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Disaster Risk Management (DRM) is complex due to interacting climate risks from interacting hazards and sectors. We develop a synthetic multi‐risk test case to explore the effects of these interactions on decision‐making under deep uncertainty. The test case accounts for changes in hazard impacts and occurrence frequency due to interactions between floods and droughts. Interactions between the shipping, housing and agricultural sectors are considered as well. We use this test case to explore the utility of the Dynamic Adaptive Policy Pathways for Multi‐Risk (DAPP‐MR) framework. DAPP‐MR has been introduced to assess DRM policies' effectiveness under deep uncertainties and to develop integrated adaptive strategies considering interactions across hazards, sectors and time. With the test case, we show that the stage‐wise approach of DAPP‐MR, which gradually increases the complexity of the analysis, can facilitate the evaluation process. Earlier stages of the analysis can be used to establish the direct cause‐effect relations, later stages allow us to identify whether additional interacting factors have a significant effect on the direct cause‐effect relations. As a result, decision‐makers can gain insights into dependencies and their relevance for developing short‐to long‐term strategies under deep uncertainty. We show that multi‐risk interactions can lead to non‐linear effects that influence the outcome of the policy analysis, for example, the indirect influence of a decision in one sector on another. Future work could investigate further improving the operationalization of this staged approach as well as extending the set of uncertainties, dynamics and decision‐rules accounted for in the multi‐risk test case. Plain Language Summary: This paper addresses the complex challenge that many regions face when dealing with multiple interconnected disasters, like floods, droughts and earthquakes. Traditional Disaster Risk Management methods often fall short, particularly in long‐term planning that considers factors such as climate change. We apply a step‐by‐step approach known as "Dynamic Adaptive Policy Pathways for Multi‐Risk (DAPP‐MR)" to assist decision‐makers in better understanding and planning for these intertwined risks over time. This paper employs a hypothetical test case where different sectors (e.g., agricultural sector) seek effective ways to prepare for and respond to flood and drought risks. The DAPP‐MR method facilitates this by breaking down the process into smaller, more manageable steps. This approach allows for an easier understanding of the direct effects of disasters and gradually incorporates more complex interactions between different risks. Our findings suggest that this step‐by‐step method can aid decision‐makers in grasping the connections between various factors and their significance in formulating both short‐ and long‐term strategies. The study also reveals that interactions between different risks can produce unexpected, nonlinear effects, adding complexity to the interpretation of policy outcomes. Key Points: A multi‐risk modeling case with interacting hazards and sectors is created to explore effects for decision‐making under deep uncertaintyDynamic Adaptive Policy Pathways for Multi‐Risk has proven effective for pathway analysis to grasp interactions and their relevance through a structured, stage‐by‐stage approachMulti‐risk interactions can alter the decision‐making outcome because of changes in performance or timings of potential pathways [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background and Aims: Two main problems the globe currently facing are migration and weather variation. Weather change has a significant impact on the agricultural industry, which affects the majority of poor people. There is a dearth of adequate methodological documentation when examining the relationship between weather variation, agricultural output, and migration. We aimed to identify methodological reporting difficulties by reviewing the quantitative literature on weather‐related migration through agricultural channels. Methods: A systematic evaluation was conducted using papers published between January 2010 and June 2022, indexed in the SCOPUS, PUBMED, and Google Scholar databases. Using inclusion/exclusion criteria, we selected 22 original research articles out of 18,929 distinct articles for review, in accordance with the PRISMA guidelines. We extracted data from each study to understand how various concepts, research designs, and investigative techniques influence our understanding of migration patterns related to weather in the agricultural sector. Results: The majority (64%) of the study's data consisted of time series data. In 50% of the studies, secondary data were used. Additionally, 55% of these studies did not state the sample size. In 40% of the studies, model assumptions were fully adhered to, whereas in 36% of the studies, they were not followed at all. The majority of the articles used the Ordinary Least Squares technique, while about 41% applied the Two‐Stage Least Squares technique. Various tests were conducted across these studies, such as robustness checks (59.1%), endogeneity tests (31.8%), omitted variable bias tests (22.7%), sensitivity analyses (22.7%), and weak instrument tests (13.6%), to name a few. In the research we selected, the methodology section had various shortcomings and lacked organization. Furthermore, the justifications for deviations from model assumptions were unclear, potentially affecting the study outcomes. Conclusion: This study has important indications for researchers in studying climatic (weather) migration through agricultural channels besides for policymakers by giving a thorough review of the methods and techniques. Key points: Providing narrative insights on how various issues, research designs, and analytical techniques shape our understanding of the association between weather variation and migration via agricultural production.Providing a broad overview of the pertinent literature, covering 22 articles, as a complement to earlier studies.Our study has important ramifications for researchers studying climatic (weather) migration through agricultural channels as well as for policymakers by giving a thorough review of the methods and techniques currently used in this sector.Future studies on weather variation, agricultural production, and migration should use prudent and comparable models that capture whole climatic (weather) impacts on migration through mediating factors like agricultural production. