A critique of high-value supply chains as a means of modernising agriculture in China: The case of the beef industry

China has embarked on an agricultural modernisation program with far-reaching implications for rural development, food safety and trade. A major focus of China’s agricultural modernisation program has been to build high-value supply chains and large, modern agro-industrial enterprises. This paper provides a critique of these efforts in the case of the high-value beef supply chain. It finds that interventionist policies to fast-track the development of high-value supply chains have perverse outcomes and that a more incremental and facilitative approach to modernisation should be pursued based around the development of mid-value supply chains.     

Using best–worst scaling to explore perceptions of relative responsibility for ensuring food safety

We examine stakeholders’ perceptions of the share of the overall responsibility of each stage in the food supply chain has in ensuring that the meat people cook and eat at home is safe to consume. We elicit these perceptions of relative responsibility via surveys using the best–worst scaling technique and analyse the data via Bayesian estimation of mixed logit models. Results are reported for two groups of stakeholders: consumers and farmers, and for two meat food chains: chicken and beef. The results reveal that consumers tend to think farmers are more responsible for ensuring meat safety than farmers do. Similarly, farmers tend to think consumers have a greater degree of responsibility than consumers believe they have themselves. Such beliefs might affect stakeholders’ willingness to take actions and reduce hazards in the supply chain. From a policy perspective, the research findings provide useful insights to support policymakers and other decision-makers in the industry in developing mitigation strategies. Communication with consumers and farmers about emerging food safety problems in a supply chain and their involvement in proactive practices would need to be attuned to their subjective perceptions of relative responsibilities in order for integrated risk management systems to be effective.     

The impact of the European Novel Food Regulation on trade and food innovation based on traditional plant foods from developing countries

The stringent food safety assessment for novel foods required by the European Union’s Novel Food Regulation (NFR) places a high burden of proof on those bringing traditional food products to the EU market not consumed in the EU prior 1997. The regulation has emerged as a non-tariff trade barrier for heritage foods from developing countries that are viewed as “exotic” from the EU perspective. We show how the regulation has discouraged investment in supply chains and market development, and how this negatively affects income generation and rural poverty alleviation in developing countries. Focusing on plant-derived foods, this paper proposes to recognize traditional exotic foods in current EU law as a food category sui generis with food safety evidence requirements being proportionate to the risks they may pose. We argue that development activities promoting export food chains must increasingly accommodate legitimate food safety concerns about neglected food species in project design and seek to generate data to enhance regulatory acceptance in target markets.     

Strategic use of private standards to enhance international competitiveness: Vegetable exports from Kenya and elsewhere

The paper examines how European retailers are using private standards for food safety and ‘quality’ as risk management and competitive tools and the strategic responses of leading Kenyan and other developing country supplier/exporters to such standards. Despite measures to harmonize a ‘single market’, the European fresh produce market is very diverse in terms of consumer preferences, structural dynamics and attention to and enforcement of food safety and other standards. Leading Kenyan fresh produce suppliers have re-positioned themselves at the high end, including ‘high care’, segments of the market – precisely those that are most demanding in terms of quality assurance and food safety systems. An array of factors have influenced this strategic positioning, including relatively high international freight costs, the emergence of more effective competition in mainstream product lines, relatively low labor costs for produce preparation, and strong market relationships with selected retail chains. To succeed in this demanding market segment, the industry has had to invest substantially in improved production and procurement systems, upgraded pack house facilities, and quality assurance/food safety management systems.     

Technology and evolving supply chains in the beef and pork industries

The U.S. beef and pork industries have achieved dramatic productivity growth in recent decades; however, the supply chain and market structure of each industry has evolved in different ways. Technological advances have been a key reason for productivity growth, with pharmaceutical innovations playing a major role. This article canvasses the similarities and differences in how beef and pork flow through their respective supply chains and documents the changes, causes, and benefits of the increased efficiency in each industry. Past research is summarized in a broad view of the livestock industry and policy and trade issues are discussed. Such a perspective allows for the consideration of what the future might hold for each industry, and how technological innovation influences product quality, trade, and market structure.     

Consumer preferences for farm-raised meat,lab-grown meat,and plant-based meat alternatives: Does information or brand matter?

