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The goal of this paper is to test the hypothesis of positive correlation between the innovative work behavior (IWB) support on the part of agricultural managers and the production performance of agricultural companies, mediated through information sharing in the companies. The research was performed on a sample of 175 companies of primary agricultural production in Slovakia. All data was analysed using the SPSS version 22.0 software package. The Cronbach's alpha coefficient was used to assess the internal consistency of scales reliability. The Baron and Kenny mediator model was also used. The hypothesis was confirmed by the research. Complete mediation was identified where up to 91.6% of the overall effect is mediated through the sharing of the information variable. The practical implications of the research point out that the transparency of communication and support of innovations introduce positive effects in relation to the performance of agricultural companies. The IWB support is a predictor of production performance of agricultural companies. However, it does not have a clear effect; the effects of other factors are important. The IWB support positively affects the production performance of companies through the sharing of information between the managers and the employees, which becomes an important tool of innovative management. Agricultural cooperatives and joint stock companies can profit less significantly from the IWB support through the sharing of information than limited liability companies. The effect of IWB support on the production performance of cooperatives in natural expression shows statistically less significant impact.

This research analyzes the dynamic effects of corporate governance, research and development (R&D) innovation, and financial policy on firm business performance under different internationalization threshold structures in Taiwan's food industry during the 2008-2019 period. The results illustrate R&D innovation's negative impact on business performance and the collateralization ratio by directors also has a negative influence. Conversely, the findings reveal that by considering the internationalization threshold effect, at a level of high internationalization, firms have positive influences on R&D innovation, and financial policy has a positive influence on business performance.

The post-2020 Common Agricultural Policy targets at supporting small and medium-sized farms. Capping and redistribution of direct payments would have a direct impact on the economic viability of farms. Calculation of economic income is a reasonable way how to calculate the economic viability of firms. However, accounting profit has been preferred for its estimation so far. The article aims to compare the income from accounting and economic point of view and reveal how much the results differ across the EU. The literature review, an empirical analysis based on Farm Accountancy Data Network (2016-2018), and a clustered heat map were applied. The results provide clear evidence of high variability of opportunity costs when calculating the economic viability in the EU, especially between countries with small intensive farms and some post-communist countries where larger farms dominate.

Can digital media advertising strategies benefit agribusiness farms? This study addresses this issue by investigating the extent to which digital and traditional media advertising strategies affect agribusiness performance and the underlying factors associated with agribusiness farms' adoption decisions. We estimate a non-linear simultaneous equation system and use a population-based survey data of agricultural processing farms in Japan. We find that female and younger farm operators', as well as incorporated agribusiness farms, are more likely to adopt digital media advertising. The sales value of digital media advertising users is higher by 51% than that of non-users. Moreover, the effect of digital advertising is not equally distributed among farms. Family farms and farms located in rural areas benefit more from the adoption of digital media advertising.

This paper tries to find out which precious metal futures are the best hedging tools for corn spot commodity, taking into account three different risk measures - variance (Var), value at risk (VaR), and conditional value at risk (CVaR). For computation purposes, we use an optimal dynamic conditional correlation (DCC) specification for every considered pair. Our findings indicate that portfolio with gold outperforms the other three precious metals (silver, platinum, and palladium) with respect to all three risk metrics. The reason for such findings is two-fold. First, gold has the lowest average dynamic correlation with corn (below 11%), and gold also has the lowest average risk of all precious metals. The second-best combination is corn-platinum, whereas the corn-silver pair gives the worst hedging results. This happens because silver has the highest average dynamic correlation with corn (14.5%), but more importantly, silver is the riskiest commodity, which makes this asset unsuitable for combining with corn. According to the results, the ratio between corn and gold in a two-asset portfolio should be about 27 : 73.