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Stakeholders require transparency that companies are conducting business sustainably, which can be provided through non‐financial disclosures. Businesses that act on environmental, social, and governance (ESG) matters can attain a competitive advantage. ESG has become necessary in the agricultural sector as agribusinesses are considered high‐impact companies. The lack of uniformity in reporting guidelines leads to inconsistent and overloading of information. The objective of this paper is to conduct an evaluation and comparison of the current ESG reporting practices of listed agribusinesses in South Africa, Australia, and Chile. To support the quality and quantity of reporting, the concept of materiality is addressed by recognising what is material to be disclosed to stakeholders. The study evaluates how agribusinesses have incorporated the proposed material topics of the new GRI 13 sector standard into their current reporting practices. A qualitative content analysis was done to identify the presence or absence of the 34 proposed material topics in their reports. The findings indicate a distinct lack of harmonisation in the agri‐food sector disclosures. Topics hardly mentioned included the rights of indigenous people, living income, and climate adaptation. Low disclosures of the keywords Climate adaptation with 3.3% and Climate resilience with 7.0% on average, for all three countries, were reported. It is recommended that the newly proposed GRI 13 sector standard must be implemented as companies can seize this opportunity for increased transparency and gain a strategic advantage. Emphasis on the materiality concept is needed as it connects with the stakeholder theory to disclose only important information. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The special issue assembles papers that addressed the following themes: how COVID‐19 has affected agricultural and resource‐based industries, the effects of major disruptions due to other disasters beyond COVID‐19 on the sector and the collective lessons for policymakers and practitioners. This paper provides an overview of the contributions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Based on the Xingke Tiben, this paper assesses the long‐run economic development of China, by constructing a new estimate of male occupational structure during 1734–1898 by sector, sub‐sector pattern, and region. After assessing the source's biases, using this new empirical basis, this paper demonstrates that the national male occupational structure was nearly identical in 1761–70, 1821–30, and 1881–90, suggesting a long‐lasting structural stasis of the national economy, allowing for fluctuations between benchmark dates. Within agriculture, substantial regional differences in labour organisation are revealed. Three distinct models are found: the Northern Regions model features a high usage of wage labour, the Yangtze Valley model presents a high level of tenancy development, and the Southern Regions model displays the highest share of landowners. All three models saw increasing use of wage labour in 1761–1890 and shrinking landownership in 1821–90. At the regional level, the long‐run estimate for Lower Yangtze suggests that the region as a whole stagnated throughout the entire period, but the overall structural stasis hides dynamic, contrasting long‐run economic change between the region's core and peripheral areas. Comparative analysis with England further suggests that the timing of the Great Divergence between China and England took place before 1734, even in the context of the regional difference. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper explores how beneficiaries of South Africa's land reform programme attempt to navigate the contradictory dynamics of production and social reproduction in collectively owned agricultural enterprises. The Mphuzanyoni Communal Property Association in KwaZulu‐Natal province farms with commercial beef herds and the Mayime Cooperative in the Eastern Cape province is engaged in a joint venture dairy farming scheme in partnership with an agribusiness firm. Severe tensions are evident between the social reproduction of households and the requirements of simple or expanded reproduction of agricultural enterprises. Bernstein's concept of competing 'funds' is used to examine struggles over production and reproduction on the farms, in which members of socially differentiated households contest divergent visions for the collective enterprises. Conflicts centre on how labour and capital should be mobilised, how income and other benefits in kind should be distributed to households and whether or not income should be invested for purposes of simple or expanded reproduction of the enterprise. Challenges of governance are rooted in these conflicts rather than in group ownership as a form of property right. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Increasing global consumption of protein over the last five decades, coupled with concerns about the impact on emissions of animal‐based protein production, has created interest in alternative protein sources. Microbial proteins (MPs), derived through the fermentation of agro‐industrial byproducts, present a promising option. This review assesses a century of advancements in this domain. We conducted a comprehensive review and meta‐analysis, examining 347 relevant research papers to identify trends, technological advancements, and key influencing factors in the production of MP. The analysis covered the types of feedstocks and microbes, fermentation methods, and the implications of nucleic acid content on the food‐grade quality of proteins. A conditional inference tree model and Bayesian factor were used to ascertain the impact of various parameters on protein content. Out of all the studied parameters, such as type of feedstock (lignocellulose, free sugars, gases, and others), type of fermentation (solid, liquid, gas), type of microbe (bacteria, fungi, yeast, and mix), and operating parameters (temperature, time, and pH), the type of fermentation and microbe were identified as the largest influences on protein content. Gas and liquid fermentation demonstrated higher protein content, averaging 52% and 42%, respectively. Among microbes, bacterial species produced a higher protein content of 51%. The suitable operating parameters, such as pH, time, and temperature, were also identified for different microbes. The results point to opportunities for continued innovation in feedstock, microbes, and regulatory alignment to fully realize the potential of MP in contributing to global food security and sustainability goals. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper aims to fill the research gap in monitoring agriculture's sustainable development in the European Union (EU) member states. The assessment used a synthetic index based on indicators related to three dimensions: economic, social and environmental. The surveys have a high practical value. Not only did they reveal differences between member states regarding agricultural sustainability, but they also captured the areas of utmost attention to particular countries. The countries were classified into four groups based on the synthetic measure. Member states with the highest level of sustainability in the agricultural sector were Austria, Estonia, Belgium and Czechia. Study outcomes also made it possible to identify the indicators with the strongest impact on the four groups of countries. These included the area under organic farming, ammonia emission, pesticide sales, and labour productivity. Due to the differentiation of agriculture in the EU, the member states largely need to undertake measures towards sustainable development in this sector. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Concerns about the human effects of climate change have contributed to forecasts of how populations in drought‐prone and flood‐prone areas would respond to these events. Empirical studies have predicted that human migration has been among the critical resilient strategy in responding to the impact of climate change. To obtain a more comprehensive understanding of the climate–migration relationship, the impacts of climate change on international migration flows from sub‐Saharan Africa nations to South Africa are investigated empirically in this paper. The study employed static and dynamic models and panel data from 35 countries in sub‐Saharan Africa, spanning 1990 to 2017. The findings are as follows: (1) The analysis shows that historical temperature has a positive and statistically significant effect on outmigration in agriculture‐dependent nations. (2) The analysis shows that agricultural value added as a share in gross domestic product has a negative and statistically significant effect on outmigration in agriculture‐dependent nations. (3) The results also show that geographic location and development level of a country, in addition to dependency on agriculture, are key factors in the climate change–international migration nexus. Policy implications are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Over the past few years, the circular economy (CE) concept has captured considerable attention from researchers and practitioners as a potential solution for social, economic, and environmental challenges. But in literature, limited engagement has been given to explore the CE initiatives, particularly in the agri‐food supply chain (AFSC). This paper aims to address this gap by critically reviewing the existing literature and identify the drivers and barriers for implementing the CE in the AFSC. This study uses a systematic literature review approach to critically analyse the current literature to develop future empirical research areas. The popularity of the CE drivers and barriers in the AFSC following the number of times they appeared in the research studies is examined. It shows that environmental (67%), policy and economy (47%), and financial benefits (43%) are the three top drivers. However, institutional (64%), financial (48%), and technological risks (40%) are the top three barriers in implementing CE practices in the AFSC. It is observed that there is an utmost need for international communities to introduce internationally accepted standards and frameworks for CE practices to be used globally to eliminate waste, particularly in the agriculture sector. Moreover, government intervention to stimulate CE initiatives plays a critical role in the transition process. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Formal credit plays an important role for the development of the agriculture sector in developing countries because many farmers are characterized as liquidity constrained. Access to credit can increase farmers' purchasing power for inputs and agricultural technology, thus raising the overall productivity. Farmers in Mali are particularly vulnerable to shocks, such as heavy precipitation events. Access to liquidity to increase the resilience of the agricultural sector is essential. Therefore, higher financing volumes are required, which make the analysis of loan demand in agriculture of interest. The purpose of this paper is to empirically investigate the role of the interest rate, the macroeconomic environment, the agricultural cycle and the gender of the farmer on the loan demand in the agricultural sector from a country in the Sahel. Unique and comprehensive loan data at the farm level, provided by a commercial Malian bank, is used for this analysis. The analysis covers the period from 2010 to 2020. Two different estimation strategies are combined. First, an ordinary least square regression is applied with the granted loan amount as the dependent variable. Second, the machine learning technique, least absolute shrinkage and selection operator, is applied to select the most relevant features to be used as explanatory variables in the estimation. The results reveal that the interest rate, the gross value added, the farmer's gender as well as the agricultural cycle have statistically significant effects on the granted loan demand in agriculture. These results are of interest to policymakers, who deal with financial inclusion as well as market failures, and agricultural financial institutions who could incorporate such information in the design of future loan products to stimulate farmers' loan demand, especially for female farmers. [EconLit Citations: G20, G21, O13, O16, Q14, Q18]. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

BACKGROUND: Humic acids (HAs) are macromolecules classified within the group of humic substances that are mainly related to the agricultural and environmental sectors, but they have attracted interest from the medicine, pharmaceutical and cosmetic industries. However, these latter sectors depend on developing extraction and purification technologies for adequate use. Thus, this paper aims to study the partitioning and recovery of HA using alkaline two‐phase aqueous systems (ATPSs) based on alkali metal‐based hydroxides and alcohols. Initially, the influence of alcohols (methanol, ethanol, 1‐propanol, and 2‐propanol) and hydroxides [sodium (NaOH), potassium (KOH) and lithium (LiOH)] in the phase diagrams construction was addressed. RESULTS: The phase formation is correlated to an increase in the hydrophobicity of alcohols and hydroxides, which allows for the enlargement of the biphasic region. In the proposed systems, HA is always partitioned to the hydroxide‐rich phase. Increasing the hydrophobicity of the alcohol favors the migration of HA to the opposite phase, while increasing the hydrophilicity of the hydroxides leads to better partition and recovery values. It was observed that increasing TLL favors the recovery of HA. Furthermore, there was a decrease in alcohol concentration in the hydroxide‐rich phase with an increase in the alkyl chain and TLL, improving the recovery. Finally, the best reached‐recovery value was 98.18 ± 0.41% (KHA = 0.038 ± 0.02) for ATPS formed by 1‐propanol + NaOH with TLL ≈ 55 at 298 K. CONCLUSIONS: Alkaline systems can be a novel route for recovering humic substances from the environment. © 2024 Society of Chemical Industry (SCI). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper analyses the strategic interests that inform deforestation policies in Australia, and the variance in policy selections over time. A theory of deliberate policy disproportionality is used to analyse 20 years of regulatory reform in Queensland, focusing on the Vegetation Management Act (VMA) 1999. Application of the framework to this case suggests that political executives were prone to deliberately adopt (dis)proportionate policies as a strategic response to either manage or capitalise on stakeholder support or opposition to any proposed legislative change. The high variance in (dis)proportionate deforestation policies is attributed to how political executives respond to claims made by competing constituencies regarding the costs versus benefits of successive reforms. During key reform phases, policy under‐reaction was the norm, and political executives intentionally limited the scope and effectiveness of the VMA 1999 due to perceived impacts on the agricultural sector. Political executives were highly responsive to the emotional investment of rural constituents and averse to introducing policies that required difficult trade‐offs. Elections offered strategic opportunities for delivering more proportionate policies that balanced public environmental benefits with economic impacts, as evidenced by a conditional deforestation ban introduced between 2004 and 2012 and reinstated in 2018. Points for practitioners: Variance in Queensland's deforestation policy over time can be attributed to the intentional decisions by political executives to limit or expand the scope of regulations as a strategic response to stakeholder expectations.Political executives were responsive to the costs versus environmental impacts/benefits of any deforestation reforms, but prone to policy under‐reaction when the priority was managing the emotive reactions from rural constituencies.More proportionate regulations, such as the partial deforestation ban of 2004, aimed to balance environmental benefits with compensation for landholders but were only implemented when electorally beneficial.Stakeholders have a significant influence on disproportionate deforestation policy design and governments will need to manage competing claims to deliver more durable policy outcomes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

