The climate and biodiversity crises have prompted most industries to adopt nature-positive actions that support ecosystem functioning and decarbonisation. This shift is prominent in the food and beverage (F&B) sector, particularly multinational alcoholic beverage companies, where regulatory pressure, capital markets, and consumer demand have accelerated efforts to engage suppliers on sustainability. This paper assessed the environmental and economic performance of spring barley suppliers to a global alcoholic beverage company (BC) in Ireland as a case study. To understand performance variability, identify opportunities for improvement, and provide national context, spring barley farmers supplying the BC in Ireland were compared with a nationally representative sample in 2020 and 2023. Estimates of emissions per euro of output and per tonne of spring barley were produced to support the BC’s understanding of its Scope 3 emissions. BC supplying farms outperformed national farms economically, with higher output and margins. The BC farmers had higher total emissions in 2020, decreasing by 2023, resulting in improved emissions efficiency, with BC farms emitting less per euro of output, whilst national farms increased. Synthetic fertiliser emissions were the highest source of emissions for both years. Differences between the years in emissions and economic performance highlight the environmental and economic volatility farmers face in the tillage industry. Our study produces emission efficiency metrics useful to F&B companies, highlights the importance of harmonised data and verification methods for companies wishing to improve sustainability performance. Our findings support F&B companies in working more effectively with suppliers to reduce Scope 3 emissions accountably.

Integrated Pest Management (IPM) is a well-established framework for agricultural crop protection. IPM has typically been represented as a pyramid of practices, beginning at the base with agronomic and cultural approaches and gravitating upwards towards chemical plant protection products. However, this representation is an insufficient description of IPM adoption at the farm level as it cannot incorporate the many challenges faced by farmers and growers. This paper presents an alternative approach to contextualize horticultural IPM based on a sample of commercial vegetable and fruit growers from the Republic of Ireland (N = 45), based on an existing model. This model incorporates the management, business, and sustainability aspects influencing IPM adoption. Utilization of the model on data collected from growers through a series of semi-structured interviews contributed to a. a comprehensive exploration of the type of IPM tools being used and b. contextualized analysis of the data with the intention of capturing grower perspectives. The findings highlight a crop and production system effect on the type of IPM tools used by the growers and suggest influence from a range of internal and external motivating and limiting factors. Excerpts from the grower interviews underline the complexity of IPM and draw attention to the lack of grower-centricity captured by IPM paradigms heretofore.

BACKGROUND:Integrated pest management (IPM) is the primary global crop protection paradigm. Based around a broad range of techniques, it is a framework for the management of pests (animal pests, weeds, diseases) with the reduction of pesticides as a core function. For policy, research and technological stakeholders to effectively assess and support IPM programmes, it is necessary to quantify adoption at the farm level. This study quantifies adoption in four temperate countries (Ireland, Northern Ireland, Scotland and England) and explores potential influence from the wider systemic landscape. Quantification is through the application of a peer-reviewed horticultural IPM metric. RESULTS:The average IPM score for the four countries analysed was 58 of 100 (range 5-100). Growers from England averaged highest (64 of 100) and displayed strong levels of adoption of the core IPM practices, suggesting that there are elements within the IPM landscape in England contributing to the systemic supports required for higher adoption at the farm level. CONCLUSION:This exploratory study is the first to apply a universal metric for horticulture to a multinational dataset. The assessment of results on a regional basis allows for the comparison of IPM adoption from national to farm level, establishing a transferable framework for longitudinal benchmarking. We conclude that the overarching operational realm in which growers function has the potential to positively influence how IPM is adopted in the field and that the context most favourable to success is informed and cognizant about IPM motivations and limitations at the grower level. © 2026 The Author(s). Pest Management Science published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd on behalf of Society of Chemical Industry.

