products

Farms Employing Foreign Workers in Italy: An Analysis with Census Micro Data

Over the last decades, foreign workers have become a significant component of Italian agriculture workforce. Their presence and incidence are highly diversified with respect to farm typologies, type of contract and geographic location. A comprehensive representation of this complex phenomenon is thus the first step to understand the different problems and needs associated to the employment of foreign workforce. This study uses micro data from the 2010 Italian Agricultural Census to first describe what are the structural and geographical features of Italian farms employing foreign workers and then to group farms through a cluster analysis. Results give a detailed representation of the incidence of foreign workers employed, revealing which part of Italian agriculture relies more on foreign workers. The cluster analysis allows the definition of six groups: foreign workers are especially involved in livestock activities, both indoor and grazing and in farms specialized in permanent crops. Among major policy implications, analysing the presence of foreign workers can help targeting policies to agricultural production system needs

Immigrant workforce and labour productivity in Italian agriculture: a farm-level analysis

The objective of this paper is to detect stylized facts and put forward testable hypotheses on the presence and role of immigrant workforce in Italian agriculture. This research focuses on professional agriculture as represented by the Italian FADN over the period 2008-2015. Descriptive statistics show that immigrants are an important component of the workforce employed in professional agriculture over this period, even with wide disparities between regions, sectors and classes of economic size. Immigrants are concentrated in larger and more productive farms and their presence is positively correlated with farm’s labour productivity (LP). To understand whether they are more productive, or they are just occupied by more productive farms, the relationship between LP and their contribution to agricultural production, in terms of Annual Working Units (AWU), is modelled at the farm level, by assuming alternative model specifications. Results emphasize that, in many cases, statistically significant relationships between the contribution of immigrants and farm-level LP can result from model misspecifications. Accounting for farms’ heterogeneity can greatly influence the dimension of this link. Moreover, when assuming persistence of LP with a dynamic specification, this relationship disappears

The productivity and environment nexus with farm-level data. The Case of Carbon Footprint in Lombardy FADN farms

This paper aims to assess whether and to what extent environmental and productivity affect each other within heterogeneous farms. The analysis concerns the sample of FADN Lombardy farms observed from 2008 to 2013. Using the FADN information on production structures and activities, a productivity index (Total Factor Productivity - TFP) and an environmental indicator (Emission Intensity - EI) are properly reconstructed at the farm level. The nexus between TFP and EI is then investigated by admitting heterogenous behaviour across farm sizes and specializations. Results show that the relationship between TFP and EI is not univocal and suggest that the mitigation of GHG emission can be based on the diffusion of the best practices adopted by high-productivity farms of different size and specialization.

The productivity and environment nexus with farm-level data. The Case of Carbon Footprint in Lombardy FADN farms

This paper aims to assess whether and to what extent environmental and productivity affect each other within heterogeneous farms. The analysis concerns the sample of FADN Lombardy farms observed from 2008 to 2013. Using the FADN information on production structures and activities, a productivity index (Total Factor Productivity - TFP) and an environmental indicator (Emission Intensity - EI) are properly reconstructed at the farm level. The nexus between TFP and EI is then investigated by admitting heterogenous behaviour across farm sizes and specializations. Results show that the relationship between TFP and EI is not univocal and suggest that the mitigation of GHG emission can be based on the diffusion of the best practices adopted by high-productivity farms of different size and specialization.

The role of economic and policy variables in energy-efficient retrofitting assessment. A stochastic Life Cycle Costing methodology

Abstract Energy saving is a major policy objective worldwide and in the EU in particular. Evaluating the convenience of energy-efficient investments, however, is complex. This paper aims to apply stochastic Life Cycle Costing to assess the economic value of energy-efficient building retrofitting investments. The proposed approach investigates how macroeconomic variables affect such an evaluation by explicitly taking into account their interdependent stochastic nature. Consequently, the economic evaluation of an investment is itself stochastic thus expressing both its expected value and its inherent uncertainty and risk. On this basis, an illustrative case-study is presented, where alternative designs of the energy-saving intervention are compared and a sensitivity analysis performed to identify the determinants of the LCC outcome and of its variability. In terms of policy implications, a tool providing a sounder evaluation of the convenience of such investments can suggest when and to what extent incentives may be appropriate to facilitate these investments and what possible financial instruments could be put forward in order to reduce the associated risk

A scoping review of the impact of agricultural, food, and environmental policies on the transition towards a safe and just operating space for EU agri-food systems

The transition of agri-food systems towards a safe and just operating space (SJOS) is a complex phe- nomenon, which implies finding proper pathways for satisfying human needs and social justice for all, while staying within the limits of the planet’s natural resources. In this context, public policies can play a key role in driving the transition. Thus, in this paper, we have carried out a scoping review of the literature on the relationships between some key public policies affecting agricultural and food and the SJOS dimensions, with the purpose of identifying the most important knowledge gaps. Following the most recent protocols proposed by the literature, we have reviewed papers published in the 20 0 0–23 period using the Web of Science database as the main reference. Our results show that the available evidence is somehow scattered across the SJOS thematic areas, with a clear prevalence of the environ- mental (safe operating space) with respect to the social [just operating space (JOS)] ones. Thus, there is a clear research gap in exploring the impact of public policies on JOS issues such as social equity, health, and nutrition security. Moreover, very few studies explore synergies and trade-offs between different SJOS dimensions. This is especially relevant in evaluating a complex policy mix such as the Green Deal of the European Union. Finally, from a methodological perspective, the available studies provide some interesting hints for extending the available toolkit for ex-ante policy modelling, which deserve further research

Barriers and drivers of digital agriculture adoption: Insights from Italian farming stakeholders

Digital agriculture technologies represent a solution for improving productivity levels and environmental sustain- ability, thanks to data with great potential. Therefore, understanding the mechanisms of adoption and diffusion of digital farming technologies is crucial. Notably multiple factors are responsible for farmers’ technology adoption rate. The objective of this paper is to analyze the barriers to technology adoption and drivers of diffusion for a group of Italian stakeholders by using qualitative research methods. Results identify many barriers to technology adoption and point out that cooperation between stakeholders, along with collaborative efforts through technical support and training activities are key strategies

Le sfide dell’economia circolare per il settore agricolo.

Nell’Unione Europea la transizione verso un’economia più circolare è fondamentale per il raggiungimento degli obiettivi del Green Deal e di sostenibilità del Millennio. L’agricoltura è un settore cruciale in questo passaggio per il suo ruolo primario nella bioeconomia circolare; tuttavia, occorre riconoscere che l’efficienza del sistema è prerequisito per ogni sostenibilità. Da questo punto di vista l’implementazione della strategia Farm to Fork appare cruciale

Key policy objectives for European agricultural policies: Some reflections on policy coherence and governance issues

Food security and environmental sustainability are global challenges that must be addressed together to be solved. After stressing the importance of solving the challenges of producing enough food to feed a growing population while preserving the climate and the environment, this analysis discusses some issues related to the policy coherence (PC) approach that should be followed. Within-policy and between-policies coherence problems are assessed and discussed, and governance problems related to the PC approach are presented. Key points for a likely approach to PC include goalbased governance grounded in the analysis of synergies and trade-offs