To date and worldwide, most business activities in the agribusiness sectors have focused on increasing productive efficiency to the detriment of the environmental impact of these activities, despite close connection that exist between agribusinesses and natural resources. This paper argues that knowledge and innovation management (KIM) can play a key role in fostering and managing creativity in the agribusiness sector. To test this assumption, an empirical model linking KIM with employee creativity, responsible green innovation, and performance in the agribusiness sector of the Dominican Republic is proposed and tested with data from 110 agribusiness companies. We found that strengthening the relationships between the above constructs is needed, with a view to readjusting the meaning of firm performance in the light of emerging (post‐pandemic) circumstances for agribusinesses. The statistical analyses yield important implications and recommendations for practice, management, and policy making in these areas in this country and elsewhere. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recently, the booming development of deep learning techniques facilitates remarkable progress in a wide range of applications, has provided insightful cues in today's modern industry and research societies. For instance, the manufacturing and agricultural industries have witnessed the unparallel dominance in AI vision to integrate the production management. Therefore, owing to its impressive learning capability, this article aims to develop an automated system that can integrate data processing and packaging operations. Notably, the inspection system can capture the geometric properties of an ellipsoidal ham and thus can be grasped by the robotic arm. Prior to the centroid detection, a series of instant segmentation procedures is introduced to determine the position of the object, which incorporates both the object localization and semantic segmentation processes. As a result, the proposed model yields a promising segmentation accuracy when experimented on the ham dataset that consists of 293 images. The best Sørensen–Dice coefficient achieved is 91%, which indicates the compelling performance. To further verify the effectiveness of the proposed framework, quantitative and qualitative visualization are presented to demonstrate the quality of the image segmentation task. The proposed algorithm and the raw data are publicly available at https://github.com/jason2303779/Ham-Centroid. Practical Applications: Recently, the booming development of deep learning techniques facilitates remarkable progress in a wide range of applications has provided insightful cues in today's modern industry and research societies. For instance, the manufacturing and agricultural industries have witnessed the unparallel dominance in AI vision to integrate production management. Therefore, this paper aims to develop an automated system that can integrate data processing and packaging operations due to its impressive learning capability. In brief, this paper introduces the first plausible mechanism to precisely identify the geometric center of an irregular‐shaped object, viz, ellipsoidal ham. A novel pipeline that composes both the object detection and semantic segmentation architectures is proposed to facilitate the vision understanding process. Succinctly, the inspection system can capture an ellipsoidal ham's geometry properties and thus facilitate the robotics vision for food products, especially in stimulating automatic industrial manufacturing development. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Sustainability is a global mandate and has set agendas for regions, nations, sectors, and corporations. Because of the globalized nature of the economy, the pursuit of sustainability in one place has implications for others. The aim of this paper is to describe how a sector—the Guatemalan Sugarcane Agro‐industry (GSAI)—can make progress toward sustainability and contribute to the Sustainable Development Goals of the country in which it operates. The methodology used was a case study description, based largely on data reported by the GSAI. The main findings of the study show that the contributions of the industry to water and sanitation in its area of operations have been important, but limited, due to several factors that include issues such as: lack of political will, lack of technical capacity, financing, and appropriate legislation. On the other hand, the contributions of the GSAI to energy have been remarkable for the Guatemalan energy matrix, highlighting that cogeneration from sugarcane bagasse represents up to 30% of the electricity demand in the country during the 6‐month harvest season. Building on social corporate responsibility theory, the actions related to the goals on water and energy are explained. What was found is that the contributions of a sector, though important, are possibly not outstanding at the national scale, and that the conditions of the country limit the reach or pace of progress of the sector. An exception is the contributions toward sustainable energy and associated emissions, which are noteworthy. The interplay of actors at different scales needs to be understood if globally we are to achieve the goals. This understanding is key to put in place policies and enabling conditions for sectors to make progress faster, helping their country advance as well as contributing to sustainability of buyers in other countries or regions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The National Agricultural Census (NAC) held in Argentina in 2018 shows that the concentration and centralization of agrarian capital in this country's heartland of grain and oilseed production is an ongoing process. An extensive academic literature has attributed this trend to the dynamics of capitalist development in agriculture in general and to Argentina's political economy in particular. Tying into these discussions and based on a case study, this paper argues that an analysis of how the growth of large corporations works in and through class differentiation helps to further explain the dynamics of concentration and centralization. This includes (i) examining the strategies of big companies to diversify capital functions across various value chain links and (ii) elucidating how they have established particular relations to smaller capitals, intermediate classes, and workers, as well as the related patterns of exploitation and appropriation of surplus value. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study delves into the dynamic interaction between various fungal strains, substrates, and treatment durations to optimize the nutritional value of these by‐products. Six fungi, including Penicillium chrysogenum, Fusarium sp., Fusarium oxysporum, Fusarium solani, Penicillium crustosum, and Cosmospora viridescens, were evaluated across three substrates: wheat straw (WS), cedar sawdust (CW), and olive pomace (OP) over treatment periods of 4, 8, and 12 weeks. The study discerned profound impacts of these fungi across multiple parameters, including cellulose variation (C.var), lignin variation (L.var), and in vitro true digestibility variation (IVTD.var). Our results demonstrated that the various fungi had a significant effect on all parameters (p <.001). Noteworthy, F. oxysporum and F. solani emerged as exemplars, displaying notable lignin degradation, cellulose liberation, and IVTD enhancement. Importantly, P. crustosum demonstrated substantial cellulose degradation, exhibiting optimal efficacy in just 4 weeks for all substrates. Notably, F. sp. excelled, yielding favorable results when treating WS. P. chrysogenum achieved optimal outcomes with 8‐week treatment for WS. Both Fusarium sp. and P. chrysogenum exhibited slight cellulose release, with remarkable reduction of WS lignin compared to other substrates. Especially, WS and OP displayed superior digestibility enhancements relative to CW. It should be noted that the treatment duration further shaped these outcomes, as prolonged treatment (12 weeks) fostered greater benefits in lignin degradation and digestibility, albeit with concomitant cellulose degradation. These findings underscore the intricate balance between fungal strains, substrates, and treatment durations in optimizing the nutritional value of lignocellulosic agro‐industrial by‐products. The outcomes of this study lead to the enhancement in the overall value of by‐products, promoting sustainable livestock feed and advancing agricultural sustainability. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Climate change‐induced shifts in snow storage and snowmelt patterns pose risks for adverse impacts to people, the environment, and irrigated agriculture. Existing research primarily focuses on evaluating these risks to irrigated agriculture at large scales, overlooking the role of local context in shaping risk dynamics. Consequently, many "at‐risk" areas lack insight into how adaptation strategies for managing risk through water supply augmentation or water conservation vary across contexts and over time. To address this gap, we develop a comprehensive index for evaluating irrigated agriculture's risk and adaptation potential to changes in snow at local scales and apply it throughout the western US. Results confirm trends toward escalating risk for changes in snow storage and snowmelt patterns over the century. However, substantial heterogeneity in the extent and drivers of risk exists due to variability in localized interactions between declines in water supply (approximately −9% ± 13% by 2100) and increased agricultural demand (approximately 7% ± 5% by 2100). Despite an existing focus on supply augmentation as a critical adaptation strategy to reduce risk, we show its effectiveness diminishes for many areas over time, declining to an average of −54% of historical augmentation potential by 2100. Conserving water through historical changes in crop acreage and type emerges as a more stable adaptation measure, reducing demand by 7%–8% regardless of time. While particularly relevant for higher elevation, less intensive agricultural settings in snowmelt‐dependent regions, findings underscore the need for strategies that support local‐scale, context‐appropriate adaptation to effectively manage escalating risk as snow changes. Plain Language Summary: Climate change‐induced shifts in snow storage and snowmelt patterns threaten water supplies for irrigated agriculture, necessitating adaptation. In agriculture, adaptation requires balancing water supply and demand locally, which is often overlooked in larger‐scale analyses. We develop a framework for evaluating risk and adaptation at local scales in the agricultural sector and apply it to the western US, which is broadly at risk for adverse effects (i.e., physical harm, economic losses, and socio‐cultural damage) if water demand cannot be met. Changing snow dynamics negatively impact many local areas over time, although impacts can often be reduced through supply augmentation and water conservation. While the degree of risk and the effectiveness of these adaptation strategies vary across regions and time, increasing demand and supply volatility diminishes opportunities for supply augmentation. This trend underscores the importance of supporting context‐appropriate adaptations for agricultural communities facing increased risk to their water supplies. Key Points: Changes to snow storage and release patterns pose localized and heterogeneous risks to irrigated agriculture, which accelerate in the futurePotential to manage risk from less snow by augmenting water storage is limited by water supply‐demand imbalances in many locations over timeConserving water by reducing demand could buffer irrigated agriculture against increased risk even as augmentation potential diminishes [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The African Development Bank (AfDB) has approved the Country Strategy Paper (CSP) for Zambia for 2024-2029. The CSP focuses on two priority areas: boosting the development of the private sector through investments in infrastructure and developing the country's agricultural value chain. The Bank's interventions will include expanding the road and rail network, improving access to water and sanitation facilities, and supporting the agricultural sector. In addition, the AfDB has signed a loan agreement with the Fonds d'équipement communal (FEC) in Morocco to fund sustainable infrastructure projects, and a Trade Finance Transaction Guarantee Facility with NMB Bank Limited Zimbabwe to unlock trade finance opportunities for Zimbabwean small and medium-sized enterprises. These initiatives aim to improve livelihoods, create job opportunities, and support economic growth in the respective countries. [Extracted from the article]