An extended Technology Acceptance Model (TAM) was used to explore the pathway between the perception of Integrated Pest Management (IPM) by growers and its practical uptake. IPM is an established framework for the management of crop health based on a range of strategic and tactical horticultural techniques. In this research, IPM adoption is quantified through the application of a novel IPM metric. Policy makers need to understand the perception to practice pathway for IPM in order to increase adoption in line with regulatory frameworks. The TAM examines perceived usefulness (PU) and perceived ease of use (PEOU) on the attitude and subsequent acceptance of a technology; extended TAM frameworks incorporate additional antecedent variables. In this study, we include the additional latent variables of business features and innovativeness to examine their capacity to predict the adoption of IPM at the farm business level for growers of horticultural crops (n = 100) in the Republic of Ireland, surveyed in 2023. Findings verify the correlation between PU, PEOU and attitude and the effect of PEOU on PU. PU has a stronger association with attitude than PEOU. Neither business features nor innovativeness were significantly related to PU or PEOU, respectively. The hypothetical correlation between attitude and IPM adoption was rejected, demonstrating a divide in the perception to practice trajectory and adding to the literature on the attitude to adoption gap. The findings demonstrate the value of empirical assessment of behavioural data. An implication for IPM policy direction is that grower perception does not always infer future grower adoption. Therefore, a cautionary reliance on perception data during the ex-ante stages of IPM incentivisation development is recommended.

Modern wheat production in Ireland faces significant disease pressure from Fusarium head blight (FHB) and yellow and brown rust, and reductions in high-risk fungicides heighten the need for alternative control strategies. Biological control agents and basic substances offer potential bio-based solutions, but reported levels of disease reduction are variable and often lower than conventional fungicides. A scoping literature review was conducted to identify EU-approved or closely related biological and basic substances for managing FHB and rust diseases in wheat. Data from 65 international studies were extracted, and disease reduction was calculated relative to untreated controls, with results analysed separately by trial type (laboratory, glasshouse, and field). Trichoderma spp. and chitosan emerged as the most promising alternatives, based on their combined performance across effectiveness, feasibility, and availability criteria. Laboratory efficacy frequently did not translate to field conditions, underscoring the importance of field-based evaluation and optimised application strategies. Most studies were conducted outside Ireland, highlighting the need for region-specific research to assess practical feasibility and effectiveness under local climatic and agronomic conditions. This analysis provides a framework to prioritise future research and development of biological and basic substance alternatives, supporting more sustainable wheat disease management in Ireland and across the EU.

The European Union’s (EU) Farm to Fork strategy seeks to reduce agricultural pesticide use by 50%, both of total pesticide use and of the most hazardous chemicals. While Ireland has achieved the goal of overall pesticide use reduction, more progress is needed regarding more hazardous substances. Ireland’s cool damp climate is unique within the EU, and with little empirical data on the possible impacts of achieving this goal on Irish farming, we sought to estimate these in cereal crops using a ‘Delphi’ style iterative expert panel methodology, conducted over two rounds, rather than until consensus was reached, to allow for knowledge gaps that may exist to become apparent. A total of 17 crop production experts with at least five years of relevant experience were surveyed anonymously, and then their answers were compiled and fed back to them, allowing participants to revise their responses based on the opinion of the group. Participants estimated that reduced use of more hazardous fungicides and insecticides could both reduce yields by 10–15%, while reduced use of herbicides would reduce yields of winter cereals by up to 30%. These impacts are substantially higher than those predicted in other Europe-wide studies. Application of additional Integrated Pest Management measures was estimated to reduce yield loss but not entirely mitigate it. These findings highlight the economic and food security trade-offs that may be required to achieve the Farm to Fork strategy’s goals.

This paper assesses the influence of weather events on the environmental efficiency of Irish dairy farms. Stochastic frontier models based on distance functions (hyperbolic, enhanced and restricted) are estimated using panel data surveyed between 2017 and 2021. Our results indicate that Irish dairy farms can improve their productive performance by increasing desirable outputs by 5.49 per cent and reducing undesirable output (nitrogen surplus) by 5.20 per cent. Results also show that higher temperature and soil moisture are negatively associated with environmental efficiency. These findings highlight the importance of taking into account weather events in farm managerial decisions and policies that aim at tackling environmental challenges in the Irish dairy sector.

Integrated Pest Management (IPM) is a crop health paradigm offering a framework for sustainable pest management. IPM encourages the integration of control measures to minimise the risks associated with pests and pest management practices, including pesticides. To optimise adoption it is necessary to understand how growers use IPM, to identify measures lagging in uptake or suitability for uptake and to explore limitations to both. This study has quantified IPM adoption using Irish food horticulture as a case study, through the development and application of an IPM metric based on field, protected and top fruit production systems. The compound metric was developed using a Delphi-style methodology with three expert panels representing the three production systems. The results show that adoption was widespread with growers overall attaining low to mid-range scores (<70, out of a maximum 100). Field crop growers performed best with a mean score of 44.8. While these results demonstrated that IPM has been adopted, it also suggested that there is room for improvement. This presentation of an IPM measurement instrument for temperate horticulture systems provides the means to benchmark IPM performance and chart cumulative progress. This is useful to policy makers and IPM stakeholders to compare performance on a national and cross-national basis with a view to refining best practice, while defining specific components of IPM for improvement.

