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Agricultural informatisation (AgI) is hailed as a 'game-changer' for farmers worldwide, even as climate change increases agriculture's vulnerability to climatic risks and threatens sustainable agrifood production. While AgI aspires to help alleviate hunger and poverty in smallholder farm households by improving on-farm productivity through the promotion of sustainable agricultural practices (SAPs), limited empirical evidence exists on the AgI–SAPs nexus, particularly under severe environmental stress such as drought. We analysed data from a survey of maize farmers in central Zambia – a country exemplifying the impact of severe drought, declared a national emergency and disaster – to explore whether and how AgI can optimise SAP adoption and improve crop yields. Given the potential endogeneity of AgI adoption, we employed a recursive bivariate probit (RBP) and endogenous-treatment regression (ETR) to estimate the former and the latter, respectively. We focused on adoption portfolios of three AgI tools – radio, television and mobile phones – and five SAPs: minimum tillage, residue retention, planting basins, improved seed varieties and irrigation. The results reveal that AgI adoption significantly influences SAP adoption, with varying impacts across different AgI and SAP portfolios. Importantly, the adoption of productivity-enhancing SAPs, particularly improved seed and drip irrigation, produced the largest yield effects (124.46 g/capita/day) for AgI adopters. This increase potentially contributes 43.21% towards daily maize-supply quantity, which is crucial for helping households meet the minimum recommended daily caloric intake. The study therefore underscores that AgI plays a critical role in improving yields through SAP adoption, serving as a compelling pathway for agricultural resilience, especially under adverse climatic conditions. These insights align with the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), particularly those aimed at zero hunger, climate action and poverty alleviation, which advocate re-thinking and transforming food-production strategies.

A significant challenge for the sustainable dairy sector is incorporating by-products generated during other food production and agricultural processes, such as fruit, vegetable, legume, oilseed, and grain production, into dairy products. In previous decades, by-products from these sectors were mainly used as feed for dairy cows and other animals. Currently, there is a trend to use these materials also in dairy production, for fortifying and developing novel dairy products. Additionally, their incorporation into dairy products offers the modification and enhancement of the technofunctional properties. This review summarises contemporary approaches and the current state of sustainable production in the dairy sector, with an emphasis on techno-functionality.

Disturbance regimes in Central European mountain forests are changing under the ongoing climate change, raising questions about how protected areas should respond to increasingly frequent windthrow and bark beetle outbreaks. In Tatra National Park, a major windstorm in 2004 triggered a landscape-scale bark beetle eruption that challenged long-standing expectations that non-intervention alone could safeguard forest ecosystems. Using the Socio-Ecological Systems framework, we combined long-term field observations with archival sources and stakeholder interviews to examine how ecological dynamics, governance structures, and actor perspectives interacted during and after the outbreak. We show that warming, abundant post-storm breeding substrate, and legacy Norwegian spruce (Picea abies) monocultures reduced forest resilience and enabled successive beetle waves. Governance fragmentation led to delayed decision-making, allowing large volumes of wind-felled timber to remain untreated and facilitating its spread into high-naturalness stands. In contrast, evidence from other European countries suggests that timely, spatially focused measures can reduce outbreak duration without compromising conservation values. Our results indicate that in disturbance-prone, spruce-dominated forest systems experiencing climate change, a combination of strict protection in core areas and timely, selective measures in adjacent zones is more likely to maintain resilience and support conservation outcomes than strictly passive or fully interventionist approaches.

Diarrhoea in newborn piglets represents a significant challenge to pig production. Controlled oral exposure, also known as “feedback”, whereby sows are exposed at least two weeks before farrowing to pathogens that cause health problems in piglets, is a traditional method of diarrhoea prevention. One type of feedback involves fermenting cow’s milk with faeces from piglets suffering from diarrhoea and administering it to sows before farrowing. The bacterial composition of the faecal inoculum and fermented milk was compared in this study, and the safety of administering the fermented milk to pregnant sows was evaluated. Using microbiota characterisation by 16S rRNA gene sequencing, the genera Acetobacter, Lactobacillus and Lactococcus formed the core microbiota of the fermented milk. However, Clostridium perfringens accounted for up to 33% of the total microbiota in some fermented milk samples. Interestingly, the drop in pH during the later stages of fermentation inactivated C. perfringens and the samples were thus enriched for inactivated C. perfringens antigen. Our findings contribute to a better understanding of the mode of action of fermented milk when used as a form of feedback.