Origin labelling is one of the most prominent approaches in the Green Morocco Plan with which the Moroccan government aims to support the marketing of domestically produced food and then improve the income of smallholder farmers. We analyse the preferences and attitudes of Moroccan consumers towards the recently established Protected Geographical Indication label "Majhoul dates of Tafilalet". The analysis is based on a survey of 303 Moroccan consumers and focuses on the influence of the label as extrinsic attribute on consumer choice. We use cluster analysis to segment the market and the Analytical Hierarchy Process to shed light on preferences of consumers under this labelling strategy. Results indicate two consumer types. The largest group seeks authenticity, origin, and quality. The label of origin in general and the origin from the oasis of Tafilalet in particular are the most important attributes affecting the purchasing decisions which fit with the goal of the labelling strategy implanted as part of the policy. The acceptance of the labelling by Moroccan consumers implies that the neighbouring countries might pursue similar approaches to support rural livelihoods in arid areas.

Farms in the European Union come in a wide variety of sizes and the effect of farm size on profitability (return on assets - ROA) has not been sufficiently investigated. The principal goal of this paper, therefore, is to study the determinants of farm profitability using the panels of the Farm Accountancy Data Network (FADN) on farms of different economic size between 2007 and 2018. We use a profitability function based on ratios that show the production and financial management strategies used by the farms. We also analyse the impact of subsidies under the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP). To deal with endogeneity, we run dynamic panel models using the system generalised method of moments (sys-GMM) estimators. We highlight the important role of the high level of equity turnover. An increase in production relative to the farm's equity plays a crucial role in the growth of profitability for all groups of farms, but it is especially important for smaller entities. In addition, farm managers should control the level of debt since the debt-to-asset ratio is a highly significant negative determinant of farm profitability in most of the groups. The increase in subsidy rate generally translates into higher ROA, but this variable has a negative impact across the largest holdings.

Food price inflation has been a significant subject of debate in Turkey since food prices soared in 2018. The study examines the linkage between agricultural input prices and food prices in Turkey by using quantitative method approaches with the monthly data spanning from 2015-M01 to 2020-M01. A co-integration analysis is performed using the autoregressive-distributed lag (ARDL) bounds test approach and Maki co-integration test with structural breaks. Additionally, the fully modified ordinary least square (FMOLS), dynamic ordinary least squares (DOLS), and canonical co-integrating regression (CCR) are applied to verify the results of the ARDL approach. The analysis demonstrates a significant, long-running relationship between agricultural input prices and food prices in Turkey. The long-run agricultural input price elasticities are found to be in the range of 1.30-1.36.

Milk and dairy products help meet the nutritional needs of the population. The main goal of this research was to analyse price volatility of milk and dairy products in Poland after accession to the European Union (EU). Price is the main economic influencer. We used 161 monthly observations from 01. 2007 to 05. 2020 to analyse the price changes. To measure the volatility, we have used Augmented Dickey-Fuller test (ADF test), Autoregressive-Moving-Average model (ARMA model), and Granger test. Our research confirmed high volatility of milk and dairy products prices. The ARMA model confirmed that the dairy product prices are stationary. Milk, butter and Gouda cheese are also useful for forecasting.

One of objectives of the Common Agricultural Policy is to ensure an appropriate living standard for agricultural households. The paper uses EU-Statistics on Income and Living Conditions (EU-SILC) data to assess the income situation and living conditions of agricultural households. The agricultural household income does not reach the average household income in any of the EU countries. Multidimensional cluster analysis is applied to classify EU countries according to the income situation of agricultural households. The cluster analysis revealed five segments and the fact that living conditions at a satisfactory level can be achieved irrespective of the economic status of the agricultural household, although it depends on an appropriate setting of agricultural policy. The index of living conditions is constructed and used for the comparison. Based on the analysis results, the variables included in the assessment of the living standard of agricultural households should be taken into account when fulfilling the objectives of the Common Agricultural Policy, especially the part that relates to improving the living conditions of agricultural households. The current EU-SILC database is appropriate for the evaluation of the household income situation. However, it does not reflect the specifics of agricultural households, so additional measurement is needed.

