The cotton sector has been amongst the most regulated in Africa, and still is to a large extent in West and Central Africa (WCA), despite repeated reform recommendations by international donors. On the other hand, orthodox reforms in East and Southern Africa (ESA) have not always yielded the...

The overall objectives of our proposed paper is to: (a) systematically document the post-reform trends in agricultural performance in Asia, Europe, and the Former Soviet Union; (b) identify the main reform strategies and institutional innovations that have contributed to the successes and...

The rise of a western-style middle class in many successful emerging economies like China currently is inducing deep structural changes on agricultural world markets and within the global agri-food business. As a result of both higher incomes and concerns over product safety and quality the...

In the Czech Republic, agricultural production is still dominated by corporate farms. However, not all of them had been equally successful, economically. In general, a varying adoption of production factors is identified as being of influence. Whether their ability to collaborate with other...

Agri-environmental schemes are the main policy instrument currently available in the EU to promote environmentally friendly farming practices. Nevertheless, the adoption rate of these measures is still limited. This paper develops a theoretical framework to explain farmer sign-up decision and...

This article deals with the issue of entry into an industry where firms share a collective reputation. First, we show that free entry is not socially optimal; there is a need for regulation through the imposition of a minimum quality standard. Second, we argue that a minimum quality standard can...

The paper stresses that in order to understand the current re-organizational processes in the food system, two kinds of social capital should be taken into account, trust and network-based social capital. Stemming from a case study, concerning the Italian processing tomato industry, it...

Trust is modelled as either enforceable or intrinsic. Antecedents of trust in history, human nature, personality and culture are analyzed. The implications of these for the dynamics of trust in business-to-business networks of organizations are discussed. Finally an agenda for empirical research...

This paper develops a due diligence for electronic transactions with new partners in business networks with complex goods such as food products to enable the use of e-commerce potentials in first time transactions. The e-commerce due diligence is a means to reduce perceived risks and...

The way entitlements are originally allocated among farmers and some conditions required to get the payments could affect farmer's willingness to trade land and entitlements. This paper - using a qualitative approach and some results of a farm based simulation analysis - explores how...