On February 23, 2022, the great Czech plant pathologist, and my personal friend and esteemed colleague, prof. Václav Kůdela passed away. For over 15 years (1990-2006), he served as the Editor-in-Chief for our journal, Plant Protection Science. His whole adult life was connected with agriculture, plant pathology, plant protection and the science of phytotherapy. However, he was also man who accepted, maintained, applied and lived his life following specific, serious traditional rules. The trajectory of his life and its fundamental message arose primarily from his family origins and experiences in youth.

Agricultural machines that are fully autonomous will still need human supervisors to monitor and troubleshoot system failures. Recognising the emergency as soon as possible is crucial to reduce adverse effects. The ability of humans to detect visual, auditory, or tactile cues is usually enabled by warning systems. The effectiveness of different warning cues varies in terms of prompting a quick response. The study’s objective was to compare the effectiveness of two bimodal warnings (i.e., visual-auditory and visual-tactile) at eliciting supervisor perception (which equates to level one situation awareness). Twenty-five participants engaged in an autonomous sprayer simulation. Two realistic remote supervision scenarios (i.e., in-field and close-to-field) were used to examine two bimodal warning cues: (i) visual-auditory and (ii) visual-tactile. The effectiveness of each bimodal warning was assessed based on two measures: (i) response time and (ii) noticeability. There was no significant difference between the bimodal warning cues in terms of response time when tractor sound was present in the experimental environment (reflecting the in-field remote supervision scenario); however, visual-tactile cues yielded shorter response times than visual-auditory cues when the experimental environment was quiet (reflecting the close-to-field remote supervision scenario). There were no statistically significant differences between visual-auditory and visual-tactile warnings concerning noticeability. Participants’ subjective answers indicated they preferred the visual-tactile cues better than the visual-auditory cues. It is concluded that visual-tactile warnings are preferred over visual-auditory warnings to enable perception during remote supervision of autonomous agricultural machines (AAMs).

Lab-grown cells (also known as cell-based or cultured meat) are novel food innovations that face uncertain consumer acceptance. This review examines recent research (2020–2024) on consumer perceptions of lab-grown cells, focusing on three main areas: (1) public awareness and familiarity, (2) psychological and cultural aspects shaping perceptions, and (3) the impact of information on acceptance. Results show that the awareness of lab-grown cells varies widely across regions; in countries with high meat consumption, such as the USA and Australia, or where culinary delights are highly valued, such as France, respondents rated lab-grown cells lower than in those countries where meat consumption is now rising, for example, China or Mexico. The knowledge of lab-grown cells positively impacted attitude, while psychological barriers (e.g. food neophobia) and disgust emerged as key deterrents. The information provided to respondents significantly influenced their willingness to accept, buy, try, eat, and pay premium prices. Personal (mainly health-related) benefits significantly increased the acceptance of lab-grown cells, while societal benefits (e.g. benefits to the environment or animal welfare) had less prominent effects than expected. At the same time, information regarding production technology (high-tech, laboratory, artificial) resulted in lower ratings from respondents. The conclusion is that overlooking the positive attributes of meat and focusing on the unproven advantages of lab-grown cells may lead to misleading results. On the other hand, effective communication – especially messages highlighting personal benefits – can substantially improve the consumer openness.

This paper presents the architecture of a cyber-physical system for the automated washing of agricultural machinery, designed to enhance efficiency and intelligent control. The system includes four layers – physical, sensor, computational, and interface and integrates actuators, sensors, decision-making modules, and analytics. A Python-based simulation using Control and SimPy showed an average washing time of 10.4 minutes and 97.5% cycle initiation accuracy under critical contamination. The Control was achieved via gated recurrent unit (GRU) prediction and proportional–integral–derivative (PID) regulation. Despite assumptions like ideal sensors and fixed conditions, the system proved feasible, with the future work targeting real-world validation and digital twin development.