Southern Europe is becoming a hotspot for climate change. Appropriate mechanisation is necessary for reducing soil compacting in such contexts. The olive tree distribution - a typical Mediterranean crop - showed a well-defined latitude gradient with progressive decline moving towards the north. Climate change, however, has supposed to cause a significant shift towards the north in the geographical range of olive trees. Our study analyses the spatial distribution of the olive tree area in Italy, a region within the species' ecological range apart from the Northern region, which is now becoming progressively specialised in this crop because of local warming. Results indicate that olive cultivated area increased in Northern Italy, especially in flat districts and upland areas, while decreasing (more or less rapidly) in central and southern Italy because of land abandonment.

Strategic documents are considered the basic tools for managing and coordinating any company's development, setting the basic development directions and goals that the company wants to achieve and the ways to achieve them. It is always necessary to reconcile the diverse interests of interest groups in relation to the development of a given enterprise to make efficient use of resources and opportunities, as far as possible without conflicts. The classification, meaning, and contents of companies' strategic documents are most often based on their established practice. The article's main goal is to identify the level of implementation of a group of implemented strategic documents aimed at increasing the efficiency and competitiveness of agricultural enterprises in the Czech Republic. The data, which were subjected to factor analysis, were obtained via a questionnaire survey from 70 agricultural enterprises in the Czech Republic. The results part contains also results from qualitative research (focus group, n = 7). The results showed that agricultural enterprises implement groups of so-called conservative strategies and competence development strategies. Most of the surveyed agricultural enterprises have a formulated innovation strategy, while 56% of enterprises do not have an implemented environmental strategy.

In the present study, we have investigated several competing stochastic frontier models which differ in terms of the form of the production function (Cobb-Douglas or translog), inefficiency distribution (half-normal or exponential distribution) and type of prior distribution for the parameters (hierarchical or non-hierarchical from the Bayesian point of view). This last distinction corresponds to a difference between random coefficients and fixed coefficients models. Consequently, this study aims to examine to what extent inferences about estimates of farms' efficiency depend on the above assumptions. Moreover, the study intends to investigate how far the production function's characteristics are affected by the choice of the type of prior distribution for the parameters. First of all, it was found that the form of the production function does not impact the efficiency scores. Secondly, we found that measures of technical efficiency are sensitive to distributional assumptions about the inefficiency term. Finally, we have revealed that estimates of technical efficiency are reasonably robust to the prior information about the parameters of crop farms' production technology. There is also a resemblance in the elasticity of output with respect to inputs between the models considered in this paper. Additionally, the measurement of returns to scale is not sensitive to model specification.

High-quality information systems explicitly focused on working with people help companies meet the increasingly complex requirements for registration of attendance, forms, employment contracts, and much more. The article's main goal is to identify areas of human resources management for which agricultural companies in the Czech Republic use information systems to increase the efficiency of processes and evaluate the development of their usage with regard to the support of digitisation. The data, which were subjected to factor analysis, were obtained via a questionnaire survey from selected 70 agricultural companies in the Czech Republic and via qualitative research (focus group, n = 7). The largest share of monitored agricultural holdings is using IT systems in the area of personal data, while the smallest share of monitored agricultural holdings is using software for monitoring education and knowledge transfer. Factor analysis identified 4 factors that characterise agricultural companies according to the use of information and communication technologies (ICT) in human resource management. The results show that in terms of the current shift of the entire agriculture towards digitisation, the use of ICT in staff management of companies cannot be neglected. The outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic exacerbates the use of ICT.

The study aimed to examine the changes in income inequalities in Polish farms and the impact of introducing the threshold of direct payments for farms (EUR 60 000) to form these inequalities. The research was based on data from the Farm Accountancy Data Network (FADN) for the years: 2006, 2013 and 2018. In each year, the sample included at least 10 000 observations that represented over 700 000 farms. The results were verified using statistical tests relating to the comparisons of averages and distributions of farm income for two samples and the Gini coefficient. The study noted deepening income inequalities in Polish farms, as evidenced by the increasing value of the Gini coefficient in the subsequent years and the growing share of payments in the formation of these inequalities. Neither for the sample analysed nor the field of observation of farms will introduce the threshold for direct payments per farm of at least EUR 60 000 (including labour costs) change the polarisation of income.