Access to credit has been a key component in protecting a country's agriculture sector against uncertainties and climate‐related shocks. Agricultural credits may also increase both agribusiness sectors' and farming‐related commercial activities' exposure to world markets. This study aims to investigate agricultural credits' short‐run and long‐run effects on agricultural production using control variables such as foreign direct investments, inflation rate, and government expenditures. We found that credits to agriculture affect value‐added agriculture positively in the long‐run; specifically, when agricultural credits increase by 1%, value‐added agriculture will increase by 0.19%; that is, an increase in credits to the agricultural sector leads to a significant increase in value‐added agriculture, while FDI and government size both reduce agricultural value‐added across countries. The findings of the pairwise causation test show that bidirectional causal links exist among almost all variables, validating feedback among agricultural value‐added, credit to agriculture, FDI, government expenditures, and inflation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Offshore wind farms (OWFs) are rapidly developing as an alternative energy source globally and in the Greater Atlantic region of the United States. Despite the pace of development, there are still many uncertainties surrounding best practices in assessing the economic impacts of offshore wind on regional fishing industries. This work aims to provide an overview and assessment of industry perceptions, methods, results, and knowledge gaps pertaining to economic areas of concern related to interactions between OWFs and fishing industries in the region. We provide a compilation of studies focusing on industry perceptions and impacts of OWFs on the fishing industry, focusing on four key economic areas of interest: fuel expenditures; insurance costs; fishing industry revenues, income, and livelihoods; and fishing support businesses. Our findings suggest four overarching knowledge gap themes that persist across all economic areas of focus: (1) a lack of economic data or economically centered data collection efforts, (2) minimal works aiming to quantify the economic impacts of key areas of concern, (3) a lack of peer‐reviewed models and methods in quantifying economic impacts, and (4) limited syntheses containing best practices or lessons learned associated with quantifying the comprehensive economic impacts posed by OWFs on fisheries. This article aims to build awareness in areas where interdisciplinary collaboration can take place as well as serve as a foundation for informing best practice guidance as it pertains to assessing economic impacts imposed by OWFs on the fishing industry. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In recent years, agribusiness firms have increasingly diversified their product portfolio and expanded into new business areas through internal growth or acquisition, which can lead to the reallocation of innovation resources. This study examines the impact of agribusiness diversification (AD) on technological innovation efficiency (TIE) in China. Based on an 8‐year longitudinal dataset of 101 Chinese listed agribusiness firms from 2012 to 2019, this study applies the Tobit regression technique to reveal the underlying mechanism between AD and TIE. The empirical results show that: (1) the AD‐TIE relationship follows a U‐shaped pattern, that is, at low levels of AD, the AD‐TIE relationship is negative; at high levels of AD, the AD‐TIE relationship is positive. (2) government subsidies (GS) negatively moderate the U‐shaped relationship between AD and TIE, such that GS flattens the U‐shaped curve. Our findings have important implications for agribusiness managers and public policymakers. [EconLit citations: H25, L25, Q16]. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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Water reservoirs are considered very important storage facilities for the condition of peak demand in the agriculture industry. The construction process of a water reservoir may be accompanied by multiple risks. This study is aimed at identifying the emerging risks resulting from variability in different functions and at prioritizing them based on the analytical hierarchy process (AHP) method. In fact, the potential variability (emerging risks), possible dependencies/couplings, and the barriers used for damping this variability were assessed using Functional Resonance Analysis Method (FRAM). The AHP method was then applied to prioritize the various functions. The results of FRAM modeling indicated that there was the possibility of a high variability in five functions. In this context, the AHP findings showed that "initial studies on the construction of the pool" with the weight of 0.310 and "excavation" with the weight of 0.308 were the most important functions in this study. In addition, the results of this study demonstrated that AHP may be a desired alternative for the identification of performance variability and the aggregation of variability. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There is often a clear need for business regulation, as the market fails in many ways that are well understood. However, there are also important examples of policy failure, or cases where policy intervention seemed like a good idea at one time, but likely caused more problems than it solved. I consider three examples of failed regulatory interventions, in labor, antitrust, and disaster response. In reviewing the literature on each topic, some of which is our own, I hope to draw general conclusions regarding the value of careful economic analysis in policy design, particularly in the regulation of agribusiness enterprises. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Many contaminants of agricultural origin are released into rural environments, particularly at the soil surface. Their fate has been extensively investigated in repacked soils, but only few studies have addressed their transport in structurally preserved natural soils. Much remains unknown about their fate and transfer within and between environmental compartments, while the susceptibility of these compartments to the contaminants adverse effects can vary considerably. The lack of studies regarding surface and subsurface transfer of contaminants through intact soil compared with studies on repacked soil led us to propose a device and protocol for sampling intact soil monoliths (60 × 30 × 22 cm3, length, width, depth [LWD]) without heavy machinery. This is achieved by a modular design with removable top and bottom lid and a protocol of cutting the soil and replacing the affected bottom soil with a drainage layer of glass beads. The device allows the application of artificial rainfall events with simultaneous highly resolved quantification of infiltration excess overland flow and drainage discharge. It is designed to facilitate the collection of samples for physical, biological, and chemical analyses that fulfill cleanliness standards for organic contaminant analysis at trace levels using only poorly reactive stainless steel and glass materials. Testing of the device was performed by measuring the transfer of the antiparasitic drug ivermectin (IVM) through and over a silt‐loam pasture soil. This test case illustrates how the device can be used to gain valuable information on the transfer of trace organic contaminants through topsoils. Core Ideas: A device for collecting intact soil and subjecting it to artificial rainfall was developed.The setup allows for high resolution measurement and sampling of drainage and overland flow.It is designed for clean sampling permitting analysis of various contaminants at trace levels.We present an experiment to test the device on transfer of ivermectin from cow dung. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The study assesses the per capita output (PCO) convergence hypothesis across 33 Indian states/Union‐Territories at the aggregate and sectoral level by using weak‐sigma and clustering‐algorithm convergence tests for the period of 2011–2012 to 2018–2019. Results from the weak‐sigma convergence test show mixed evidence. This suggests that Indian states are not converging to single steady‐state. Further, results revealed the existence of multiple club‐convergence at aggregate and sectoral level after applying the clustering‐algorithm test. Results also show that the service sector is converging faster than the industry and agriculture sectors. Our findings recommend that sector‐specific policies need to be adopted to boost the aggregate PCO at club level. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The study examines financial and transaction characteristics that influence mergers and acquisitions (M&A) in U.S. agribusinesses. During the M&A private phase, we model the likelihood of firms becoming bidders or targets as a function of firms' past financial performance. During the M&A public phase, the likelihood of bidders becoming acquirers is modeled as a function of firms' past financial performance and M&A transaction characteristics. The results for the subset of bidders in the M&A private phase suggest that the likelihood of a firm becoming a bidder is positively correlated with the bidder's firm size 1 year before the M&A announcement. In contrast, the likelihood of a firm becoming a bidder is negatively associated with bidder's leverage, cash level, and very low market valuations. For the subset of targeted firms, the likelihood of firms being targeted is positively associated with the firm's leverage and negatively related with its profitability. Our results for the M&A public phase model show that firm experience in the M&A market is positively associated with the likelihood of acquisition completion. In addition, relative to nonhorizontal transactions, horizontal mergers tend to be more difficult to complete. [EconLit Citations: G34, M2]. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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Spatial planning aims at constantly improving the distribution of people and activities within available space, especially near cities on ancient agricultural or industrial areas. However, a proper schedule of the development work necessitates the assessment, as precisely as possible, of the difficulties that would be encountered in terms of geotechnical abilities of the terrain and hazards resulting from previous use. In the Grands Philambins site, three different geophysical techniques were combined: multi‐depth resistivity; magnetic gradiometry; and electromagnetic induction. The aim of this study was to map, in a few days and with high measurement densities, all the electromagnetic properties of the terrain and to evidence metallic features. The acquired data were compared with prior documentation, mainly the aerial photos acquired since the middle of the 20th century. The terrain structure is complex, at the junction of geological formations composed of limestones and marls in different proportions, which were characterized by the geophysical survey. It also exhibits metallic features, among which an enigmatic 70 m diameter radially striped disc object, which was identified as non‐ferrous and corresponding to an ancient antenna earthed socket. This case study illustrates the relevance of the use of electromagnetic induction measurements in land planning studies as this method can map three independent underground properties and identify metallic features. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]