Policies supporting organic food and farming in the EU: assessment and development by stakeholders in 11 European countries

There is no single ‘best way’ of policy development. Bottom-up approaches to policy design and a broad debate among stakeholders facilitate policy learning and innovation. A novel approach of a bottom-up policy design process involving stakeholders is introduced. The first results obtained by implementing this methodology are presented. The outcomes of a large international effort for a development of policies for organic food and farming, which took place in Maj 2004 in Europe, are analyzed: the synthesized results from 11 European countries (AT, CH, CZ, DE, DK, EE, GB, HU, IT, PL, SI) on the current situation of policies related to the organic food market in Europe are highlighted and policy recommendations for the development of the organic food and farming sector are formulated. Specifically, strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threatsof policies related to the organic food market are identified and policy instruments used to address these aspects are developed

The potential of the new EU Rural Development Programme in supporting Organic Farming

Background: In July 2004, the Commission presented a new proposal for a Council Regulation on support for rural development by the European Agricultural Fund for Rural Development (EAFRD) for the programming period 2007 – 2013 which has been agreed upon in June 2005 (European Commission 2005a, Council of the European Union 2005a and 2005b). The explanatory memorandum of the new Rural Development Programme (RDP) presented by the European Commission mentions that after a period of reforms of the First Pillar of the CAP, now focus will be led on the reform of rural development policy. However, this does not mean a paradigm shift but rather a consolidation and administrative simplification making rural development policy more efficient and coherent (Wehrheim 2005). Compared to current Council Regulation (EC) 1257/1999, the new RDP considers in Article 6 to strengthen the partnership approach through close consultation of competent regional, local and other public authorities as well as Non-governmental organisations and private bodies representing civil society (European Commission 2004b). The regulation seeks dovetailing policies of first and second pillar: e.g. through modulation. On the other side, EU rural development policy should move towards a more strategic approach, reinforcing it and simplifying its implementation (European Commission, 2004a). To ensure the sustainable development of rural areas, the new RDP focuses on a limited number of core priority objectives relating to agriculture and forestry (European Commission, 2004b): 1. improving the competitiveness of agriculture and forestry by means of support for restructuring, development and innovation 2. improving the environment and the countryside by means of support for land management 3. improving the quality of life in rural areas and encouraging diversification of economic activity: Each of these core objectives relates to one thematic axis for which each a range of measures are proposed: Axis 1: Improving the competitiveness of the agriculture and forestry sector Axis 2: Improving the environment and the countryside Axis 3: The quality of life in rural areas and diversification of the rural economy In addition a fourth overarching axis is introduced which relates to all three objectives: Axis 4: “LEADER” Axis While so far the 2nd Pillar of the CAP was funded by two different financial sources (EAGGF Guidance and Guarantee section), the new regulation envisages the creation of only one new fund for Pillar 2: The European Agricultural Fund for Rural Development (EAFRD). Thus, current differences of Guidance and Guarantee section as concerns programming, administration and monitoring will be dispensed, which might lead to a significant ease of administrative tasks (Grajewski 2004). The resources available for the period 2007 to 2013 amount according to Article 70 of the Council proposal to 88,75 billion Euro at constant 2004 prices (European Council, 2005). The minimum EU fund contribution at axis level shall be 20%. In the case of Axis 1 and 3, maximum funds are ceiled to 50% of the eligible public expenditures (75% in convergence regions). For Axis 2 and the Leader Axis the maximum rate will be 55% (80% in convergence regions), expressing the EU priority attached to these axes. For the outermost regions the maximum co-financing rates are increased by 5 points (Council of the European Union 2005a). The implementation process of the new policy foresees adoption of the Community level strategic guidelines for rural development by autumn 2005 in order to enable Member states to finalise their national strategic plans until mid 2006 (European Commission 2005a). So far, there has only been some scientific discussion on earlier stages of the respective regulation (Grajewski et al. 2004, Schader and Stolze 2005, Wissenschaftlicher Beirat Agrarpolitik, nachhaltige Landbewirtschaftung und Entwicklung ländlicher Räume beim Bundesministerium für Verbraucherschutz, Ernährung und Landwirtschaft 2005). Generally the approach of the regulation was considered to be an improvement. However, little reference has been made so far in the discussion to the prospects the new policy holds for support of organic farming, inspite of the fact that there are economic arguments in favour of support for organic farming (Dabbert et al. 2004). Organic farming is mentioned only once in the regulation, as a minor point and without any specifics. This seems to be in contrast to the importance given to organic farming by other statements of the Commission (European Commission 2004c). Also the recent Commission proposal for strategic guidelines (European Commission 2005b) is more explicit on the role of organic farming for rural development. It thus seems worthwhile to take a closer look at this aspect

Policies Supporting Organic Food Markets in the EU: Analyses by Stakeholders in 11 European Countries