Palm oil is a superior product from Indonesia that is continuously and widely used for daily needs such as cooking, grooming, and manufacturing. However, this potential must be supported by oil palm business actors' performance to maintain its intensity and competitiveness. This study investigates how various factors affect Indonesia's crude palm oil (CPO) export intensity and competitiveness by employing panel regression and the basic gravity model. The panel data used here is a 20-year time series with cross-sections from five major importers from 1999 to 2018. The results show that the importer's gross domestic product (GDP) and quantity of export significantly and positively affect Indonesia's CPO export intensity, while the exporter's GDP and economic distance has a significant and negative effect. The factors that positively and significantly influence competitiveness are soybean's import value and Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO) certification, while Malaysian CPO's export and population of importing countries negatively affect Indonesian CPO competitiveness.

We use chaotic artificial neural network (CANN) technology to predict the price of the most widely traded agricultural futures - soybean futures. The nonlinear existence test results show that the time series of soybean futures have multifractal dynamics, long-range dependence, self similarity, and chaos characteristics. This also provides a basis for the construction of a CANN model. Compared with the artificial neural network (ANN) structure as our benchmark system, the predictability of CANN is much higher. The ANN is based on Gaussian kernel function and is only suitable for local approximation of nonstationary signals, so it cannot approach the global nonlinear chaotical hidden pattern. Improving the prediction accuracy of soybean futures prices is of great significance for investors, soybean producers, and decision makers.

This paper proposes a model for determining the most advantageous merger within a set of dairy farms. It uses data envelopment analysis (DEA) to estimate the total technical efficiency improvement that the merger would produce and for decomposing it into a learning effect and a pure merger effect. A design of experiments has also been carried to test the effects of various factors (the total number of farms, the standard deviation of herd size, the percentage of farms exhibiting increasing returns to scale, the standard deviation of the current technical efficiency of the farms) on different response variables (the percentage of farms involved in the merger, the reduction of herd size and the efficiency improvement obtained by the merger). The results show that the disparity in the herd size of the farms in a region and the percentage of farms that exhibit increasing returns to scale increase the number of farms that enter into the most advantageous merger. The disparity of herd size also increases the number of cows that are not needed after the merger. Finally, the expected efficiency improvement increases with the total number of farms.

In this modern era, the detection of plant disease plays a vital role in the sustainability of agricultural ecosystem. Today, India being second in farming, well-timed information related to crop is still questioning. Indian Government's farmer portal is available for pesticides, fertilisers, and farm machinery. To alleviate this problem, the paper describes a model to validate the leaf image, predicting leaf disease and notifying the farmer in an effective way on the harvest failure to stabilise farming income. For specific consideration on the validation, a data set library with predefined, uniformly scaled, regular image patterns of leaf disease, is maintained. The research suggests that farmers utilising the model can predict the breakout of leaf disease predominantly acquiring 100% yield.

This paper examines the global soybean market in a holistic way, analyses the land use and other historical determinants of soybean exports, such as labour and capital endowments, soybean productivity, international prices and demand conditions through an empirical model. In addition, it pays particular attention to the role of leading exporters in the export changes and the nature of the connections between them in an interrelated system. The results suggest that the productivity per hectare and the land used to harvest soybeans are the main factors explaining soybean exports in a global context. The analysis also reveals that Brazil, the current market leader, positively influences the other exporters. On the contrary, minor exporters such as Ukraine, Paraguay, or Canada present competitive relationships with the major exporters. The nature of the relationships between the exporters and the pressure on natural resources highlight the importance of government involvement in developing joint strategies that ensure the growth of this sector and the achievement of United Nations Sustainable Development Goals.

