In the European Union legislative proposals for the next Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) the income support remains an essential part of the CAP. This paper analyses agricultural income levels, the role of EU aids in ensuring fair levels of income and how different socio-economic and structural characteristics affect farms’ economic viability. Italian Farm Accountancy Data Network (FADN) data have been processed and economic viability has been assessed by comparing Farm Net Income to a reference income and by estimating a profitability index to check whether the agricultural activities remunerate factors owned by the farmer and his/her family. After an explorative analysis, two multinomial logit models have been estimated to evaluate how structural and socio-economic characteristics affect the likelihood of a farm to be viable with and without EU aids. Both structural farm characteristics and farmer’s production strategies explain the likelihood of a farm to be viable in the short and in the medium-long term. Farms are more likely to be viable as the size increases and the higher the capital intensity, while viability likelihood decreases with the farmer’s age, when the holder is a woman, and the farm is localized in Southern Italy. CAP payments do not modify the factors that affect farm viability but can change their weight.

The ongoing Covid-19 pandemic rapidly and dramatically disrupted household behaviours in almost all areas and, among these, eating behaviours and daily food patterns have also been radically altered. All reported changes have potential effects in terms of food waste, which is a global problem that mainly occurs at household level. Many scholars attempted to understand the antecedents of food waste in the framework of Theory of Planned Behaviour (TPB). In this paper we follow this strain of research by focussing on two different behaviours, suggested by the Waste Framework Directive of the EU, namely (a) reducing servings and (b) using leftovers, which may be predicted by the intention to reduce food waste. An online questionnaire containing the key constructs of the TPB and the concern towards the pandemic was administered to a sample of 201 Italian consumers. Results show that the TPB model was confirmed for both behaviours while the Covid-19 concern had no direct effect. However, in the case of portion reduction, there is a significant interaction between concern and intention not to waste food. That is, the effect of intention on reducing servings is increasing as the level of concern increases. Therefore, some indications on how to address food waste policies are drawn.

Measuring the economic sustainability of Italian farms using FADN data | Adele Coppola, Mario Amato, Domenico Vistocco, Fabio Verneau | Agricultural Journals

Over the last years, many firms introduced environmental and social sustainability in their business mission and adopted Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) as the operative tool of a new business model. Several studies focused on the relationship between CSR and firm’s performance or more generally value creation in the supply chain. The present work aims at giving further insight into this relationship with reference to the agri-food sector. It wants to illustrate a conceptual framework of this relationship and represents a preliminary empirical work aimed at understanding and testing some main link. Through multivariate techniques data on CSR actions were analysed to identify the firm CSR strategies and using the correlation analysis and non-parametric tests the link between CSR strategies and firm performance was tested, both directly and through innovation variables. Results highlighted that firms with lower CSR orientation have also lower profitability levels and showed the association between the adoption of specific innovations and some CSR patterns, while the connection innovation-performance was not statistically proved. The small size of the sample does not allow a conclusive analysis. Nevertheless, results provide useful insights to better specify the conceptual model CSR-performance.

To reach the SDG 12.3 target, understanding food waste behaviour (FWB) is fundamental, especially among young people. As future generations of parents, leaders, and citizens, they might potentially solve food sustainability issues and other matters arising from food waste. In such a context, this study extends the theory of planned behaviour (TPB) by including personal norms and environmental concern to explain and to predict the FWB of young Italians who belong to Generation Y and Generation Z. The theoretical model was empirically tested by administering a questionnaire to 322 Italian young people and by applying two distinct PLS-SEM models for Generation Y and Generation Z. Our results support not only the main relationship suggested by the TPB model with respect to FWB but also that, in affecting it, personal norms and environmental concern play different roles according to the generations. Understanding the mechanisms through which personal norms and environmental concern translate into reducing food waste is crucial to defining interventions aimed at changing youth behaviour. It could represent a relevant step towards preventing food waste and promoting sustainable management of food chains.