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Andalucía es la mayor productora de aceites de oliva del mundo, una situación derivada tanto de la expansión superficial como de la intensificación productiva, estimuladas por la internacionalización de la economía. Las plantaciones más recientes se caracterizan por su elevada densidad y completa mecanización, en consonancia con los resultados del cambio tecnológico aplicado a la agricultura industrial. En el presente trabajo nos preguntamos qué posibilidades de prosperar tienen estos cambios en áreas donde domina la tradición, como es la provincia de Jaén. Dado que nos encontramos en lo que consideramos primeros síntomas de transformaciones que pueden ser drásticas, en la metodología se ha privilegiado el trabajo de campo. En los resultados se han considerado distintos modelos posibles y su relación fundamental con la disponibilidad de agua. Entre las conclusiones se han destacado diferentes limitaciones y debilidades que este proceso expansivo puede suponer desde una perspectiva territorial.

The spread of the cultivation of olive groves outside their traditional lands of the Mediterranean with the introduction of super-intensive plantation models threatens the competitiveness of tradit...

Resumen: En la lógica de la especialización regional productiva, el olivar se ha conformado como la principal ocupación del suelo agrícola en Andalucía. En los municipios más rurales, de hecho, las opciones para el mantenimiento de la población están muy condicionadas por la evolución de este sector productivo. Una de las características más interesantes del mismo es el fuerte peso que la economía social tiene en la fase de molturación de la aceituna, de forma que las cooperativas son responsables del setenta por ciento del aceite obtenido. El objetivo de este trabajo es analizar los procesos de innovación que se están desarrollando en estas empresas aceiteras para hacer frente a los desafíos de la competencia y para operar como palanca de desarrollo rural. A partir de entrevistas en profundidad con responsables de cooperativas se presenta un balance de la situación actual, concluyendo que una profundización, mejora y generalización de las transformaciones que están en marcha pueden ser claves para mejorar la capacidad competitiva de los territorios en los que operan. Palabras clave: aceites de oliva, desarrollo rural, economía social, innovación, globalización. Abstract: In the logic of regional productive specialization, the olive grove has become the main occupation of agricultural land in Andalusia. In the most rural municipalities, in fact, the options for the maintenance of the population are highly conditioned by the evolution of this productive sector. One of the most interesting characteristics of this sector is the strong weight that the social economy has in the olive milling phase, so that the cooperatives are responsible for seventy percent of the oil obtained. The aim of this work is to analyze the innovation processes that are being developed in these olive oil companies to face the challenges of competition and to operate as a lever for rural development. Based on in-depth interviews with cooperative managers, a balance of the current situation is presented, concluding that a deepening, improvement and generalization of the transformations that are underway can be key to improve the competitive capacity of the territories in which they operate. Key words: olive oils, rural development, social economy, innovation, globalization.

Producción Científica, The COVID-19 pandemic has deeply affected economic activities worldwide. The challenge for territories and companies has been how to cope with mobility restrictions. Even in the case of essential activities such as agri-food industries, the adaptation has been a challenging issue to deal with. The paper aims to show how the wine and olive oil industries in Spain have restructured their activities in order to respond to the confinement and the new normalcy, using new technologies as a strategic tool, but also making the most of new actions to keep their presence in the national and international markets. The research was carried out mostly through qualitative analysis, using the in-depth interview as a main tool to gain strategic information from managers of companies and local policymakers. Results show that when local policy makers and managers cooperate, despite the different perceptions they could have, the outcome is positive for facing competitive shocks and carving out new local initiatives, making firms and the territory itself more resilient.

Social innovations have been the subject of much academic discussion in recent years and have been approached from multiple scientific perspectives. This work sets out to determine whether innovations carried out by Andalusian olive oil cooperatives can be described in terms of social innovation and if they could run a main role as rural development actors preserving the competitive capacity of farmers and the living conditions in rural Andalusia. Through an analysis of the available literature, the use of municipal statistical data and the conducting of in-depth interviews, we show how cooperatives have been proposed as a solution to the problems that international competition poses for the production activity of olives and olive oil. At present, the most innovative cooperatives are undergoing a slow process of incorporating innovations, above all organisational and management ones, which reach beyond the entities themselves, given the social character that they have in the region, where they are considered a public good. Despite the problems that olive oil cooperatives have historically had in competing in the market, they can contribute to maintaining the population in the rural environment and improving the quality of life in the region, justifying the need for government support.