The purpose of the paper was to analyse changes in food consumption patterns in the European Union (EU) countries and link these patterns with food production and imports. The two research questions posed by the authors were as follows i): are the structures of the consumption, production and importation of food becoming more similar or more diverse among EU countries, and ii) are changes in food consumption patterns caused by changes in domestic production, or has food been imported to a greater extent from abroad. The study investigated countries which that have been continuously keeping relevant statistics since 1961. The food consumption structures recorded in the years 1961-1969 and 2010-2017 were compared among these countries. Following this, the countries were grouped into subsets using the criterion of greatest similarity in terms of food consumption structures. The same was done in the case of their food production and imports. The study found that countries were becoming increasingly similar in terms of their consumption patterns. An opposite situation occurred concerning food production. In the case of food imports, structural diversity between countries decreased. It follows that changes in food consumption patterns mainly occurred through the adjustment of imports.

This study aims to test the overshooting effect of agricultural prices and the absorber hypothesis of exchange rates by extending the existing overshooting model. Using a combination of modern time series methods and monthly aggregate data from China, we demonstrate that overshooting of agricultural prices does indeed occur since the impact of monetary expansion on flexible agricultural prices is significantly larger than on relatively sticky industrial prices. Granger causality tests confirm that monetary expansion is a possible determinant of the movements of both agricultural and industrial prices, thus providing a solid empirical foundation for the overshooting hypothesis. Our findings also confirm the absorber hypothesis, in that the overshooting effect of agricultural prices under a fixed exchange rate regime (ERR) is shown to be greater than that under a floating ERR. The main policy implication is that policymakers should pay attention to the spillover effect of monetary expansion on agricultural prices when adjusting macroeconomic policies, especially under a fixed ERR.

Recently, the growing interest in healthy and organic nutrition has led to an increase in both the consumption and production of olive oil. The fact that olive and olive oil production is mostly concentrated in the countries with a coastline on the Mediterranean has rendered their olive oil exports important in meeting the increasing demand for olive oil. For the exporting countries, this has raised the issues of having a large share in the international olive oil market and increasing their competitiveness. The importance of increasing competitiveness, especially for countries that generate income from agricultural production, is the driving force for conducting this study. The aim of the study was to determine the factors affecting the comparative advantages of the leading olive oil-exporting countries. In this context, the olive oil production, consumption and unit export prices of Turkey, Spain, Italy, Portugal, Greece and Tunisia for the 2000-2019 period were tested with a panel data analysis method to ascertain whether these variables have any significant effect on the revealed comparative advantage (RCA) index. According to the findings, olive oil production affects the RCA index positively, whereas olive oil consumption affects it negatively in a statistically significant way.

The perceptions of individuals with coeliac disease about gluten-free products and their consumer behaviour when eating out in hospitality establishments in the Czech Republic were investigated. The dependence of the selected characters important in the consumer behaviour of coeliac patients in the decision-making process when choosing a dining establishment, in particular the focus on identifying the key criteria that influence the decision-making of coeliac patients when selecting a particular public catering establishment, were examined. 441 questionnaires were analysed. The result is a finding of the consistency and relevance of characters in the decision-making process of coeliacs when selecting dining establishments and their satisfaction with the range of gluten-free foods in open and closed dining establishments in the Czech Republic. Deglutenised foods (raw ingredients) are very expensive and a structured and economically balanced range of processed products should be found in the hospitality industry with the acceptance of the purchasing power of their consumers.

Honey composition is mainly affected by botanical origin, however geographical factors as well as beekeeping practice and storage conditions can also influence its quality. The aim of the study was to determine the impact of geographical origin on physicochemical quality and biological activity of honey. For this reason Polish and Slovak varietal honeys, including per each country: 10 multifloral, 5 tilia, 5 rape, 5 acacia and 5 forest were compared according to their physicochemical parameters (free acidity, pH, electrical conductivity, moisture content, and colour intensity), sugar profile, diastase activity, as well as antioxidant activity (DPPH and FRAP tests, as well as photochemiluminescence method). Moreover, total phenolics compounds and flavonoids content were determined. The most significant differences (P < 0.05) between Polish and Slovak counterparts were found for tilia while the lowest for rape honeys. The impact of geographical origin on overall quality of honey was proved by PCA statistical tool.