The near-expired food (NEF) is a significant opportunity to reduce food waste, while consumers often associate NEF with safety issues, which results in a large amount of safe and healthy food being wasted globally. This research focuses on food date labelling (FDL) and explores how consumers' label cognition impacts their willingness to purchase NEF. Using a random sampling method online, we obtain 2 113 valid samples from China and conduct an information intervention 'quasi-natural experiment' to obtain participants' FDL cognition and willingness to purchase the near-expired milk (NEM) before and after the intervention and evaluate the impact of the intervention through the differences-in-differences model. The results show that consumers' initial purchase willingness for NEM is low, and their FDL cognition has a positive effect, especially in Eastern China and higher education consumers. Information intervention increases consumers' willingness to purchase NEM by changing their label cognition, and the intervention has a more pronounced impact among older, male, and higher education consumers. Considering the pressure on resources and the environment caused by food waste has become an impediment to sustainable development, the findings expand the application of the Knowledge, Attitude, and Practice (K-A-P) theory in the NEF field and clearly reveal the important role of eliminating consumer prejudice of FDL in reducing food waste to achieve the United Nations Sustainable Development Goal 12.3 'Halve food waste.'

Biofortification provides a sustainable, pragmatic strategy to address the lack of vitamin A and the associated health complications. The objectives of the study encompassed the quantification of the carotenoid content of 147 maize inbred lines, the identification of variable regions within the ZEP1 gene, the correlation of these observed variances in the presence of this gene with carotenoid content, and the identification of lines harbouring the favourable alleles of the crtRB1 gene. The observed correlations among the carotenoids synthesised by distinct branches of the biosynthetic process were both significant and positive. Utilising gel-based genotyping, 24 lines with contrasting carotenoid profiles were selected, evaluated and sequenced. Analysis of the variation in the sequence classified these lines based on their similarities to give 8 allele groups. The findings highlight that inbred lines both group 1 and group 8 exhibited significant associations with the carotenoid content of the lines. Specifically, ZEP1_7852, a discernible variation belonging to group 8, was found to be significantly associated with zeaxanthin content and total carotenoid content. Furthermore, 25 lines were found to have provitamin A content above 15 μg/g, harbouring the favourable alleles of the crtRB1 gene using KASP SNP zm0016. These lines can serve as parents for source populations and hybrids, leading to the further enhancement of provitamin A in maize.

The widespread application of Internet technology in rural development has significantly facilitated the modernisation of agriculture and profoundly and positively impacts sustainable rural development. This study empirically investigates the effect of Internet access on farmers‘ participation in farmer professional cooperatives based on a sample of 3 349 participants from the 2020 China Rural Revitalization Survey (CRRS), using both probit regression and instrumental variable probit (Ivprobit) regression models. The results indicate that, firstly, Internet access significantly enhances farmers‘ participation in farmer professional cooperatives. Secondly, Internet access influences farmers' decisions to join professional cooperatives differently, with older farmers, those with less education, and non-cadre individuals being more significantly affected in their willingness to participate. The findings deepen the understanding of the relationship between digital technology and organisational participation in rural development and provide empirical evidence for formulating more targeted rural development policies.

The aim of this paper is to investigate whether the more pro-environmental attitudes of farmers influence the technical efficiency of agricultural sectors in EU regions (NUTS-2). To answer this, I employed data envelopment analysis (DEA) for efficiency analysis combined with the double bootstrapped truncated regression to investigate the relationship between environmental attitudes and technical efficiency. I found that this relationship is positive, i.e. pro-environmental attitudes were related to greater efficiency. An increase in the environmental attitude variable by one standard deviation led to an improvement in efficiency of 2.8–6 p.p. The higher share of farmers with formal training also proved to be a positive and significant determinant of efficiency. The share of arable land on which conventional tillage was used, and soil erosion proved to be significant but negative determinants of efficiency. Policymakers should present to farmers the environmental benefits of agricultural policy but should also highlight that greater environmental awareness translates into a more efficient operation.

