Sustainable agri-food production

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https://hdl.handle.net/20.500.12518/104

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Browsing Sustainable agri-food production by Author "Adenuga, Adewale"

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    The Case for Long-Term Land Leasing: A Review of the Empirical Literature
    (MDPI, 2021-03-01) Adenuga, Adewale; Jack, Claire; McCarry, Ronan
    Land, as a factor of production, has a vital role within the agricultural sector compared with other sectors. However, in recent years, land mobility has become a significant issue around the world with increased concentration and competition for land ownership, limiting the overall competitiveness of the agri-food sector and constraining the potential opportunities for new entrant farmers to access land. While land leasing is increasingly being embraced as a common form of land tenure serving as an alternative to the purchase of land for agriculture, the length of lease has been shown to have a significant impact on land productivity and sustainability. In this study, we provide a comprehensive and systematic review exploring the benefits of longer-term land leasing with a particular focus on developed countries and some selected developing countries in the context of commercial farming with more formal arrangements. Specifically, we highlight the barriers to longterm land leasing and identify potential incentives that might be adopted to encourage long-term land leasing for both landowners and farmers who seek to rent land.
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    Quantifying land fragmentation in Northern Ireland Cattle Enterprises
    (MDPI, 2022-03-06) Milne, Margaret Georgina; Byrne, Andrew William; Campbell, Emma; Graham, Jordan; McGrath, John; Kirke, Raymond; McMaster, Wilma; Zimmermann, Jesko; Adenuga, Adewale
    Farmland fragmentation is considered to be a defining feature of Northern Ireland’s (NI) agricultural landscape, influencing agricultural efficiency, productivity, and the spread of livestock diseases. Despite this, the full extent of farmland fragmentation in cattle farms in NI is not well understood, and little is known of how farmland fragmentation either influences, or is influenced by, different animal production types. Here, we describe and quantify farmland fragmentation in cattle farms for all of NI, using GIS processing of land parcel data to associate individual parcels with data on the cattle business associated with the land. We found that 35% of farms consisted of five or more fragments, with dairy farms associated with greater levels of farmland fragmentation, fragment dispersal and contact with contiguous neighbours compared to other production types. The elevated levels of farmland fragmentation in dairy production compared to non-dairy, may be associated with the recent expansion of dairy farms by land acquisition, following the abolition of the milk quota system in 2015. The comparatively high levels of farmland fragmentation observed in NI cattle farms may also have important implications for agricultural productivity and epidemiology alike. Whilst highly connected pastures could facilitate the dissemination of disease, highly fragmented land could also hamper productivity via diseconomies of scale, such as preventing the increase of herd sizes or additionally, adding to farm costs by increasing the complexity of herd management.
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    Understanding the drivers and motivations of farm diversification: Evidence from Northern Ireland using a mixed methods approach
    (SAGE Publications, 2020-11) Jack, Claire; Adenuga, Adewale; Ashfield, Austen; Mullan, Conall
    Farmers are increasingly required to become more productive and innovative to ensure effective 9 management of farm resources and to improve their livelihoods. Farm diversification has been 10 identified as a viable strategy that can be adopted by farm businesses to achieve these objectives 11 in order to reduce their reliance on agricultural production as the main source of household 12 income. In this study, we employ a mixed methods approach to analyse the factors influencing 13 farm diversification and diversification strategies in Northern Ireland. The challenges of setting 14 up a farm diversification enterprise were also explored. Data collection and analysis were 15 undertaken by combining both quantitative and qualitative approaches in a two-stage process 16 using primary data obtained from a survey of farm businesses and interviews with key 17 stakeholders involved in the Northern Ireland agricultural sector. The study results show that the 18 primary motivating factor in pursuing farm-level diversification is the need to generate additional 19 income. The analysis has shown that farm level diversification has the capacity to contribute to 20 both the sustainability of family farms and the wider rural economy. The study results support 21 the need for governments to explore the development of policy measures to support 22 diversification at farm level.
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    Unraveling the impact of variable external input use on the cost efficiency of dairy farms in Europe
    (Elsevier, 2020-10-14) Ojo, O.M.; Adenuga, Adewale; Lauwers, L.; Van Meensel, J.
    There has been a global shift towards intensification in the dairy sector in recent years which may have considerable impact on the cost efficiency and economic returns of farms. Considering this, the goal of this study is to offer an empirical analysis of the effect of variable external input use on dairy farms. Employing a novel Activity Analysis Model (AAM), the study analysis was conducted in two distinct but complementary steps. In the first step, we discriminated two technologies (low and high inputs) which allow us to classify a sample of dairy farms according to their level of intensification, while in the second step, we evaluated two cost efficient frontiers instead of assessing individual farm inefficiency scores. With this approach, we explore different technologies within a sample of EU dairy farms. Our results, on average, shows that agricultural practices using low inputs dominates the high input ones for farms operating on a large scale while a slight dominance of high input over low inputs exist for small scale farmers. While we reckon that low input can be cost competitive with their high input counterparts, we also note that regional differences do exist. Thus, showing that the significant gap between the two discriminating frontiers depends not only on farm size but also on farm region. We found that increased cost efficiency can reduce the negative environmental impact of EU-dairy farms while simultaneously reducing farmers’ production costs. The results of the study can therefore provide a direction to policymakers and dairy farmers alike as regards the efficient use of external inputs which may consequently reduce environmental burdens associated with dairy farms.