Effect of Farmers' Awareness of Climate Change on Their Willingness to Adopt Low-Carbon Production: Based on the TAM-SOR Model

The COVID-19 pandemic highlighted the intricate relationships between human health and the social-ecological system in an era of climate and global change. Widespread COVID-19 adversely affected farmers' employment, production practices, and livelihood resilience. At the same time, climate change is a key issue limiting agricultural production worldwide. Emissions of greenhouse gases, such as carbon dioxide, are a major factor leading to global climate change. Greenhouse gas emissions from agricultural production are receiving increasing attention. Therefore, it is particularly important to develop low-carbon agriculture. Based on data from 920 family farms in Jiangsu province and Shaanxi province, this study constructs a structural equation model and empirically tests the relationship between the variables using the bootstrap method. The results show that: (1) climate change awareness did not directly stimulate farmers' willingness to pursue low-carbon production;(2) climate change awareness has an impact on low-carbon production willingness through perceived ease of use and consequence awareness;and (3) anti-risk ability can effectively moderate the impact of climate change awareness on low-carbon production behavior in agriculture. The theoretical model framework proposed in this study provides a reference for research in the field of low-carbon agriculture and also provides some insights and suggestions for environmentalists and governments. In addition, policymakers should effectively raise the sense of responsibility of farmers to address climate change and promote low-carbon agricultural production to achieve healthy and sustainable agricultural development. © 2022 by the authors.

Changing Food Patterns during the Pandemic: Exploring the Role of Household Dynamics and Income Stabilization Strategies

COVID-19 still looms as the largest risk to the agriculture, energy, and health sectors, threatening sustainable global economic development. The literature shows that the COVID-19 pandemic can divert governments' attention away from climate change, renewable energy, and food security challenges that are necessary to address for sustainable economic growth. The COVID-19 pandemic has consistently influenced environmental behaviors, as it has primarily decreased income levels and disrupted food systems worldwide. This study examined the impacts of COVID-19 on food consumption patterns, food diversity, and income challenges and explored the factors affecting food consumption patterns during the pandemic. The data collected through an online survey from 1537 Chinese households were analyzed through a paired t-test, a mixed-design ANOVA, and a logistic regression analysis. The results revealed that the consumption of the majority of individual food commodities decreased during the COVID-19 pandemic. Among the individual food items, the consumption of pork witnessed the greatest decrease during the COVID-19 pandemic compared to the normal period. The decrease in food diversity was higher for the households whose income was affected compared to the households whose income was not affected during the COVID-19 pandemic. Furthermore, the consumption quantities of various food groups declined more for highly income-affected households than for medium and slightly affected households during the pandemic. Households that adopted a dissaving income-stabilizing strategy were 47% points more likely to maintain their food consumption patterns during the pandemic. Farmers were 17% points and 19% points less likely to suffer worsened food consumption compared to self-employed and wage workers, respectively, during the pandemic. Thus, self-production methods such as kitchen gardening can assist households to maintain and improve their consumption of food commodities during the COVID-19 pandemic. © 2022 by the authors.

Toward Regenerative Sustainability: A Passive Design Comfort Assessment Method of Indoor Environment

The fact that people spend a major part of their lifetime indoors, together with the lethal COVID-19 pandemic which caused people to spend even more time inside buildings, has drawn attention to the significance of achieving Agenda 2030 SD goal number three: good health and well-being, in reference to the indoor environment. The research subject is the health and well-being of building users explored through the sustainable (passive) design principles having an impact on the comfort and quality of the indoor environment. It is set within a regenerative sustainability framework encompassing the physiological, biophilic, psychological and social aspects of comfort. The Comfort Assessment Model's categories, to some extent, rely on the first author's doctoral thesis, with further modifications regarding the passive design criteria and indicators. A comparative analysis of the model with international sustainability certification (rating) systems has been performed, proving the significance of introducing more passive design comfort (health) related criteria into sustainability assessment models. In addition, a focus group of expert architects contributed to the research conclusions by responding to a questionnaire addressing the issues of sustainability, comfort and passive design, in terms of the health and well-being of building users, which confirmed the relevance of applied passive design measures for providing comfort indoors and fulfilling sustainable development goals. © 2023 by the authors.

