Agriculture’s impact on climate change is unambiguous although its role is multifaceted as it is a source of greenhouse gases but also a sink. It’s feasibility to mitigate climate change has raised interest, but thorough studies about the net benefits of the mitigation practices are needed....

In modern agriculture, pesticides feature so prominently in growers’ arsenal to reduce crop damage caused by various pests and diseases. But their indiscriminate use can harm human health and the environment and, eventually, impact agricultural productivity negatively. In an era of an...

Pig farming is one of the strongest polluters of water resources due to its intensive production techniques and slurry rejection. Several European countries have already introduced environmental regulations aiming at reducing the pollution caused by nitrates from agricultural sources, but not...

Integrated land use models (ILM) are increasingly applied tools for the joint assessment of complex economic-environmental farming system interactions. We present an ILM that consists of the crop rotation model CropRota, the bio-physical process model EPIC, and the farm optimization model...

The use of irrigation water for agricultural production requires innovative and sustainable research and an appropriate transfer of water saving technologies. The main aim of this paper is to explore the irrigating behaviour of farmers examining factors affecting their decision to adopt novel...

The main objective of the paper is to trace the composition of the CAP support for Italian farms at the eve of the implementation of the CAP reform. The paper is based on three regional case studies, that represent as many farming specialisation typologies: Veneto, in the North-East, where...

The CAP reform and the recent EC communication aimed at preparing its Health Check emphasise the need for interventions locally based where agricultural policy integrates with a broader policy for rural areas growth. In this context, the paper investigates the possible different sets policy...

Using a sample of French crop farms during the 1999-2006 period, we test whether less technically efficient farmers are more likely to engage in organic farming in order to benefit from conversion subsidies. Despite some limitations in our data, we find no evidence of such selection effect. On...

In order to measure agriculture sustainability, the efficient use of inputs becomes a crucial issue. In this perspective, the analysts concentrate their attention on the total factor productivity index (TFP). In this view, Lynam and Herdt (1989) proposed the TFP as a suitable assessment of the...

China is the world’s largest producer and consumer of agricultural products, but the intensive agriculture contributes in a remarkable manner to environmental problems. Since environmental protection has recently become a popular issue in China, the government attaches great importance to the...