Nowadays, sustainability is an omnipresent concept in our society, which encompasses several challenges related to poverty, inequality, climate change and so on. The United Nations adopted the Agenda 2030, a plan of action formed of universal Sustainable Developments Goals (SDGs) and targets, which countries have to face in order to shift the world toward a sustainable future. One of the most relevant SDGs since the onset of the financial crisis in 2007 has been the so-called reduced inequalities, which consists of dealing with the inequality of opportunities and wealth between and within countries. However, reducing inequalities depends on many heterogeneous aspects, making it difficult to make a proper analysis that evaluates the European Union (EU) countries performance of this goal. In this study, we introduce a novel approach to evaluate the inequalities in EU countries based on a sorting a multi-criteria decision-making method called AHPSort II. This approach allows to obtain a classification of the EU countries according to their achievements in reducing inequalities to subsequently carry out a deep performance analysis with the aim of drawing conclusions as to the evolution of inequality in them along the years. The results are consistent with the main international organizations&rsquo, reports and academic literature, as shown in the Discussion Section.

This article explores the impact of regional innovation policies in the upgrading of multinational subsidiaries. To this end, it analyses the design and implementation of a cluster organization, th...

This paper discusses the relevance of local development policy as an instrument for regional development. Endogenous development strives to obtain self-sustained development in urban and rural areas and argues that institutions that facilitate the introduction of innovations leading to diversification of productive activities and market access are key to the process. The efficiency of local initiatives depends on the agreement between local actors on strategies and goals, as well as local communities’ participation in the management and control of development initiatives. The effectiveness of local initiatives confronts important challenges, such as compatibility of goals, interaction of the forces of development, and strengthening of institutions. Therefore, endogenous development is always a slow process that demands the evolution of institutions and requires specific local initiatives and actions for each territory.

This article analyses the design and implementation of a cluster organisation, the Andalusian Furniture Technology Centre (CITMA). The case of CITMA illustrates how policy processes are inherently political and far more complex than portrayed in conventional accounts based on the linear model of innovation. Policies are, in fact, unpredictable and fraught with uncertainty, opportunity and local specificity. However, acknowledging this complexity is not enough; it has to be unpacked to foster policy learning. To this end, we have opened the black box of the organisation to understand the political process underlying its creation and dissolution. Through this narrative, we shall witness how the technology centre, initially conceived and approved as a publicly funded organisation with the aim of raising SME's absorption capacity by providing technological services, turned into a semi-public consulting firm focused on selling business services to big companies. The outcome of this policy was precisely the opposite of what had been intended with this initiative and the consequence or the result of a top-down policy approach in which the regional ministry failed to take into account the needs, interests and resistance of the different stakeholders by unilaterally changing the project and the funding model approved by its predecessor. The CITMA case highlights the lack of a multi-disciplinary approach to innovation policy in Andalusia and the fact that innovation policies have been defined and implemented in a hierarchical and siloed fashion with little attempt at policy alignment across different areas and levels of government.

Purpose This is one of the first long‐term studies on entrepreneurial intentions (EIs) and their role in predicting start‐up. In entrepreneurship, the usefulness of intention models depends crucially on their stability over time. The purpose of this paper is to explore this issue in a cohort of university graduates. Design/methodology/approach Using a structural equation model (SEM), it addresses three research questions: whether EI and perceptions are stable over time; whether the pattern of relationships of the variables in the model remains stable over a three‐year period; and whether intention accurately predicts entry into self‐employment. A two‐wave study was conducted with respondents being final year students at time 1 (T1), and part of the working/active adult population at time 2 (T2). Findings The results suggest that construct scores and the pattern of relationships between the variables are notably stable over the three‐year period. The only partial exception is that of perceived behavioral control. Finally, EIs are found to significantly explain actual start‐up behavior. Implications are derived for future research and entrepreneurship education and policy. Research limitations/implications The generalizability of the results cannot be claimed until these findings are replicated by additional samples from different segments of the population and in different contexts. In particular, the number of new entrepreneurs at T2 is small and results in this respect are to be taken with caution. Originality/value The value of this paper resides in its clarifying the conditions under which EIs and their antecedents remain stable over time, thus enabling actual start‐up behavior.

