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Smallholder farmers who grow diverse landraces in centres of crop diversity contribute to sustaining the capacity of agricultural and food systems to adapt to change by maintaining crop evolution in their fields today, thus enabling humanity to continue to have the broad genetic variation needed to adapt crops to changes tomorrow. Given this fact, the last 20 years have witnessed an ever-growing interest in on-farm conservation of crop infra-specific diversity. While numerous projects to support it have been, and continue to be, implemented worldwide, there has been very little systematic assessment of the extent to which these projects have been effective at contributing to the maintenance of crop diversity on-farm and the creation of associated benefits for the farmers involved. The factors and relationships implicated in attaining conservation and livelihood results are complex, so that a conceptual scheme that brings them together in a simplified but coherent fashion can be extremely useful for the scientists, donors, policy-makers and practitioners concerned. This paper presents a conceptual framework for analysing on-farm projects, the trade-offs involved and assesses their success in a more systematic way. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The wine market has evolved dramatically over the last three decades. The premium wine segment has expanded significantly to the detriment of basic wines. Nevertheless, in traditional wine producing and consuming countries, inexpensive wines still account for a large market share, both in volume and value. Marketing strategies for such wines are changing in an attempt to tap this increasingly crowded market segment. Despite its importance, the basic wine segment has not been studied in-depth and is often assumed to have no product differentiation. This paper tried to ascertain the existence of a possible degree of heterogeneity within nonpremium wines and to measure, by means of elasticity computation, the relationships among categories of wines aggregated with criteria that go beyond price. A demand system (censored QUAIDS) was estimated, using a statistically representative panel of 6,773 Italian households, to see to what extent, if any, substitution occurs in home consumption of basic wines, which is the main channel of distribution of inexpensive wines in Italy. Although price is an important lever in supply policies, our results also suggest the importance of packaging, such as carton as an alternative to glass. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents estimates of the welfare and poverty effects of a price increase in a major food commodity in an underdeveloped country. We use household data from a Zambian survey to estimate a demand system with which various price scenarios can be simulated for the main Zambian staple and its possible effects on different population categories. Our results show that a 50 per cent increase in maize prices could lead to an average consumption decrease of 17 per cent among Zambian households, and overall poverty could rise from 68 to 70 per cent fairly quickly at national level. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Highlights: [•] Neophobia–neophilia forces affecting Italians food choice were analysed. [•] Attitudes to new food technologies were used to predict food choice of Italians. [•] FTNS scale performs properly with Italian consumers. [•] FTNS contribute to the understanding of the Italians’ behavioural responses. [•] The results support the value that FTNS can provide to food companies. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

In the wake of highly volatile world prices of staple commodities, we examine the impacts of increases in maize prices on various categories of households in Malawi. Using household-level data, changes in household income are calculated taking into account the net maize production status of the household and food price elasticities estimated from a censored demand system. While maize price increases have unequivocal deleterious effects on the incomes of urban households, rural households experience differential impacts. Net producing households in rural areas benefit from price increases with households above the poverty line obtaining proportionally higher incomes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• Variety seeking is considered by using brand and wine typologies as main drivers. • Revealed preferences made available by real Italian market data are used. • Four groups are identified based on consumer characteristics and their behavior. • Individual personal traits are strongly linked to the variety seeking behaviour. • Variety seeking is more widespread for wine typologies than for brand. This study investigates variety seeking behavior in the wine domain. Since variety seeking depends on brand strategies and consumers' preferences for different types of vines and denominations, a bi-dimensional perspective is adopted. Two new variety seeking measures are defined, namely the Wine Index of Diversity and Brand Index of Diversity. A finite mixture regression model is implemented to identify and characterize groups of households sharing similar variety seeking behavior in a statistically representative sample of 8,313 Italian households. Four groups are identified based on consumer characteristics and their purchasing behavior. The largest group is "switchers," which includes consumers showing a relatively higher wine diversity than brand diversity. Estimates reveal the "habitual" group, that lives in the southern Italy and consumes wine less frequently than all other groups. The "loyal" group includes the youngest consumers with an above average income, who reside in the northern regions. Finally, the "variety seekers" are older, have the highest incomes, and live in the central regions. This grouping provides insights into the effects of brand and wine typology on consumers' choices. