SABIIA - Sistema Aberto e Integrado de Informação em Agricultura (Sabiia)

Hussain, Salman; Halpin, Lauran; McVittie, Alistair.

Environmental management systems [EMS] are now a well established management tool in the ‘greening’ of industry. There is a large body of literature on methodological procedures and application strategies for implementing EMS. Associated with this proliferation of ‘how to’ manuals has been a limited discussion of why a firm ought to implement a management tool that inevitably affects the bottom line of profitability. We argue that there has been much less by way of methodologically rigorous and academically objective analysis of the motivation for EMS application. Much of this literature is coined in terms of the potential benefits (social, ethical and financial) with arguably an insufficient emphasis on potential real cost burdens. This arises in part...

The non-market benefits of rural service provision

Palavras-chave: Environmental Economics and Policy; Research Methods/ Statistical Methods.

Ano: 2008

URL: http://purl.umn.edu/61119

McVittie, Alistair; Moran, Dominic; Hall, Clare.

The provision of services in rural areas is constrained by a number of issues arising from the remoteness of such areas and the relative sparsity of rural populations. These factors combine to increase the cost of supply and reduce the demand for services, which consequently threatens the viability of service provision whether by the public or private sectors. A possible to solution to these issues lies in the co-location of rural services, which in general means that two or more distinct services are located within the same premises thus reducing the delivery costs associated with one or more of these services. Beyond the simple economics of service provision lies the existence of nonmarket elements of services in terms of benefits to local communities of...

Marginal abatement cost curves for UK agriculture, forestry, land-use and land-use change sector out to 2022

Palavras-chave: Community/Rural/Urban Development.

Ano: 2007

URL: http://purl.umn.edu/46008

Moran, Dominic; MacLeod, Michael J.; Wall, Eileen; Eory, Vera; McVittie, Alistair; Barnes, Andrew Peter; Rees, Bob; Smith, Peter; Moxey, Andrew.

Greenhouse gas emissions from agriculture, land use, land use change and forestry (ALULUCF) are a significant percentage of UK industrial emissions. The UK Government is committed to ambitious targets for reducing emissions and all significant industrial sources are coming under increasing scrutiny. The task of allocating shares of future reductions falls to the newly appointed Committee on Climate Change (CCC), which needs to consider efficient mitigation potential across a range of sectors. Marginal abatement cost curves are derived for a range of mitigation measures in the agriculture and forestry sectors over a range of adoption scenarios and for the years 2012, 2017 and 2022. The results indicate that in 2022 around 6.36 MtCO2e could be abated at...

Measuring the Sustainability of the UK Food Chain

Palavras-chave: Environmental Economics and Policy.

Ano: 2009

URL: http://purl.umn.edu/51065

Barnes, Andrew Peter; McVittie, Alistair.

Recent policy interest has been directed at the sustainability of food industries, in particular the post-farm gate food chain. This comprises of manufacturing, wholesaling, retailing and catering. In order to measure sustainability Byerlee and Murgai (2001) have argued that productivity measures, alongside key indicators of resource quality trends, should be used to indicate sustainable growth. This paper adopts this approach by presenting Fisher indexes of both Total Factor Productivity (TFP) index and for prominent externalities emerging from the food chain over the period 1998 to 2002. TFP shows an average annual growth rate of –0.52% per annum. Input growth, in particular intermediate purchases, has outstripped output growth over the entirety of this...

The environmental benefits of investment in agricultural science and technology: an application of global spatial benefit transfer

Palavras-chave: Total Factor Productivity; Externalities; Sustainable Growth; Agribusiness.

Ano: 2006

URL: http://purl.umn.edu/46003

McVittie, Alistair; Hussain, Salman; Brander, Luke M.; Wagtendonk, Alfred; Verburg, Peter H.; Vardakoulias, Olivier.

Food security is a major current and future policy concern. The world population is projected to reach 9 billion by 2050 and continuing growth in economic output and incomes is expected to result in changing food consumption patterns. In particular the wider adoption of ‘Western’ diets will result in both higher calorie intake and greater meat consumption. Continuing climate change is expected to add further pressures to agricultural production. This paper presents the results of a global analysis funded by the TEEB study on the environmental benefits of investment in agricultural knowledge, science and technology, specifically in terms of closing the gaps between developing and developed country agricultural productivity. The results show that by easing...

A Total Social Factor Productivity Index for the UK Food Chain Post-Farm Gate

Palavras-chave: Research and Development/Tech Change/Emerging Technologies.

Ano: 2011

URL: http://purl.umn.edu/108955

Barnes, Andrew Peter; McVittie, Alistair.

The UK post-farm gate food chain comprises manufacturing, wholesaling , retailing and catering. Current turnover is around £250 billion per annum. Total factor productivity measures the ratio of inputs to outputs. However, most studies have only included the marketable inputs and outputs within the system. Following criticisms of the negative effects of the food chain this paper adopts a n index based approach to measuring Total Social Factor Productivity, which includes the major externalities within the food chain. Generally, whilst TFP growth rates are low over the period 1998-2002, these have reduced even further when negative externalities are included.