Globalisation affects the smallest specialized companies in mature sectors, especially in the less developed regions in Europe. In these cases, the competitive advantage that these industries had achieved in the international market due to low costs of the factors has been broken. One way to improve its competitive position is an active participation in the international market through communication and information technologies along the productive chain. This paper describes these specialized companies in European mature sectors. Specially, we examine the of the province of Jaén (Andalusia). The results have been obtained surveying a hundred of companies –food, clothes and furniture sectors. These results show how these enterprises use communication and information technologies to adapt its competitive capacity in the new global market.

Entrepreneurship is becoming a very relevant instrument to promote economic growth and development in different regional and national economies. However, social scientists have not still agreed on the determinants of the decision to become an entrepreneur. Therefore, there is some concern that policies may not be sufficiently efficient in achieving this objective. From a psychological point of view, the intention to become an entrepreneur has been described as the single best predictor of actual behaviour (Ajzen, 1991; Kolvereid, 1996). Hence, some studies have started to analyse the entrepreneurial intention and its determinants (Krueger et al., 2000) but however, methodologies and research instruments used so far differ widely. Then, the availability of a validated instrument to measure abilities, attitudes and intentions towards entrepreneurship could be of much help. In this paper, we use an Entrepreneurial Intention Questionnaire (EIQ), which has been recently validated, to measure entrepreneurial intentions in a sample of students from different Spanish universities. After a brief description of the characteristics and psychometric properties of the EIQ, most important results are discussed. In particular, we pay attention to the influence of different personal and family variables on the entrepreneurial intention level. These variables could be considered as belonging to the institutional environment of each territory. Differences in institutions -in a broad sense- may be a very relevant factor to explain divergent entrepreneurial activity levels. Results show how these external variables affect intention and, as a result actual entrepreneurial behaviour.

RESUMEN Las tecnologías de la información y comunicación (TIC) constituyen una de las principales fuerzas de la globalización. El comercio electrónico aprovecha Internet para mejorar la competitividad de las empresas y territorios. En un escenario como el actual, este canal, por un lado, abre posibilidades de desarrollo para las regiones Objetivo 1, pero, por otro, refuerza los factores de crecimiento de los territorios más ricos. En cualquier caso, plantea nuevos criterios de desigualdad entre regiones y dentro de ellas. El aprovechamiento de sus ventajas requiere infraestructuras y equipamientos, capacidad organizativa y formación. Pese a los déficit que las regiones Objetivo 1 españolas muestran en estos campos para desarrollar la Sociedad de la Información (SI), la actitud y los esfuerzos de los agentes públicos y privados en mejorar su posición en el contexto nacional e internacional han iniciado un largo camino que puede permitir utilizar el comercio electrónico como un elemento que contribuya al crecimiento y la mejora de la competitividad regional. ABSTRACT The technologies of the information and communication constitute one of the main forces of the globalization. The e-commerce takes advantage of Internet to improve the competitiveness of the companies and territories. In a scenario like the current one, on the one hand, this channel opens development possibilities for the Objective 1 regions, but, on the other hand, reinforces the growth factors in the rich territories. Furthermore, new unevenness issues between regions and inside them raise. However, the use of its advantages requires infrastructures and equipment, organizational capacity and formation. In spite of the deficit that the spanish Objective 1 regions show in these fields to develop the Society of the Information, the attitude and the efforts of the public agents has begun a long way to use the e-commerce like an element to improve the regional development and competitiveness.

This article presents olive oil production from both the cluster and the industrial perspective. We distinguish both concepts to interpret the current reality from a territorial point of view. In this sense, we use the notion of the agri- industrial district to explore olive growing activity in the province of Jaen, due to the special social and historic relations that are involved in the organisation of production. On the other hand, we use the cluster concept to characterise organisational proximity linked to different companies which form the international olive oil value chain. The agri-industrial district has focused its attention on the production of oil to be sold in the intra-industrial bulk unbottled oils market. But new challenges are taking place upstream in the cluster, with new players emerging, especially in the distribution channels. In addition, downstream, we are observing the emergence of new industrial and service activities that could pave the way for the next structural changes in the rural development process in Europe.