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The wine sector in recent decades is experiencing a vertiginous process of changes and new dynamics that are affecting the performance and strategies of firms in the sector: growing internationalization, the fall in the domestic markets of traditional producing countries, the entrance of exogenous capital, etc. The expertise that a given organization demonstrates to adapt to the new situation will be reflected in profitability, the basic indicator for judging efficiency in business management. Starting from a representative sample of firms from Castilla-La Mancha, the greatest wineproducing region in the world, this paper poses a new econometric model consisting of the performance variables defined by the principal component technique. It is inferred from the results that business profitability comes from three variables. First is company structure with greater profitability for capitalist firms than for cooperatives. Second is size where performance is better the larger the size, taking advantage of scale economies. Third is financial structure with greater cost-effectiveness when the firm's make- up prioritizes its own resources and liquidity. On the contrary, the lack of permanent financing to address fixed assets and a trade dynamic orientated toward the sale of low-priced bulk wine significantly reduce profitability ratios. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The recent evolution of the foods prices has been evaluated in several studies considering: the commercial margins analysis and the prices temporal evolution although more of them have been developed using the consumer optics. In this paper, the temporal evolution of the foods prices in Spain has been analysed in the period 2000-2009 considering the farmer optics. Concretely, information in relation with the prices received by the farmers, the prices paid by them and the consumer price index (CPI) has been used. Then, using a time series analysis, the long run relationships between series have been analysed. The results show a long run balance between the prices received and paid by the farmer and between the CPI and the received prices. The main conclusions show that, in spite of the existing imbalances in the short term, in the long term the received and paid prices tend to a balance situation. An important element in the evolution of the CPI is the prices received by the products in the primary sector. Nevertheless, the inputs price fixation in the primary sector in the long term does not show a significant relationship with the CPI. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This research examines several indicators of soil quality in Spanish olive grove through Delphi methodology, in particular, texture, fertility, colour, depth, compaction, aeration, organic matter and water infiltration. This paper describes the farmer's perception about levels of soil erosion in the studied zone, taking into account their level of adoption of agrarian innovations and their attitude towards economic risk related to the application of new technologies. The panel of experts selected is composed of 63 growers in the upper basin of Genil River in 2005; this area is characterized by hillside olive groves and medium-high levels of soil erosion, so that farming is heavily dependent on soil conservation practices, specifically by tillage following contour lines, no-tillage with herbicides and maintaining of pruning on the top soil (by preliminary survey at 2004), as well as its promotion through the recent European agri-environment legislation in the area. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]