Eight types of capsules containing Bifidobacterium animalis subsp. lactis Bb12 with addition of inulin and/or ascorbic acid were prepared by emulsion method with milk protein matrix or by extrusion method with alginate matrix. The size of protein and alginate capsules containing only Bb12 was 204 ± 18 µm and 1.7 ± 0.1 mm, respectively. Addition of both inulin (1% w/w) and ascorbic acid (0.5% w/w) increased the size of alginate capsules. Both methods of encapsulation prevented efficiently the manifestation of Bb12 cell metabolic activity. All types of encapsulation provided higher resistance of Bb12 cells to the conditions of a model gastrointestinal tract (GIT) compared to free cells. The influence of co-encapsulation with inulin (1% w/w) and ascorbic acid (0.5% w/w) on viability in model GIT was not demonstrable in alginate capsules but it was significant in protein capsules. The most efficient was co-encapsulation in a protein matrix with 1% w/w inulin and 0.5% w/w ascorbic acid.

Grape juice of Cabernet Sauvignon was fermented with three axenic cultures of Saccharomyces cerevisiae (CS-V1, CS-V2, CS-V3) to determine the effect of yeast strain on the aroma of rosé wine. An analytical methodology based on headspace solid phase microextraction combined with comprehensive two-dimensional gas chromatography and high-resolution time-of-flight mass spectrometry was used for identification of volatile organic compounds (VOC) in resulting wines. This method allowed the identification of 97 VOC responsible for wine aroma which was strictly affected by the strain used for fermentation. Results of the statistical analysis showed that strains CS-V2 and CS-V3 had the highest similarity of VOC profiles while CS-V1 was significantly different. Wine fermented with yeast strain CS-V1 was characterized by a high concentration of hexyl octanoate, 2-phenylethyl octanoate and free terpenoids (farnesol, farnesyl acetate). Strain CS-V2 contributed to an increased relative concentration of 1-hexadecanol, 1-heptanol, 9-decenoic acid and nerolidol. Wine fermented with CS-V3 had a high level of benzaldehyde, hexyl hexanoate, benzeneacetaldehyde and terpenoids α-terpineol and nerol.

The effect of modified atmosphere packaging (MAP) in combination with cold storage on physicochemical and microbiological changes of farmed pufferfish was studied during 14 days of storage. Results showed that samples with MAP3 (gas composition of 60% CO₂, 5% O₂, 35% N₂) treatment had the significantly lower total volatile basic nitrogen, K value, and total viable counts. The water holding capacity, low field NMR analysis and MRI indicated that MAP3 was more effective in maintaining the water content and water migration. Analyses of free amino acids (FAAs) also indicated that MAP3 treatment had a positive effect on preventing the degradation of proteins and retained better flavour quality.

Disulphide bonds and sulphhydryl concentrations were evaluated to determine the effects on rheological, thermodynamic, pasting, and dynamic rheological characteristics of mixed flours. Gluten samples, first treated with sodium sulphite of different concentrations, were added into flour at a 4% level, which had a significant impact on free sulphhydryl, disulphide bonds, and the ratio of the two indices. There was no relevance between the ratio and other parameters except for free sulphhydryl. The mixed flour doughs had reduced water absorption, dough development time, dough stability time as well as degree of weakening (P < 0.05). Disulphide bonds were associated negatively with the rate of starch gelatinisation (C3-C2), peak, and setback and these characteristics were correlated strongly with dough development time, dough stability time, and progressive protein weakening (C2-C1). The stability of starch gelatinisation and cooking stability of mixed flours did not remain significantly different. The larger the concentration of sodium sulphite, the higher the peak, breakdown, final viscosity, and setback values, but there were no significant differences between samples. For all samples, storage modulus and loss modulus increased with increasing scanning frequency. For mixed doughs, the trend lines of moduli decreased with increasing levels of reduction in added gluten. There was no substantial effect on thermal properties of flours.