The Non-Market Benefits Of Rural Service Provision

Palavras-chave: Food Chain; Total Factor Productivity; Total Social Factor Productivity; Externalities; Industrial Organization; Productivity Analysis; Q56.

Ano: 2006

URL: http://purl.umn.edu/25374

McVittie, Alistair; Moran, Dominic; Hall, Clare.

The provision of services in rural areas is constrained by a number of issues arising from the remoteness of such areas and the relative sparsity of rural populations. These factors combine to increase the cost of supply and reduce the demand for services, which consequently threatens the viability of service provision whether by the public or private sectors. A possible to solution to these issues lies in the co-location of rural services, which in general means that two or more distinct services are located within the same premises thus reducing the delivery costs associated with one or more of these services. Beyond the simple economics of service provision lies the existence of non-market elements of services in terms of benefits to local communities...

MARGINAL ABATEMENT COST CURVES FOR UK AGRICULTURAL GREENHOUSE GAS EMISSIONS

Palavras-chave: Community/Rural/Urban Development; Public Economics.

Ano: 2007

URL: http://purl.umn.edu/7977

Moran, Dominic; MacLeod, Michael J.; Wall, Eileen; Eory, Vera; McVittie, Alistair; Barnes, Andrew Peter; Rees, Robert; Topp, Cairistiona; Moxey, Andrew.

This paper addresses the challenge of developing a ‘bottom-up’ marginal abatement cost curve (MACC) for greenhouse gas emissions from UK agriculture. A MACC illustrates the costs of specific crop, soil, and livestock abatement measures against a ‘‘business as usual’’ scenario. The results indicate that in 2022 under a specific policy scenario, around 5.38 MtCO2 equivalent (e) could be abated at negative or zero cost. A further 17% of agricultural GHG emissions (7.85 MtCO2e) could be abated at a lower unit cost than the UK Government’s 2022 shadow price of carbon (£34 (tCO2e)-1). The paper discusses a range of methodological hurdles that complicate cost-effectiveness appraisal of abatement in agriculture relative to other sectors.

Public Preferences for Broiler Chicken Welfare: Evidence from Stated Preference Studies

Palavras-chave: Climate change; Marginal abatement costs; Agriculture; Environmental Economics and Policy; Resource /Energy Economics and Policy; Q52; Q 54; Q58.

Ano: 2010

URL: http://purl.umn.edu/91399

McVittie, Alistair; Moran, Dominic; Nevison, Ian.

Animal welfare presents particular policy challenges. Good welfare provides private productivity benefits to producers and some level of positive external benefits to people who care about animal welfare status. In enacting welfare legislation and setting regulatory standards, government needs to measure costs and benefits of welfare changes. While costs are generally observable, the nature of market failure means that welfare benefits are not truly observed in welfare related transactions. Accordingly non-market benefits assessment methods are required to measure the total economic value of welfare improvement. This paper compares the results of two stated preference methods to measure the policy benefits of the proposed EU broiler Welfare Directive....

A Structural Equation Model of the Factors Influencing British Consumers’ Behaviour towards Animal Welfare

Palavras-chave: Broiler welfare; Choice experiments; Contingent valuation; Livestock Production/Industries; Consumer/Household Economics.

Ano: 2006

URL: http://purl.umn.edu/45990

Toma, Luiza; McVittie, Alistair; Hubbard, Carmen; Stott, Alistair W..

Results of national and pan-European consumer surveys and the growth in the demand for so-called “animal friendly” food products suggest that consumers within the European Union show a high level of concern for the welfare of farm animals. This paper analyses the determinants of British consumers’ behaviour towards animal welfare using structural equation models (SEM) with observed and latent variables. SEM is a statistical technique for testing and estimating relationships amongst variables, using a combination of statistical data and qualitative causal assumptions. We used a data set collected in 2005 through face-to-face interviews of 654 consumers in England. We analysed the range of statements in existing literature on consumers’ behaviour towards...

INVESTIGATING USER PREFERENCES FOR SERVICES IN RURAL AREAS OF SCOTLAND: A TERRITORIAL APPROACH

Palavras-chave: Animal welfare; Consumers’ behaviour; Structural equation models.; Agricultural and Food Policy.

Ano: 2009

URL: http://purl.umn.edu/58149

Hall, Clare; Moran, Dominic; McVittie, Alistair.

Territorialisation of rural policies requires moving from a sectoral approach to service provision, and policies that focus exclusively on health and education, for example, to an understanding of overall service provision and quality, differentiated by rural area definition, not primarily by sector. An investigation of the expectations of stakeholders in rural Scotland, relating to availability, quality and accessibility of services, revealed that preferences were often different within different areas. The results input to the debate about the need to territorialise rural policy, and provide information for allocation decisions relating to resources aimed at creating sustainable rural communities in Scotland.