Despite rising interest in and sales of innovative non-animal-based protein sources, there remains a lack of information about consumer demand for these new foods and their ultimate market potential. This study reports the results of a nationwide survey of more than 1800 U.S. consumers who completed a choice experiment in which they selected among conventional beef and three alternative burger patties, (lab-grown, plant-based with pea protein, and plant-based with animal-like protein) at different prices. Respondents were randomly allocated to treatments that varied in the presence/absence of brands and information about the competing alternatives. Results from random parameter logit models indicate that, holding prices constant and conditional on choosing a food product, 72% chose farm-raised beef and 28% chose one of the alternatives: 16% plant-based (pea protein) meat alternative, 7% plant-based (animal-like protein) meat alternative, and 5% lab-grown meat. Adding brand names (Certified Angus Beef, Beyond Meat, Impossible Foods, and Memphis Meats) increased the share for choosing farm-raised beef to 80%. Environment and technology information had minor effects on conditional market shares but reduced the share of people not buying any options, indicating information pulled more people into the market. Even if plant- and lab-grown alternatives experienced significant (e.g., 50%) price reductions, farm-raised beef maintains the majority market share. Vegetarians, males, younger, and more highly educated individuals tend to have relatively stronger preferences for the plant- and lab-grown alternatives relative to farm-raised beef. More people opposed than supported taxing conventional beef for environmental and animal welfare objectives and more opposed than supported having plant- and lab-grown alternatives use the label ‘beef’     

Ground beef recalls and subsequent food safety performance

The U.S. Food Safety Inspection Service recalled more than 370 million pounds of meat and poultry products and oversaw 680 Class 1 recalls over 1998–2014. The cost to firms was about $109 million in lost market value (Pozo and Schroeder, 2016). Thomsen and McKenzie (2001) argue that firms internalize the costs of recalls, and Marino (1997) asserts that high food safety costs lead to food safety investment, but no research has examined the impact of recalls on plant food safety performance. Using performance on tests for Salmonella conducted by the Food Safety Inspection Service as a measure of food safety, this article examines the performance on Salmonella tests of ground beef plants with Class 1 recalls. The results show that plants have high Salmonella levels before and during the year of the recall and have much lower levels afterward. The paper also shows that ground beef plants with recalls are less likely to meet the FSIS standard for Salmonella and that the likelihood of failing to meet the standard increases as the standard becomes more stringent.     

Can food waste behavior be managed within the B2B workplace and beyond? The roles of quality of green communication and dual mediation paths

Food waste is becoming increasingly a crucial issue to organizations, but little is known about workplace food waste reduction among frontline employees in the business-to-business (B2B) context regardless of the salience of frontline employees with such a behavior as green intermediaries in B2B supply chains. Our research seeks to fill this gap by investigating how and when quality of green communication in the B2B workplace influences frontline employees' workplace and household food waste behavior, as well as the relationship between these two types of food waste behavior among frontline employees. The dataset for this study came from sales employees in manufacturing companies based in Vietnam. The results unveiled the roles of employees' green role identity and harmonious environmental passion as the dual mediation paths for the relationship between quality of green communication and employees' intention to reduce food waste, which in turn attenuated both their workplace and household food waste behavior. The positive relationship was noted between employees' workplace food waste behavior and their household food waste behavior. The results further demonstrated the boundary condition role of household leftovers reuse routines to enhance the link between intention to reduce food waste and food waste behavior. The implications are discussed on initiatives for reducing B2B frontline employees' food waste behavior, thereby transforming them into green agents in B2B supply chains.     

The food system transformation in developing countries: A disaggregate demand analysis for fruits and vegetables in Vietnam

Food systems in developing countries are currently undergoing a rapid transformation towards high-value products and modern supply chains. While supply side aspects of this transformation have been analyzed previously, issues of consumer demand have received much less attention. This article analyses demand patterns for fresh fruits and vegetables in Vietnam, using household survey data and a demand systems approach. Demand for products from modern supply chains – particularly supermarkets and non-traditional imports – is highly income elastic, and the income effect is stronger than the impact of prices and supermarket penetration. This highlights the importance of considering demand side aspects when projecting future trends. Our results imply a continued restructuring of the food sector in the further process of economic development.     