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article aims to evaluate the effect of insurance on production, technical efficiency, and input use of Italian specialised-quality grape growers. A panel instrumental variable stochastic frontier approach is applied over the years 2008–2017 using data from the Farm Accountancy Data Network. The results show the requirement to correct for the endogeneity that stems from insurance adoption. Insurance has an enhancing effect on production and efficiency and reduces the use of intermediate inputs. It suggests that insurance helps to diminish the risk-averse farmers' suboptimal input use due to the presence of uncertainty. Crop insurance leads risk-averse farmers to behave as if they were risk neutral and employs the profit-maximising input vector. Therefore, by reducing the risks linked to the uncertainty of outcomes, crop insurance leads grape growers to go in the direction of profit maximisation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The increased environmental awareness is affecting the food supply chain since food system emissions represents a big share (from 19% to 29%) of total greenhouse gas emissions. Carbon emissions reduction target represents a global challenge gaining the headlines around the world and pushing academic scientists to discuss actively possible technical innovations, economic consequences and environmental benefits. However, carbon footprint estimates largely differ across the literature, even though they refer to the same food product, involving the same production processes. The present paper addresses explicitly the latter drawback, implementing a meta-analysis focused on fresh vegetables chain. The objective is assessing the uncertainty of "Carbon footprint" estimates, seeking a meaningful statistical description of the findings of a vast collection of studies. Our results show the large estimates variability across empirical studies and how these estimates largely depend by certain study-specific characteristics, like methodology adopted. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Summary This study investigated the clinical activity and toxicity of R-HCVAD-AM [rituximab plus HyperCVAD (R-HCVAD) alternating with high-dose cytarabine and methotrexate (AM)] in patients with newly diagnosed Mantle Cell Lymphoma (MCL). Patients aged ≤70 years with confirmed MCL received four alternating cycles each of R-HCVAD and AM. Patients who obtained a partial response proceeded to autologous stem cell transplant. Sixty-three patients were enrolled and 60 were fully eligible. Median age was 57 years (22-66); 60%, 33% and 7% were classified at low (L)-, intermediate (I)- or high (H)-risk, respectively, according to the MCL International Prognostic Index (MIPI). Only 22 patients (37%) completed the four cycles and three patients died during therapy. Overall response and complete response rates were 83% and 72% respectively. After a median follow-up of 46 months (range 1-72) the estimated 5-year overall survival (OS) and progression-free survival rates were 73% [95% confidence interval (CI) 59-83%], and 61% (95%CI 45-73%) respectively. MIPI maintained the prognostic value with an estimated 5-year OS of 89%, 80% and 24% for L, I, and H groups respectively ( P < 0·001). This multicentre study confirms that R-HCVAD-AM is an active regimen for the initial treatment of patients with MCL, but is associated with significant toxicity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Summary: This study assesses the generation and consequences of the In-Trust Agreements (ITAs) that established the legal status of the CGIAR germplasm as freely available for the benefit of humanity under the auspices of FAO. The analysis looks at the history of the ITAs and focuses on the role of Bioversity International in research and other activities in influencing, facilitating and enabling the ITA negotiations. Results confirm the central role of Bioversity and policy research in the negotiations process. Concepts developed during the ITA negotiations contributed toward subsequent multilateral negotiations that eventually culminated in the International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The objective of this paper is to assess the possible influence of the 1994 In Trust Agreements (ITAs) on acquisition and distribution of germplasm held by the International Research Rice Institute (IRRI) genebank. The agreements, legally affirmed the 'public good' status of the collections that were placed 'In Trust' for the benefit of the world community under agreements with FAO. They initiated a formal system of multilateral access to CGIAR-held ex situ genetic resources. The hypothesis that the consequences of the ITAs lead to an enhancement of CGIAR germplasm utilization is tested here using a basic conceptual framework to infer on factors determining the distribution of germplasm. Subsequently, a Bayesian empirical model is applied to IRRI accessions distribution's time-series to provide formal evidence to the hypothesis. Results show that there is a discernible 'change' point that would support a significant drop in germplasm distribution followed by a new growing trend around the establishment of the ITAs. This had followed a period beginning around 1989 and leading up to the establishment of the ITAs of a large number of requests for restoration of germplasm back to countries of origin and a reduction in acquisitions. As a result the number of accessions held by IRRI reached a low point around 1994. The number of accessions might not have been built back up without the establishment of a stable policy environment that was provided by the ITAs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Acrylamide (also known as 2-propenamide) (AA) is a toxicant that develops in food during high-temperature cooking, and its occurrence is common in biscuits and baked snacks. AA is known for its in vivo neurotoxic and carcinogenic effects, and it is considered a potential carcinogen for humans. Infants may be exposed to AA as early as during weaning through baked food such as biscuits. This study set out to ascertain the concentration of AA in food products intended for infants to assess the dietary exposure to this food contaminant. AA levels were determined through GC/MS and bromination, and dietary exposure was evaluated by a probabilistic method based on Monte Carlo simulation. The results showed that the probability of a carcinogenic exposure is 94%, 92%, and 87%, respectively, for 6-, 12-, and 18-months infants, suggesting the need to delay the introduction of baked products in the diet of weaned infants. It should be noted, however, that these conclusions were drawn considering the biscuits as the primary source of exposure. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]