Assessing climate change mitigation and adaptation strategies and agricultural innovation systems in the Niger Delta

Climate change and its impacts on agriculture have been widely discussed at national and global levels. An important aspect of the discussion has been adaptation/mitigation approaches. Consequently, several strategies have been suggested as measures to ensure agriculture remains productively profitable. However, food security especially in critical times, such as the lockdown during the COVID-19 pandemic proved to be a challenge even for regions naturally endowed for agriculture. The study evaluated research recommended strategies, and further examined the innovativeness of the strategies in fostering sustainable agricultural innovation system (AIS) in the Niger Delta. The study relied on both secondary and primary data;analysed 129 previous studies and gathered responses from 282 extension agents. The study introduces a method for assessing the innovativeness of strategies by calculating their rated values on five traits. Findings revealed the issues and implications of adopting most recommended strategies and the place of most strategies in fostering AIS. The study highlights the possible reasons why farmers fail to adopt most strategies as suggested by studies on climate change in the region. Based on the findings, recommendations were made on the way forward. The study adds to the scanty discussion of climate change and AIS at regional levels, particularly in the climate change prone and oil rich Niger Delta region. The study offers a novel approach for scoring innovations in agriculture. © 2022, The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Nature B.V.

Quality Food Products as a Tourist Attraction in the Province of Córdoba (Spain)

Traveling to learn about the gastronomy of a destination is becoming increasingly important among tourists, especially in the wake of the pandemic. Quality foods endorsed by protected designations of origin (PDOs) are increasingly in demand, as are experiences related to their production processes. In this study, the seven PDOs in the province of Córdoba (Spain) are analyzed. These PDOs produce olive oil, wine or ham. A field study was performed, whereby 315 gastronomic tourists who visited a gastronomic route or a PDO in Córdoba were surveyed. The objective was to characterize the profile of visiting tourists and to anticipate future demand using ARIMA models. The results indicate that the growth in gastronomic tourism in Córdoba is lower than that in the wider region, and that there are no significant differences among the different profiles (oil tourist, enotourist and ham tourists) due in part to the fact that most tourists travel from nearby regions. The novelty of this study is that three products are analyzed, and strategies are proposed to deseasonalize this type of tourism, for example, by creating a gastronomic brand that represents Córdoba and selling products under that brand (especially in international markets), by highlighting raw materials and prepared dishes and by making gastronomy a complement to heritage tourism in the city and rural tourism in the province.

COVID in Africa, one year later

This paper presents an update of last year analysis of COVID in sub-Sahara Africa (SSA). The number of confirmed cases and deaths has dramatically increased, partially driven by the expanded diagnostic capacity, but it is an unknown undercount of people infected: we are blind with respect to the real size of the pandemic. The aggregate numbers mask a substantial heterogeneity: South Africa accounts for almost half of the cases in the region;Ethiopia, the second top country in the ranking, follows from afar, with only 6% of reported cases. There are signs that the third wave of COVID, driven by the more transmissible Delta variant, is easing off. The concerns that the pandemic would have affected more severely the most vulnerable populations (refugees and internally displaced persons) have not been confirmed: there is no evidence of hospitals overwhelmed nor of high mortality in humanitarian settings, a pattern that has not found an explanation. As of now, only 1% of African has been vaccinated, a sign of vaccine inequity and of ‘a catastrophic moral failure' of rich countries, which have secured a surplus of hundred million COVID vaccines that they cannot use. The combined effects of the pandemic and control measures have been particularly severe in SSA economies, where underemployment and job insecurity prevail. Reduced export of commodities, collapse of tourism and agriculture, decline of foreign investment, aid, and remittances have driven million Africans in extreme poverty. The international financial institutions have shifted their strategies from austerity to a strong package of grants and concessional loans to support poor countries, including those in SSA, to cope with the immediate consequences of the pandemic, under the lemma ‘vaccine policy is the most important economic policy'.