This paper aims to investigate the effects of the COVID-19 crisis on small family farms in Visegrad countries and to provide evidence of how they have responded and coped with the crisis. We conducted our investigation using an exploratory qualitative research design based on 86 semistructured in-depth interviews with owners or responsible managers, and explored the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on different areas of their businesses, such as human resources, supplier-customer relations, production, distribution channels or strategies, price of inputs and outputs and business models. Our findings showed that small family farms have been resilient in the face of the COVID-19 pandemic. Several negative impacts were identified, such as a decrease in sales due to the closure of accommodation and restaurant services, delays in the supply of inputs, and minor problems with the availability of workers, but those were perceived to be moderate. However, the COVID-19 pandemic created not only difficult challenges but also opportunities for small farms. Based on our findings, three main recommendations regarding the adaptability and resilience of family farms in Visegrad countries have been formulated: i) the importance of a diversification strategy, ii) selling through short supply chains, and iii) digitalisation of agriculture.

How to encourage backers to increase investment and obtain more funds is an important issue for both initiators and platforms in reward-based crowdfunding. Based on the trust theory and the elaboration likelihood model (ELM), this study explores the impact of project information disclosure on the investment intensity of backers in agri-food crowdfunding. The results show that the initiator type, trademark registration, number of certificates, number of reward types, number of project updates, and number of comments had significant positive effects on backers’ investment intensity. Meanwhile, the investment threshold and lottery had a significantly negative impact on backers’ investment intensity. The number of backers played a mediating role in the relationship between independent variables and backers’ investment intensity. Based on the research conclusions, practical implications were proposed for initiators, crowdfunding platforms, and regulators.

Salinity is one of the critical environmental factors that decreases the water availability and induces nutritional imbalance in crops. In order to study the effect of calcium nitrate [(Ca(NO₃)₂] in the nutrient solution under salinity conditions, an experiment was designed with different salinity (0, 50, and 100 mM) and Ca(NO₃)₂ (2, 3, and 4 mM) levels on Cucurbita pepo (zucchini). Based on the results, an increase in the salinity from 0 to 100 mM caused a decrease in the leaf potassium and calcium concentration, whereas the iron, magnesium and zinc concentrations increased. The most effective Ca(NO₃)₂ level in increasing the nutritional quality and yield of zucchini was 3 and 4 mM. Salinity at 50 and 100 mM significantly increased the leaf sodium concentration and leaf area as well as the leaf number per plant, while the application of both Ca(NO3)2 levels modulated the harmful effects of salinity. The amount of malondialdehyde (MDA), proline and hydrogen peroxide (H₂O₂) as well as the catalase (CAT) activity increased under the severe salinity conditions, whereas the application of 4 mM Ca(NO₃)₂ had the potential of removing the negative effects of severe salinity. The catalase activity increased along with the increase in the Ca(NO3)2 concentration, which was independent from the salinity level. However, the amount of proline, MDA and H2O2 decreased in plants fed with 3 and 4 mM Ca(NO₃)₂ compared to the control in the presence of salinity. These findings suggest that both the 3 and 4 mM concentrations of Ca(NO₃)₂ under 50 mM salinity could be used to improve the zucchini performance by maintaining the ion homeostasis and inducing the antioxidant defence system.

The purpose of this paper is to evaluate current nutritional guidelines of modern diets based on medical and nutrition facts and their effect on gut microbiota and health, considering current recommendations of world authorities such as FAO and WHO. For this purpose, the first part is devoted to the impact of microbiota on human health, and special attention is committed to the effect of fibre on gut microbiota. The second part is dedicated to the fundamental division of diets and the evaluation of concrete nutritional guidelines of modern diets into microbiota and health, followed by the recommendations of global authorities. Modern diets include diets from the point of view of medical science (e.g. Mediterranean), promoted by nutritionists and authorities (e.g. Nordic) and by social trends (e.g. vegan). The evaluation summarises that high-fibre diets have tremendous benefits on human health. Diets with fresh, local and naturally fermented food positively impact the gut microbiota, hence human health (agrarian diets). The results of the review show that the nutritional guidelines associated with the lowest mortality are the Mediterranean with the Atlantic or Nordic diet, which is in line with the recommendation of the world authorities (FAO, WHO, UN). The low-fibre western diet with highly processed foods with no or very low levels of live bacteria appears to be high-risk in terms of preventing civilisation diseases with a negative impact on gut microbiota, which is in line with current FAO and WHO guidelines.

