This edited volume evaluates recent EU quality policy, focusing on the structure, governance, technical specifications and performances - economic, environmental and social - of Food Quality Schemes (FQS) in the European Union and South East Asia. The intended benefits of FQS include generating a fair return for farmers and producers, and enabling consumers to make better-informed purchasing choices through effective labeling. In addition, policy makers now consider FQS as a means of guaranteeing not only quality in food production, but also sustainability. Despite these potential benefits, the economic performance of the FQS (e.g. PDO, PGI, organic) has been variable. While some support significant value-added production, with substantial benefits to producers, consumers and wider economies, many others have failed to become economically sustainable. In addition, the environmental and social performance of FQS remains largely unexamined, with the exception of the environmental performance of organic products. The editors examine these discrepancies and offer a nuanced evaluation of the effectiveness of such policies. Several unique features make this volume a key resource for those interested in FQS and in the sustainability of food products. The editors provide a concise description of the value chain, the governance and the technical specifications of 27 FQS in Europe and South East Asia. The editors also provide a sustainability assessment of each of these FQS, and support or question the view that FQS are moving from "quality" to "sustainability." Finally, the volume serves as a repository of key data on these FQS. Readers have access to the raw data necessary to compute the indicators used in the sustainability assessment (eg. value added, number of jobs, quantity of fertilizers, etc), allowing them to conduct novel re-analysis. The book is designed for an interdisciplinary audience of academics, policy makers, and stakeholders. The compilation of FQS case studies makes it a useful reference for researchers and students of food policy, geography, food anthropology, local and rural development, local agri-food systems and agri-food chains. Stakeholders such as national and European regulators, entities responsible for FQS technical specifications, and embassy staff will also find the information relevant. Additionally, individuals helping to implement food quality schemes, including auditors, producers, and consumer associates, as well as stakeholders in the sustainability of food products, including farmers, farmer's associations, and environmental NGOs, will also find the information relevant and important for their work.

This volume deals with the diverse range of industries concerned with the supply and processing of food in the UK. It covers sources relating to food production and processing, including foodstuffs supplied from abroad, and also fish supply and processing.

This text presents the results of extensive field research on the maize economy in six African countries, as well as broader-based studies of maize research and extension (R&E), soil fertility, seed distribution, fertilizer, and marketing and processing.

This book offers a coherent perspective on the transition to a market-based agri-food system in the Central and Eastern European Countries and the New Independent States of the former Soviet Union. It provides a formal analysis of the entire food chain from farm inputs to final consumers including imports and exports. Major components of the agribusiness sector (inputs, farm-level marketing, processing, distribution and retailing) are all dealt with in separate chapters. In addition there is coverage of food security, multinationals, commercial law, finance and building market institutions. Theoretical chapters are devoted to problems concerning prices, transactions costs and bilateral monopoly. This theoretical discussion gives an in depth discussion of the difficulties underlying the process of transition to a market-based agri-food system and forms a consistent focus for the book as a whole. Overall, the book makes a highly original contribution to the literature on this topical subject and will be indispensable for agricultural and food economists, as well as general economists and others interested in the topic of economies in transition.

The authors investigate the market for beef in Japan. Using simply explained economic concepts, they analyze each of the main determinants of the demand for beef in Japan to provide the reader with an in-depth understanding of this enigmatic market. Each chapter analyzes a specific aspect of the beef market--price, foreign competition, or the impact of culture and history--and the resulting effects. Marketing Beef in Japan is a succinct summary of the latest information and thought on this complex market, from authors who clearly convey their unique and diverse expertise.Everything from changing Japanese tastes and market trends to demographics and government regulations is discussed by the authors of Marketing Beef in Japan. It is a vital resource for firms that plan to export to Japan or wish to do so. Among the many topics explored are: insights into Japan?s complex multi-layered beef distribution system historical and cultural determinants of beef consumption the unique nature of the multiple niche beef markets available in Japan the effect of changing import regulations analysis of the potential of major beef exporting countries to supply the Japanese market technical requirements for placing perishable product into the Japanese market predictions for the future evolution of the Japanese beef marketWith all economic concepts and terms simply explained, Marketing Beef in Japan is an ideal guide for students and researchers in agricultural economics, agribusiness, marketing, and international trade. Agribusiness executives, consultants, and researchers with an interest in the Asia-Pacific market will find the book an informative reference for successful ventures into the Japanese beef market. While the book provides specific insights for this market, readers can also use it as a model for marketing case studies of consumption trends in any market.

Like much of SMEs research, innovation studies of small enterprises have commenced later and are less numerous. The focus of such studies remains high-technology enterprises, which continue to attract both academic and popular interest, oblivious to the innovative endeavours of people in traditional low-tech industries. This book attempts to address this imbalance through a comprehensive analysis of innovation in this largely neglected area. Based on case studies of seven small innovative food companies, this book presents an in-depth analysis of innovation in the Scottish food and drinks industry and unravels a lesser-known approach to effective low-cost product innovation, which is simple and economical, yet elegant and successful. Using careful data collection and rigorous statistical testing, the analysis and findings in this book address a wide spectrum of interests: academics in business schools, policy makers in governments and executives and entrepreneurs in food and other low-technology sectors.