Linking small farmers to modern retail through producer organizations – Experiences with producer companies in India

Since the early 2000s, India’s agro-food sector has undergone rapid transformations towards greater market share of modern food retail. This has impacted Indian agriculture and farmers as supermarkets re-organize supply chains towards more explicit forms of coordination. Compared to other developing countries, little has been said in the Indian context about what role farmer organizations can play to help smallholder farmers specifically, improve their position in those emerging value chains. In this paper, I address this gap and demonstrate that producer companies are a promising tool to strengthen famers’ position in their relationship with supermarket chains in India, but one which needs further improvement.     

Public–private partnerships and collective action in high value fruit and vegetable supply chains

Accessing developed country food markets entails meeting stringent food safety requirements. Food retailers impose protocols relating to pesticide residues, field and pack house operations, and traceability. To enable smallholders to remain competitive in such a system, new institutional arrangements are required. In particular, public–private partnerships can play a key role in creating farm to fork linkages that can satisfy market demands for food safety, while retaining smallholders in the supply chain. Furthermore, organized producer groups monitoring their own food safety standards through collective action often become attractive to buyers who are looking for ways to ensure traceability and reduce transaction costs. This paper compares the ways in which small producers of fruits and vegetables in Kenya and India have coped with increased demands for food safety from their main export markets.     

International cattle ID and traceability: Competitive implications for the US

Global standards for animal identification and traceability are evolving rapidly. Major world animal health, trade, and food safety organizations have formally recognized the importance of, and actively promoted, animal identification and traceability system development. Advanced animal traceability systems have been deployed by major beef exporters and are increasingly being adopted by important beef importing countries. This study summarizes and compares animal identification systems across major export and import countries. Results reveal that the United States lags behind both major export and import countries in development and adoption of cattle identification and tracing systems. As such, the United States has placed itself in a vulnerable position relative to competing export countries with respect to demonstrated animal traceability. This status could adversely affect market access in the future for US beef exports.     

A choice experiment model for beef: What US consumer responses tell us about relative preferences for food safety,country-of-origin labeling and traceability

Several food safety issues have prompted questions regarding the role of country-of-origin labeling, traceability, and food safety inspections in consumers’ perceptions of food safety and quality. The importance of origin-labeling and traceability have been discussed in the EU for some time. North American cases of mad cow disease have led to increased discussions of these topics in the US, however, relatively little research has been conducted to examine the value US consumers place on these attributes. Choice experiments were used to analyze US consumers’ relative preferences and willingness-to-pay for these meat attributes in labeled ribeye beef steaks. Relatively speaking, consumers value certification of USDA food safety inspection more than any of the other choice set attributes, including country-of-origin labeling, traceability and tenderness. As a result, indication of origin may only become a signal of enhanced quality if the source-of-origin is associated with higher food safety or quality.     

Food safety recall effects across meat products and regions

Food safety is one of the key issues for the international meat market. As a major meat exporter, few things facing the U.S. meat industry in recent years have garnered more attention than food safety events and policies. The impacts of Food Safety Inspection Services (FSIS) recalls on United States consumer meat demand are estimated using monthly grocery-scanner data identifying effects across products, geographic regions, and recall type. Results suggest beef E. coli recalls significantly reduce the demand for recalled ground beef contemporaneously among most, but not all, regions in the United States. Evidence of heterogeneity in demand impacts across regions and products is provided for the first time. Domestic and international implications for policy makers, industry leaders, and researchers are discussed.     

Private agri-food standards: Implications for food policy and the agri-food system

This paper provides a brief introduction to the evolution and nature of private food safety and quality standards, highlighting the resultant impacts on the structure and modus operandi of supply chains for agricultural and food products and the challenges posed for processes of agricultural development. It serves as an introduction to a series of papers that provide a comprehensive overview of the current state of knowledge regarding private food safety and quality standards in both an industrialised and developing country context. In so doing, it aims to provide a catalyst for further research on this rapidly evolving field of inquiry.     

Private food safety and quality standards for fresh produce exporters: The case of Hortico Agrisystems,Zimbabwe

There is evidence that the challenges of complying with stricter food safety and quality standards are acting to exclude small-scale producers from export supply chains for high-value agricultural products. The case of Hortico Agrisystems illustrates the considerable challenges and costs faced by supermarket suppliers in sourcing from a broad base of small-scale producers in the context of evolving food safety and quality standards. While small-scale producers are able to achieve levels of compliance at least equal to those of large-scale producers, multi-tiered and dynamic systems of control are required to maintain control. These need to include measures that facilitate compliance, incentives to reward good performance and penalties to punish non-compliance. In establishing a sustainable supply system in this context, both exporters and small-scale producers face a steep learning curve in adjusting to new requirements, further emphasising the need for supply chains to be responsive to change.     