This study was planned to investigate an alternative treatment modality in diabetic wound healing. In this experimental study, the efficacy of both cold atmospheric plasma/nitric oxide (NO) and NPH insulin ointment, recently known to have beneficial effects on wound healing, was investigated in diabetic wound healing. Twenty-four (24) diabetic rats were divided into four groups DC, DI, DNO and DINO (diabetic control, diabetic insulin, diabetic nitric oxide, diabetic insulin + nitric oxide groups). No treatment was applied to the DC group, NPH insulin was applied to the DI group, CAP/NO was applied to the DNO group, and CAP/NO + NPH insulin was applied to the DINO group once daily for 14 days. The wound area reduction and the wound contraction rate were calculated on the basis of the tissue sections taken, and histopathological and genetic analyses were carried out. Compared to the control group, exogenous NO gas was found to be a potent antibacterial agent in the diabetic wound healing, causing a reduction in the wound area (P = 0.034), an increased contraction rate (P = 0.021), epithelialisation (P = 0.02), collagen organisation (P = 0.006) and a reduction in the number of inflammatory cells (P = 0.002). A significant increase in the expression of IL-8 mRNA was observed (P = 0.026). It was concluded that NPH insulin alone contributes to wound healing, but it is not necessary to use it together with exogenous NO gas.

Current efforts are focused on the search for efficient methods of pathogen management that will not result in damage to the environment or cause an imbalance in the existing biota. One of the strategies for this is the use of nanoparticles in agriculture for disease management. This review presents a summative view on the various applications of nanoparticles in conferring disease resistance to crops and the possibility of using nanoparticles as carriers of genetic material for the generation of disease resistant crops. Nanoparticles are directly being used for the control of pathogens. Nanoparticles have been used as antiviral, antifungal and antibacterial agents. The nano-encapsulation of pesticides in controlled release matrices is one of the most promising research areas for the future. Nano-encapsulation has been shown to increase the efficiency of pesticides, reduce their volatilisation and decrease the toxicity and environmental contamination in crops. Nano-encapsulated agrochemicals or biomolecules can be engineered to be released in a controlled manner and in a target-specific location. Nanoparticles also have great scope in the field of transgenics vis-à-vis pathogen resistance. The field of agriculture can be revolutionised by the use of nanoparticles for imparting disease resistance in crops. The field is so versatile that the possibilities are endless.

A choice experiment (CE) is a stated preference method to elicit the respondent's preference. The CE can predict consumer valuation for a hypothetical product's attributes. Many scholars have discussed the CE's design, analysis, reliability, and validity. Still, no scientific papers reviewed its application in agri-food studies in a broad spectrum, particularly in investigating food product categories and their attributes. Additionally, this review emphasises the technical aspects of CEs, such as the sample size, software, data analysis, and research implications. The result discovered that most CE studies are relevant to developed countries. Most reviewed studies observed wine and meat as objects in the CE studies, in the theme of health, food safety, origin, and sustainability. The future research trend was related to health benefits and natural ingredients. Thus, this review provides recommendations for future studies to explore consumer preference using CE in agri-food research.

The paper analyses the effect of electronic-trading (e-trading) on the wholesale prices of select commodities in agricultural marketplaces to aid agrarian income levels. Post a literature review, the researcher performed a field survey to get the opinions of 371 farmers and traders. The researcher also conducted the descriptive statistical analysis, the difference in differences analysis, and the t-test analysis to show the wholesale price improvement after the e-trading platform implementation. The field survey findings and the statistical analysis suggest an increase in average wholesale prices of select agri-commodities in select markets of India due to the National Agriculture Market (eNAM) e-trading platform effect. The suggestions to practitioners and social policymakers highlight an improvement in the functioning of e-trading in terms of better prices for farmers, lowering transaction costs, increased transaction speed, reduced administrative hurdles, improved infrastructure and eventually higher income for a farmer. The knowledge base developed in this paper will help researchers reduce the knowledge gap in agricultural pricing.

Cortisol, which is produced in the adrenal glands, is an endogenous glucocorticoid hormone that delivers its hormonal message to cells by acting on glucocorticoid receptors. It is one of the main stress hormones responsible for stress responses in animals and humans, and its overproduction is characteristic of certain diseases. While acute stress disorder can be evaluated by means of measuring the cortisol concentration in blood and urine, chronic stress disorder can be detected by monitoring the cortisol concentration in fur or hair. Hair collection is simple, inexpensive and non-invasive, and can be performed easily and rapidly; thus, it appears to be a suitable method for determining the level of stress in dogs from shelters, abused dogs or dogs involved in different types of animal interactions. Since it is a relatively new method, monitoring cortisol in hair or fur requires further research in order to definitively prove its efficacy, and possibly to determine reference range values for different breeds of dogs.