The quality of diet is being questioned as never before, as public attention focuses on additives, irradiation, drug and persticide residues and the threat of food--borne infections such as salmonella and listeriosis. In this book, Andrew Johnson subjects modern farming methods to a scrutiny which reveals them to be not only responsible for a decline in food quality but highly questionable on environmental and humanitarian grounds. Factory Farming is the most comprehensive survey to date of the implications of modern livestock farming for food quality and safety, for the animals themselves and the environment as a whole. As well as covering the more familiar issues of battery egg production and the use of hormone growth promoters, the author discusses the rapid rise of fish farming, the capabilities of genetic engineering and the hidden envirnmental costs of high--tech livestock production systems. Illustrated throughout, Factory Farming is a compelling examination of modern farming techniques and the disastrous conseuqences their continued use might have.

The contributing authors of Understanding the Japanese Food and Agrimarket discuss broad forces that affect markets in Japan and specific situations faced in marketing grain, livestock, and seafood products; fruits; vegetables; and wood products. Many of the contributors speak and read Japanese and have lived in Japan for extensive periods; they are able to give deep insights into how and why the Japanese consumption and distribution system behaves as it does. They draw on their expertise to fully explore various Japanese food and fiber markets. As they demystify the Japanese market, they illustrate for readers several systematic approaches to mastering the Japanese food and fiber markets.Readers will discover that effective long-term marketing strategies in Japan must be based on sound analytical information. The contributors provide such needed material with chapters on items as diverse as wine, grain products, beef, and fruits and vegetables. Some of the specific topics covered include: changes in Japanese food consumption Japanese food distribution system demand for beef products in Japan demand for vegetables and vegetable seeds Japanese wine market demand for bakery products new food products for the Japanese market developing trade relations in wood productsExecutives of commodity associations or firms exporting foods to Japan will find the general sections most interesting as well as chapters specific to their products. Teachers and students exploring exporting to the Japanese market will be intrigued by the various dimensions of the "multifaceted" nature and opportunities of the Japanese market.

Wine, Terroir and Utopia critically explores these three concepts from multi-disciplinary and intersecting perspectives, focusing on the ways in which they collide to make new worlds, new wines, new places and new peoples. Wine, terroir and utopia are all rooted in natural, spatial and temporal realities, yet all are unable to exist without purposeful human intervention. This edited volume highlights the theoretical and analytical lens of diverse scholars, who critically discuss a dazzling array of intersecting realities and imaginaries - economic, political, cultural, social and geological - and in doing this challenge many of our deeply-held responses to utopia. Drawing on an impressive range of international examples from South Africa to Bordeaux to New Zealand, the chapters adopt a range of theoretical and methodological approaches. This volume will be of great interest to upper level students, researchers and academics in the fields of Sociology, Geography, Tourism, Hospitality, Wine Studies and Cultural Studies. It will also greatly appeal to practitioners and enthusiasts in the worlds of wine production, consumption and marketing.

Over the last century, the Everglades underwent a metaphorical and ecological transition from impenetrable swamp to endangered wetland." "At the heart of this transformation lies the Florida sugar industry, which by the 1990s was at the center of the political storm over the multi-billion dollar ecological "restoration" of the Everglades. "Raising Cane in the 'Glades" is the first study to situate the environmental transformation of the Everglades within the economic and historical geography of global sugar production and trade.
Using, among other sources, interviews, government and corporate documents, and recently declassified U.S. State Department memoranda, Gail M. Hollander demonstrates that the development of Florida's sugar region was the outcome of pitched battles reaching the highest political offices in the U.S. and in countries around the world, especially Cuba--which emerges in her narrative as a model, a competitor, and the regional "other" to Florida's "self." Spanning the period from the age of empire to the era of globalization, the book shows how the "sugar question"--a label nineteenth-century economists coined for intense international debates on sugar production and trade--emerges repeatedly in new guises. Hollander uses the sugar question as a thread to stitch together past and present, local and global, in explaining Everglades transformation.

The increasing demand for food as well as changes in consumption habits have led to the greater availability and variety of food with a longer shelf life. However, these items, when not properly preserved, can lead to severe food-borne illnesses that can be fatal. Thus, countless studies are now geared towards the processing, distributing, and safe storage of foods. Novel Technologies and Systems for Food Preservation is an essential reference source that discusses novel and emerging cooling and heating technologies, processes, and systems for food preservation, as well as improvements for control and monitoring systems that aim to foster energy efficiency, equipment safety, and performance. Additionally, it looks at concepts that may be useful for the development of new policies and legislation concerning food preservation. Featuring research on topics such as energy efficiency, food quality, and legislation policies, this book is ideally designed for government officials, policymakers, food and service industry professionals, food safety inspectors, researchers, academicians, and students.