Assessment of SARS-CoV-2 Stability in human and environmental matrices, and potential hazards

In the context of the ongoing pandemic of COVID-19, SARS-CoV-2 was detected in human excreta and environmental matrices. The occurrence of SARS-CoV-2 in environmental compartments raises questions on its fate and stability in these matrices and its potential to spread in the exposed communities. This review focused on the stability of the SARS-CoV-2 in human excreta, wastewater, soils, crops, and other environmental matrices, that may be reached through human excreta and sewage products spreading. Little is known about the persistence and survival of SARS-CoV-2 in the environment. Up to now sewage sludge, soil and crops are seldom investigated implying the convenience of considering future researches focusing on SARS-CoV-2 in soils receiving wastewater and sewage sludge, as well as on grown crops. Information regarding SARS-CoV-2 persistence in environmental media is crucial to establish and implement effective policies and measures for mitigating the transmission of COVID-19 and tackling eventual future outbreaks.

Smart Contract to Traceability of Food Social Selling

Traditionally, food sustainability has been considered solely in the stage of agricultural production. However, globalization, the expansion of the food production industry, and the emergence of supermarket chains that control the retail food market require specific significant changes in supply chains in the food sector and, therefore, we need to address the economic, social, and environmental impacts of these events. On the other hand, social selling has increased rapidly in recent years, with a further boom, following current events related to the coronavirus disease (COVID-19). This explosion of social sales, where there are usually no control and regulation entities, can bring problems associated with mishandling items. In this paper, we expose how Blockchain technology supports the traceability of social sales by validating the data provided by the chain participants such as digital health passports, production and transport data in the sale process;the proposed solution generates recommendations on productmanagement considering the agreements previously made by the network actors. To evaluate the proposed smart contracts, we useHyperledger Caliper, obtaining an average throughput of 12.6 transactions per second and an average latency of 0.3 s for the asset update process. We also use a study case to evaluate the proposed project platform's selling-transport stage using Internet of Things (IoT) sensors. © 2023 Tech Science Press. All rights reserved.

Analytical Overview of Digital Cloud Services

Over the past twelve years, cloud systems have significantly changed business processes in all areas of business. Companies are using cloud services as a key factor in completing their digital transformation, and the COVID pandemic has further accelerated this task. The cloud is emerging as a top management agenda item as companies move from a separate approach to a more holistic, end-to-end digital transformation driven by the cloud. Cloud services save businesses time and money by increasing productivity, improving collaboration, and driving innovation. Now—during the coronavirus crisis, more than ever, cloud services are vital to help companies re-discover, reinvent and overcome uncertainty. Cloud services range from data storage to functional software, including accounting software, customer service tools, and remote desktop hosting. These services can be divided into three groups: infrastructure as a service (IaaS), platform as a service (PaaS) and software as a service (SaaS). This article is devoted to an analytical overview of modern digital cloud services, and the services they provide that can be applied in all areas of business. © 2023, The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG.

Labor Shortage Poses Safety Challenges for Growing Agritourism Industry

Trends: Agritourism is increasingly popular, generating the need for additional employees. Given the labor shortages in the U.S., this motivates producers on agritourism operators to develop strategies to address the labor shortages, some of which could impact worker safety. Research and current initiatives: Contributing factors to labor shortages in agriculture include the aging workforce, declining rural populations, the stressful nature of agricultural work, long hours and less labor intensive options. Foreign labor has been impacted by immigration policy changes, H2A program inefficiencies and the recent pandemic. Staffing agritourism operations is further complicated by the need for seasonal employees and staff with varying skill sets, such as hospitality, food service, and retail;industries with critical labor shortages. Some strategies agritourism operators employ to address staff shortages (e.g. employees work longer hours, hiring younger staff) may impact safety. Collaborations between producers and safety professionals could help develop strategies to address labor shortages while ensuring worker safety. Gaps in knowledge, regulation and practice: More information is needed on employees on agritourism operations including the number of employees, hours worked, tasks performed, safety training provided, impact of customers in worksites, injuries incurred, current strategies employed to address the labor shortages, and motivators for staff to participate in safety training. Recommendations for the future: Research is needed to address the gaps in knowledge previously mentioned, and the information gathered used to develop recommendations, safety strategies and resources to help agritourism operators employ effective recruitment and retention strategies that also help establish a safe working environment.