In Catalonia, agroecological cooperativism is part of a set of alternatives that appeared as a response to the current hegemonic food consumption model, controlled by large commercial establishments. It is defined by its promotion of short food supply chains (SFSCs), operates under the values of the social and solidarity economy (SSE) and holds a strong political commitment. This article, on the one hand, studies the setup of agroecological cooperativism understood as the outcome of a network of producers, intermediaries and consumers and, on the other hand, examines the impact of information and communication technologies (ICT) in the development of this consumption model. The data has been obtained through on-site interviews and online research on the 56 consumer groups and cooperatives present in Barcelona. Descriptive statistics and correlation analysis have been used to study them. The results prove the salient role that ICT has as a facilitator in the relational network established between the agents that take part in it, thus becoming a key characteristic element of the new agroecological consumer cooperativism.

In order to establish a clear limit between protective and harmful effects of alcohol consumption, it is necessary to define patterns of consumption. However, there is no universally recognized quantitative classification for patterns of consumption by alcohol doses. This is because the pattern of alcohol consumption does not only describe how much alcohol was consumed, but also takes into account a number of boundary conditions. This review deals with variabilities in the definitions of standard alcohol doses and patterns of alcohol consumption. These terms are being discussed with respect to the benefits and harms associated with alcohol consumption as well as the risks intrinsic to studies of such a complex phenomenon as the effect of alcoholic beverages on human health.

The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) emphasizes the right of everyone to have access to safe, sufficient and nutritious food in its Rome Declaration. This article suggests how this noble FAO goal can be achieved. We suggest that a first step could be the introduction of a global meat tax, where the size of the negative externalities from meat production could be calculated based on foresight and big data. Applying the tool of a global meat tax will lead to a "double dividend" as negative externalities are reduced and at the same time huge tax revenues will be generated which could be used to make further steps in the direction of achieving the stated FAO goal in the Rome Declaration.

RE-NUM-OR is a new, flexible, and user-friendly renumbering and reordering data arrangement software for unprocessed pedigree files used in genetic evaluation systems for personal computers. RE-NUM-OR was written using Python (Ver. 2.7.13) 64 byte programming language and compiled with PyInstaller-3.2.1 software which is a set of utilities for freezing Python scripts into executable. RE-NUM-OR not only runs on 32 or 64 byte MS Windows but also runs on 64 byte GNU/Linux. The program has new, practical, and simple interface and the user does not need to create a parameter file for running the program and .txt, .xlsx or .et extension files can be used as input files directly. Output files (.txt, .xlsx, .et, .dat) can be obtained. For animal, sire and dam IDs, it can read all standard characters (ASCII codes from 32 to 126) in input files. The program supports both dot (.) and comma (,) for numerical data. Pedigree lines for parents do not need to be arranged prior to their progeny. If pedigree lines for parents follow their progeny, the program can detect this and it can reorder the animals as pedigree lines placing parents prior to their progeny. Another feature of this software is that it has a pop-up window with error notification. Also, it supports repeated observations. RE-NUM-OR executable, its user manual, and sample input files are available from www.kemalyazgan.com.tr.

The specificity of the agricultural sector (seasonality, the methods of obtaining human resources and so on) affects the situation in the labour market. The demand of agriculture companies for qualified workers is relatively high; unfortunately, people still prefer to work in the related or other fields where they have more suitable work conditions related. Building the brand of the employer, improving the awareness of the public and increasing the loyalty of the present employees can raise the offer of vacancies and obtain new qualified employees. The aim of the paper is to identify the benefits of human resource branding in businesses arising therefrom. A partial aim is to identify the present key managerial challenges of agriculture businesses. In the work, the data collected from a questionnaire survey (n = 108) were used together with the information from the Czech Statistical Office, in the opinion of which the labour market in the agricultural sector does not exhibit a positive trend. As a part of the evaluation, a factor analysis was carried out identifying three categories of benefits (the stabilisation of workers, organisational processes, and other benefits) crucial for the employer branding in agriculture.