Is 'Cooperative' a Plus factor in market communication ? A franco-Swedish Comparative study of consumer perceptions

Diffusion du document : INRA Station d'Economie et Sociologie rurales 65 rue de Saint-Brieuc 35042 Rennes Cedex (FRA)While what might be termed ethical or 'civic' consumption is no longer reserved to a few isolated eccentrics, the aim of this paper is to set out some first thoughts on the wellfoundedness of developing market communication for agricultural cooperatives based on their specific form of organisation.Based on a consumer suruey conducted jointly in France and Sweden, it sets out to appraise consumer knowledge of and interest in cooperative firms and their activities and to get a clear picture of the image consumers have of these organisations.We first describe the general framework for the study (part 1), then the method employed {part 2). We then set out the results (part 3) and interpret them (part 4)

Provfiske vid kusten - KUL

The database KUL, with data from fishing with net and fyke net in coastal Waters, has been in use since year 2006 and provides quality assured catch data of coastal fish. The base also store information such as individual gender, length, weight and age. The database complements the internal database FiRRe, which stores data collected since the 1960s. Continuous work is done to transfer older data to the database KUL. The database is in Swedish.SLU Aqua:s kustfiskedatabas KUL innehåller kvalitetssäkrade fångstdata. KUL har varit i drift sedan 2006. I basen lagras också stickprovsinformation som könsfördelning och uppgifter om enskilda fiskar som längd, vikt, ålder och likande. Databasen kompletterar provfiskedatabasen FiRRe som lagrar fångstuppgifter från 1960-talet och framåt. Ett kontinuerligt arbete pågår med att föra över äldre data till KUL

Is 'Cooperative' a Plus factor in market communication ? A franco-Swedish Comparative study of consumer perceptions

Diffusion du document : INRA Station d'Economie et Sociologie rurales 65 rue de Saint-Brieuc 35042 Rennes Cedex (FRA)While what might be termed ethical or 'civic' consumption is no longer reserved to a few isolated eccentrics, the aim of this paper is to set out some first thoughts on the wellfoundedness of developing market communication for agricultural cooperatives based on their specific form of organisation.Based on a consumer suruey conducted jointly in France and Sweden, it sets out to appraise consumer knowledge of and interest in cooperative firms and their activities and to get a clear picture of the image consumers have of these organisations.We first describe the general framework for the study (part 1), then the method employed {part 2). We then set out the results (part 3) and interpret them (part 4)

Ecosystem service multifunctionality of low-productivity forests and implications for conservation and management

Low-productivity forests are often the last remaining pristine forests in managed forest landscapes and typically overrepresented among protected forests. However, the provisioning of individual and multiple ecosystem services (ES-multifunctionality) by these forests remains poorly assessed, making it difficult to evaluate their importance in forest conservation and management.Here, using nationwide data on ES from over 2,000 forest plots, we test whether levels of ES-multifunctionality and individual ES differ between low-productivity forested mires and rocky outcrops in relation to the levels of productive forests, and as a function of forest age, tree species richness and climate. We defined ES-multifunctionality using different threshold values of the maximum levels (low, medium and high) and weighted these according to land-use objectives (equal weight of all services, greater weight to cultural and supporting ES or greater weight to production).We show that the ES-multifunctionality of forested mires is consistently lower than those of productive forests. However, the ES-multifunctionality increased with forest age in forested mires but not in productive forests. The ES-multifunctionality of forested rocky outcrops, on the other hand, was higher or equivalent to that of productive forests under equal weight and supporting land-use objectives, respectively. Our findings highlight that forested rocky outcrops can supply multiple ES, especially older forested stands with mixtures of coniferous and deciduous trees. Generally, we found no evidence for strong trade-offs between the ES studied and our results highlight the importance of forest age for increasing the ES-multifunctionality of low-productivity forests.Synthesis and applications. Low-productivity forests should not be exempt of forestry or protected purely based on low productivity or low land-use conflict if the goal is to conserve multiple ecosystem services (ES). Inclusion grounds for protecting low-productivity forests should instead carefully consider the site type (dry vs. wet), forest age and tree species richness. To maintain higher ES-multifunctionality in low-productivity forests, older or deciduous trees should also not be harvested. This will require changes in current conservation or management policies of low-productivity forests of some countries

Strategic environmental assessment in policy and sector reform : conceptual model and operational guidance

Around the world, it is increasingly being recognized that for sustainability goals to be reached, efforts need to go beyond complying with standards and mitigating adverse impacts, to identifying environmental sustainability as an objective of the development process. This approach requires the integration of environmental, sustainability, and climate change considerations into policy and sector reform. Because sector reform brings about significant policy change involving adjustments in laws, policies, regulations, and institutions, it is a sensitive political process often driven by strong economic interests. Policy makers are subject to a number of political pressures that originate in vested interests. The recommendations of environmental assessment are often of little relevance unless there are constituencies that support them and have sufficient political power to make their voices heard in the policy process. While strong constituencies are important during the design of sector reform, they are even more important during implementation. It follows that effective environmental assessment in policy and sector reform requires strong constituencies backing up recommendations, a system to hold policy makers accountable for their decisions, and institutions that can balance competing and, sometimes, conflicting interests