Analysis by Canonical Correlations of Labor Activity in Mi- Lagro City during Covid-19 Pandemic

The labor activity of Milagro city is preceded in many cases by agriculture, representing at the same time as the only source of income for the large number of people who inhabit these areas, which has also been affected to some extent by the appearance of the covid-19 virus, for this reason the possibility of analyzing the degree of influence of this situation on the labor sector is raised. In this research work, the statistical methodology of Analysis by Canonical Correlations was used, to a set of variables located in two different periods of time on the people who exercise some activity within the labor field, where the difficulties that they present are highlighted re-flected mainly in the delicate economic situation that they demonstrated to have. In addition, the collection of different points of view summarizes how complica-ted it is to be able to get a good workplace, which provides them with better benefits, given that in most cases their work is compromised by the variability of working hours, the lack of insurance, and the cons-tant challenges of living in rural areas.

Does Pandemic Fatigue Prevent Farmers' Participation in the Rural Tourism Industry: A Comparative Study between Two Chinese Villages

Rural tourism is an important income generation method for farmers post-pandemic. However, few studies have focused on how pandemic fatigue has affected their willingness to participate in rural tourism development. We conducted a quasi-experiment to test these effects using data from two Chinese villages. Shanlian village, which was more severely affected by COVID-19, was the experimental group, while Huashu village was set as the control group. Our results reveal that both physical and mental fatigue hinder farmers' intention to engage in rural tourism. Further, there were significant interaction effects between physical and mental fatigue on the farmers' participation in rural tourism. For farmers with low physical fatigue, the higher their mental fatigue, the less willing they were to participate in rural development. Conversely, for the higher physical fatigue group, farmers with low levels of mental fatigue were still more willing to participate in rural tourism development. These findings reduce the current research gap concerning the relationship between pandemic fatigue and farmers' participation in rural tourism and indicate that practitioners and policymakers should consider farmers' fatigue management as an important factor for the sustainability of rural tourism during the ongoing COVID-19 crisis. © 2022 by the authors.

Stochastic ordering of systemic risk in commodity markets

The contribution of commodity risks to the systemic risk is assessed in this paper through a novel approach that relies on the stochastic property of concordance ordering of CoVaR. Considering the period that spans from 2005 to 2022 and the VIX as the proxy for the stability of the financial system, we build the stochastic ordering of systemic risk for 35 commodities belonging to four sectors: Agriculture, Energy, Industrial Metals, and Precious Metals. The estimates of the ΔCoVaR signal that contagion effects from commodity markets to the financial system have been stronger during the years 2017–2019. Backtests validate CoVaR as a more resilient risk measure than the VaR, especially during periods of market turmoils. The stochastic ordering of CoVaR shows that severe losses (downside risk) in commodity markets tend to exacerbate systemic financial distress more than gains (upside risk). Commodity risks arising from WTI and EUA are threatening triggers for systemic risk. In contrast, the financial system is less vulnerable to a broader range of scenarios arising from fluctuations in Gold prices. As top contributors to the systemic risk, among the sectors we find Energy and Precious Metals with respect to upside risk and downside risk. The Covid-19 crisis has deeply amplified the systemic influence arising from the downside risk of WTI, Gasoline, and Natural Gas UK and has confirmed the safe-haven role of Gold. © 2022 Elsevier B.V.

Covid and US Farm Labor

Many governments closed their borders in spring 2020 to prevent the spread of Covid, but they also made exceptions to allow farm employers to recruit temporary foreign workers to fill seasonal farm jobs. The pandemic changed many parameters of food systems. Closed restaurants led to widespread layoffs in leisure and hospitality, rates of Covid were high among nonfarm food processing and meatpacking workers, and there was less Covid than expected among the foreign workers who increased their share of employment in production agriculture. The pandemic accelerated three major changes that were already underway, viz., more labor-saving mechanization, more foreign workers, and increased imports of labor-intensive commodities. Mechanization increases the resilience of production agriculture to labor supply shocks. © 2023 Taylor & Francis Group, LLC.

