Fabio Albino Madau

The existence of buyer power in the Italian fresh milk supply chain

Purpose – Buyer power can be defined as the ability to obtain trade terms more favourable than a supplier’s normal trade terms. The purpose of this paper is to estimate existence of buyer power in the Italian market of fresh milk. The sector is characterised by high industrial and retail firms concentration and a significant gap between the downstream and upstream prices exists. Design/methodology/approach – The authors applied the “first-pass” test proposed by Lloyd et al. (2009) on a set of monthly price indexes series from 2000 to 2013 in order to estimate if a buyer power exists in this sector. This in order to verify how prices are transmitted along the supply chain and to determine if buyer power contributes in conditioning the retail-producer price spread. Findings – Estimated results suggest that buyer power exists in the Italian fresh milk supply chain and oligopsonistic behaviour affects the spread between downstream and upstream prices. Originality/value – The paper gives a contribute on estima...

An analysis of sustainability policies in European agriculture in the long term: methods and materials using the FEEM indicators.

This article aims to analyze how sustainability in European agriculture might evolve in the long run, depending on which different policy scenarios are used. Particular attention is paid to the role played by the “new challenges,” which are the policy aims of the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) after 2013: climate change; safeguarding biodiversity; rational use of water resources and promotion of bio-energy. The conceptual framework is the new set of indicators on sustainability evaluation proposed by the Fondazione ENI Enrico Mattei. No empirical findings have been carried out in this research. This study is aimed at highlighting the possible relationships between the challenges that the CAP faces if it is to guarantee sustainability in the sector and to evaluate how the promotion of these policy priorities can affect sustainability. The results of this qualitative analysis show the possible contradictions between the CAP objectives if harmonic and sustainable agricultural development is to be achieved.

Sustainability of Dairy Sheep Production in Pasture Lands: A Case Study Approach to Integrate Economic and Environmental Perspectives

Sheep farming plays a large role in some specific economies, maintains strong links with natural resources, and produces multiple functions in rural areas. Its sustainability has to deal with different purposes. This study aims to assess economic and environmental sustainability of extensive dairy sheep farming in Sardinia. A case study approach was adopted in order to directly collect farm data and to integrate assessments on more dimensions of sustainability. We found that farm is not profitable without support of public financial aids. Furthermore, production of nitrogen is under the normative limit and greenhouses gas emission intensity, allocated with economic criteria, was equal to 2,3 and 16,1 kg of CO2eq emitted per kg of produced milk and meat, respectively. Empirical evidences suggest the need to better take into account environmental externalities and into the farmer’s choices. A public financial support system expressively based on minimizing environmental externalities might force farmers to incentive eco-sustainable production and guarantee them profitability.

The monetary value of the rural landscape in Gallura (Italy): a choice experiment analysis

La tutela e la valorizzazione del paesaggio rurale rappresentano temi di rilievo strategico all’interno della Politica Agricola Comunitaria (PAC). E evidente, infatti, che le caratteristiche di un paesaggio rurale possono mutare significativamente a seconda dei possibili cambiamenti di scenario che condizionano l’uso delle superfici destinate all’agricoltura. Tali effetti possono essere indotti dalle dinamiche dei prodotti agroalimentari e dalle scelte promosse dal decisore pubblico. Le aree forestali, in virtu della loro valenza ricreazionale e di conservazione del territorio, rivestono un ruolo importante nel caratterizzare i paesaggi rurali. Il presente studio e volto a valutare il contributo delle foreste e di altri usi alternativi a fini agricoli nel determinare il valore del paesaggio rurale in Gallura (Sardegna, Italia). La metodologia Choice Experiment (CE) e stata applicata a questo scopo, con l’obiettivo di stimare il valore attribuito a tre specifici attributi paesaggistici, che riflettono altrettanti usi del suolo diffusi in Gallura: presenza di foreste, di vigneti e di pascolo. La disponibilita a pagare stimata per la conservazione della foresta e risultata essere assai piu alta di quelle relative al pascolo e ai vigneti. Da questi risultati discendono alcune importanti implicazioni sul piano degli indirizzi di politica agraria.

Grande distribuzione e alimenti biologici: un’analisi sul comportamento del consumatore

In the last decade, relevance of organic products into the food demand is constantely increasing. It is common opinion that a good contribute in affecting organic food purchases is due to the Large Retail. In the light of this considerations, this paper aims to investigate if and in which measure some of the typical strategies adopted by the Italian Large Retail affect organic food purchases. More specifically, the purpose is to evaluate effects of six well-noted strategical actions reflecting pricing, information, assortment and awareness in conditioning organic food demand by Large Retail consumers. Furthermore, a logit-linear model was adopted as to evaluate which social and economic variables are sensitive to each strategical factor. Findings reveal that pricing would be the factor that mostly moves the organic food demand in the Italian Large Retail. They also suggest that type of work, geographical residence, age and gender would be the individual variables that mainly influence behaviour of consumers in the Large Retail.