Food insecurity,poverty and the Malawian Starter Pack: Fresh start or false start?

Chronic food insecurity and chronic poverty are closely related in Malawi. Since independence in 1964 national food security has been a key policy objective. However, until the 1990s less emphasis was placed on the household dimensions of food security and its links with chronic poverty. In the last decade a number of initiatives have been used in Malawi to tackle the issue of household food insecurity. One of the most controversial has been the Starter Pack programme launched in 1998. Initially consisting of a free handout of packs of improved maize seed, legumes and fertiliser to every small holder farm household in Malawi the scheme, under donor pressure, was subsequently scaled down to become a form of targeted social safety net programme. This paper analyses the strengths and weakness of both the original programme and its scaled down version and assesses the reason for the considerable opposition to the programme from Malawi’s donor community. Although Starter Pack is no longer operative in Malawi the Malawian experience is used to derive lessons for other countries where household food insecurity is an important dimension of chronic poverty.     

Policies and practices for aquaculture food safety in China

There are growing concerns over the safety of aquaculture food products from China, which supplies 70% of the world’s farmed fish food. We present a comprehensive literature review, supplemented with qualitative data obtained from interviews with experts in the field, to examine the policies and practices designed to ensure the safety of food produced by the Chinese aquaculture industry. The food safety system has many parts that are administered by different governmental organizations with poor coordination among them. The system apparently operates as two entities: one for products destined for the export market and based largely on the requirements of importing countries, and the other with lower standards and levels of enforcement for domestic market products. The top-down approach focuses more on the end product rather than the production practices. There are several indications that regulations pertaining to antibiotic use are not being followed. Recent events have brought the issue of overall food safety to the attention of the Chinese public and the Government is acting positively towards addressing deficiencies of the system. Chief among these is the Food Safety Law which comes into effect in June, 2009. But the central government must work in concert with provincial and local authorities to improve the infrastructure for inspecting and tracking food from farms to the end consumers to ensure a greater degree of safety of aquatic food for the Chinese population.     

Does food aid have disincentive effects on local production? A general equilibrium perspective on food aid in Ethiopia

This paper examined impacts of food aid on domestic food production employing a computable general equilibrium modelling technique and using data from Ethiopia. The simulation experiments have shown that food aid has unambiguous disincentive effects on domestic food production. The removal of food aid caused a modest increase in food prices but this stimulated food production. Employment and income generation effects of the latter outweighed the adverse effect of the former. Consequently, the removal of food aid led to improvements in aggregate household welfare. Contrary to some concerns in the food aid literature that any reduction in food aid would hurt the poor, the simulation experiments suggested that actually poor rural households and urban wage earners are the ones who benefit most in absence of food aid but entrepreneurs are more likely to encounter a marginal welfare decline. We have distinguished between in-kind food aid and cash equivalent transfers in order to isolate the disincentives that in-kind transfers would make to domestic production from those that are related to household purchasing power problem. The expansionary effect of removing food aid becomes significantly larger when it is accompanied by cash equivalent payments because the latter would provide demand side stimulus to agriculture while the removal of in-kind transfers would stimulate supply side, with the supply and demand side effects reinforcing each other. In our modelling framework, the only adverse effect would be a modest deterioration in the external current account, because the expansionary effects of food aid would cause imports to rise but exports to fall.     

Tracking,tracing, and business process interests in food commodities: A multi-level decision complexity

The ability for tracking and tracing activities has become a common feature in supply chains not the least because of quality assurance and product liability considerations. Furthermore, food safety concerns have put tracking and tracing at the centre point of discussions on the development of a competitive and sustainable food production. However, in commodities and especially in food commodities, the establishment of tracking and tracing capabilities meets many barriers that have prevented their broad based use beyond what is legally required. Characteristics in the food sector as well as the nature of food commodity products may result in unfavourable cost–benefit considerations at enterprise levels. The view is different at sector and policy levels which creates a complex decision situation. The paper develops a suitable tracking and tracing process and decision model which also supports the understanding of the deadlock the sector is in. The decision situation for enterprises and the sector is summarized in a cost–benefit decision table that provides a framework for future developments.