COVID-19, local food system and digitalisation of the agri-food sector

Purpose: This paper aims to evaluate the responses taken during the pandemic of COVID-19 in sustaining agricultural activities and safeguarding local food supply via digital platforms by applying the case study method. Design/methodology/approach: This paper uses a case study approach due to its systematic way of collecting data, analysing information and reporting results to understand the particular problem. For this study, secondary data consisting of government reports and documents are used to give a broader understanding of the impact of COVID-19 on the local food system and digital platform for agricultural produce. Findings: The impact of COVID-19 on the agri-food sector is the move towards a more resilient and sustainable local food system, whereby nations emphasise food security by encouraging local food production. This is done by boosting micro, small and medium enterprises' (MSME) output, "supporting local” initiatives and leveraging digital platforms and FinTech in business transactions. Research limitations/implications: This study highlights that MSMEs' adoption of digital platforms, particularly in the agri-food sector, demonstrates their willingness to embrace new business models that leverage technological advancements while maintaining the personal touch that attracts customers. Practical implications: This study implies that although the pandemic outbreak created prolonged uncertainties with an immediate impact on the economy and ways of doing business transactions, digital platforms and FinTech ensured continuous food supply during the period. Originality/value: This paper provides initial valuable insight to academics, practitioners and policymakers in agriculture and innovation management. It can be observed that digital platform and FinTech plays an essential role in ensuring safety and undisrupted food supply, especially in the case of fresh produce grown by local small-scale farmers and MSMEs. This creates a more resilient agri-food system and reduces the pressure from the conventional model of food purchase and social distancing requirements. © 2022, Emerald Publishing Limited.

Of Canals, Rivers and the Right to Exist: New (?) Methodological Tools for a Changed World

What can a dying river teach us about post/de-colonial science and technology? In a post-COVID world, absence and loss will be a constant presence in the lives of most. While thinking with erasures and absence in science and technology studies is not new, our current moment pushes us to burrow deeper into the histories of technologies that produce manufactured empty space, examine histories that pushed groups to the fringes of documented memory and encourage us to ponder how we must deal with these moments. This essay examines what the Yaqui River and the history of the Yaqui in Sonora can teach us about historical erasures and new meanings in landscapes and waterways lost to agro-business.

Anti-noncommunicable diseases attributes of pineapple (Ananas comosus): a concise review

Pineapple (Ananas comosus) is a tropical fruit that is numerous in Indonesia. This fruit can be processed into various processed food products. This author writes this article to find out the potential of pineapple as a food product that can be anti-noncommunicable diseases (NCDs) such as diabetes, obesity, oxidative stress, and cancer. This article is written using the narrative review method where data are collected from literature studies, namely articles in journals, books, and other literature-based online on database portals and leading search engines such as PUBMED and NCBI, the official website of the USDA (United States Department of Agriculture) and the European Phenols Explorer. The collected data are then analyzed, synthesized, discussed in the discussion, and general conclusions are drawn. The findings uncovered that pineapple contains polyphenols and antioxidant components, which are pretty high in concentration and could be useful as anti-NCDs. This fruit also has a proteolytic enzyme, bromelains, which is an immunomodulator against viral infections and diseases. This review concluded that pineapple fruit can be processed into various functional food products through several methods to maintain the content of polyphenols and antioxidants that have anti-NCDs potentials. It is necessary to process or execute this idea to identify and feel its benefits according to the research objectives, and in vivo, clinical trials are needed. Copyright © 2022 The Authors. Published by Rynnye Lyan Resources.

Examining ecological strategies adopted by agricultural exporting firms in an emerging country

PurposeThe rising food demand around the globe goes hand in hand with the rapid development of the agriculture industry. However, this development at the same time has detrimental effects on the natural environment. Hence, promoting ecological strategies in agriculture is essential for environmental sustainability. This study aims to investigate the institutional determinants of ecological strategies adopted by agricultural exporting firms and how these strategies enhance the firms' competitive advantage and financial performance.Design/methodology/approachA survey was conducted to collect data from 218 managers of agricultural exporting companies in Vietnam, which is a major exporter of agricultural products. The data were analyzed using different techniques including partial least squares structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM).FindingsThe results reveal that market pressure, regulatory pressure and competitive pressure motivate the adoption of ecological strategies among the surveyed agricultural exporting firms. Furthermore, such strategies help these firms obtain competitive advantage, which in turn increases their export financial performance. In addition, larger firms, compared to smaller firms, are more likely to adopt ecological strategies.Originality/valueThis study contributes to the literature by developing and validating a unique model examining the institutional pressures of ecological strategies and their outcomes in export markets. The study extends current knowledge about ecological exporting strategies for agricultural products, and its findings have several managerial and policy implications for promoting these strategies among agricultural exporting firms in emerging countries like Vietnam.