There is no single 'best way' of policy development. Bottom-up approaches to policy design and a broad debate among stakeholders facilitate policy learning and innovation. A novel approach of a bottom-up policy design process involving stakeholders is introduced. First results obtained by this methodology are presented. The outcomes of a large international effort for a development of policies for organic food and farming in Mai 2004 in Europe are analyzed: the synthesized results from 11 European countries (AT, CH, CZ, DE, DK, EE, GB, HU, IT, PL, SI) on the current situation of policies related to the organic food market in Europe are highlighted and policy recommendations for the development of the organic food and farming sector formulated. Specifically, strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats of policies related to organic food market are identified and policy instruments to address these aspects are developed.multi-stakeholder involvement, policy learning/transfer, network, organic food market policy, policy recommendations, Europe, Agricultural and Food Policy, Food Consumption/Nutrition/Food Safety,

Agricultural Policy Assessment and Development by Stakeholders: A Cross-Country Analysis of National Organic Farming Policy in 11 European Countries

There is no single 'best way' of policy development. Bottom-up approaches to policy design and a broad debate among stakeholders facilitate policy learning and innovation. A novel approach of a bottom-up policy design process involving stakeholders is introduced. First results obtained by this methodology are presented. The outcomes of an international effort for a development of policies for organic food and farming in Mai 2004 in Europe are analyzed: the synthesized results from 11 European countries (AT, CH, CZ, DE, DK, EE, GB, HU, IT, PL, SI) on the current situation of policies related to the organic food and farming sector in Europe are highlighted and policy recommendations for the development of the sector formulated. Specifically, strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats of policies related to organic food market are identified and policy instruments to address these aspects are developed.Agricultural and Food Policy, Q18,

POLICY ASSESSMENT AND DEVELOPMENT BY STAKEHOLDERS: A CROSS-COUNTRY ANALYSIS OF NATIONAL RECOMMENDATION ON ORGANIC FARMING POLICY IN 11 EUROPEAN COUNTRIES

There is no single 'best way' of policy development. Bottom-up approaches to policy design and a broad debate among stakeholders facilitate policy learning and innovation. A novel approach of a bottom-up policy design process involving stakeholders is introduced. First results obtained by this methodology are presented. The outcomes of a large international effort in Mai 2004 in developing organic farming policy in Europe are presented: the synthesized results from 11 European countries (AT, CH, CZ, DE, DK, EE, GB, HU, IT, PL, SI) on the current situation of organic farming policy in Europe and policy recommendations for the development of the organic farming sector.Multi-stakeholder involvement, policy learning, organic farming policy, Agricultural and Food Policy,

Policies supporting organic food and farming in the EU: assessment and development by stakeholders in 11 European countries

There is no single 'best way' of policy development. Bottom- up approaches to policy design and a broad debate among stakeholders facilitate policy learning and innovation. A novel approach of a bottom- up policy design process involving stakeholders is introduced. First results obtained by this methodology are presented. The outcomes of a large international effort for a development of policies for organic food and farming in Mai 2004 in Europe are analyzed: the synthesized results from 11 European countries (AT, CH, CZ, DE, DK, EE, GB, HU, IT, PL, SI) on the current situation of policies related to the organic food market in Europe are highlighted and policy recommendations for the development of the organic food and farming sector formulated. Specifically, strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats of policies related to organic food market are identified and policy instrument s to address these aspects are developed.multi - stakeholder involvement, policy learning/ transfer, network, organic food market policy, policy recommendations, Europe, Agricultural and Food Policy,

Auditory contagious yawning is highest between friends and family members: support to the emotional bias hypothesis

Contagious yawning differs from spontaneous yawning because it occurs when an individual yawns in response to someone else’s yawn. In Homo sapiens and some nonhuman primates contagious yawning is higher between strongly than weakly bonded individuals. Up to date, it is still unclear whether this social asymmetry underlies emotional contagion (a basic form of empathy preferentially involving familiar individuals) as predicted by the Emotional Bias Hypothesis (EBH) or is linked to a top-down, selective visual attention bias (with selective attention being preferentially directed toward familiar faces) as predicted by the Attentional Bias Hypothesis (ABH). To verify whether the visual attentional bias explained the yawn contagion bias or not, in this study, we considered only yawns that could be heard but not seen by potential responders (auditory yawns). Around 294 of auditory yawning occurrences were extrapolated from over 2000 yawning bouts collected in free ranging humans for over nine years. Via GLMM, we tested the effect of intrinsic features (i.e., gender and age) and social bond (from strangers to family members) on yawn. The individual identity of the subjects (trigger and potential responder) was included as random factor. The social bond significantly predicted the occurrence of auditory yawn contagion, which was highest between friends and family members. A gender bias was also observed, with women responding most frequently to others’ yawns and men being responded to most frequently by others. These results confirm that social bond is per se one of the main drivers of the differences in yawn contagion rates between individuals in support of the EBH of yawn contagion