The 2015 EU milk quota abolition initiated considerable expansion in the dairy sector. This expansion has increased the demand for additional labour in some EU countries, most significantly in Ireland. This paper explores the role of hired labour on Irish dairy farms' technical efficiency (TE). We use a detailed farm-level panel data set of a representative sample from 2000 to 2018. To estimate transient, persistent, and overall TE over time, we apply a 4-component stochastic frontier model. Our findings show significant variation in TE scores over the period. We also control for endogeneity to obtain marginal effects of hired labour on TE. The results reveal that hired labour has a significant yet small, positive effect on farms' TE. Our findings suggest that the effect of hired labour on TE is larger for small and medium-sized farms. This effect is larger when herd size increases.

Purpose The purpose of this study is to analyse the impact of behavioural determinants, such as consumer attitude, subjective norm, behavioural control and sustainable buying behaviour, on organic food purchase behaviour in different EU countries. Design/methodology/approach A structured survey of more than 5000 individuals from Germany, Netherlands, Spain, Italy and Czech Republic was conducted to elicit consumer responses regarding behavioural determinants of organic food selection. Both a structural equation modelling approach and a multinomial logit model were employed to analyse the data. Findings Consumer attitudes, subjective norms and behavioural control were shown to significantly influence the frequency of organic food purchasing behaviour for the whole sample and to varying degrees across each of the countries. The effect of a sustainable buying behaviour was found to be more pronounced for Germany, Netherlands and Italy than for Czech Republic and Spain. Research limitations/implications Analysis is based on self-reported data on frequency of organic food purchases, which might be subject to recall bias. Overestimation may arise as consumers tend to report increased purchasing due to the “desirable” qualities of organic food. We tried to ensure that the translations bore similar meanings cross country although some miscomprehension by survey respondents was a possibility. Practical implications To stimulate consumer demand for organic products, it is important to design policies and interventions that take into account the impact of both behavioural factors and demographic attributes on consumer decision-making across various locations. For example, market analysts and policymakers may find it useful to exploit the impact of consumer attitude towards the qualities of organics to induce sales of such food in their locations. Originality/value This paper combines unique survey data from five EU countries using a common model to explore and compare consumer behavioural preferences for multiple organic food products. In addition to a classic triad of behavioural factors believed to influence organic food purchases, sustainable buying behaviour as a determinant of organic purchasing behaviour was included in the analysis.

Innovation is a key driver of productivity growth. This paper proposes a novel methodology in order to explore the impact of farm-level innovations on farm productivity and its components (i.e. technology, efficiency and scale) using representative data from Irish dairy farms. We measure innovation by an index based on employed production practices, continuous innovation activity and knowledge weighted by expert opinions. The results suggest that more innovative Irish dairy farmers are more productive. Specifically, all farmers improve their production technology and efficiency through their use of innovations, but farmers at specific levels of innovativeness may experience a decrease in productivity due to the small scale at which they operate. This indicates that innovation has a non-linear effect on productivity. We discuss the policy implications for reducing the unequal gains of innovation across farmers.

Circular farming is a sustainable food production system focused on recovering nutrients and minimizing negative environmental effects. Consumers' preference for circular food stimulates producers to adopt circular farming systems. This study aims to analyse consumers' willingness to pay for beefsteak produced in a circular farming system and behaviours that influence their preferences. 5,246 EU consumers were surveyed using choice experiment methodology and planed behaviour theory. Results showed circular beefsteak is preferred more than conventional beefsteak, but less than organic. Similarly, consumers are willing to pay a higher premium for circular beefsteak than for conventional and lower than organic. Preferences regarding planned behaviour theory showed social norms and perception of behavioural control increases preferences for circular beefsteak. Environmental attitudes increase organic beefsteak preferences, but reduce conventional beefsteak preferences, like sustainable behaviours and frequency. The potential market for circular beefsteak urges policymakers to create a standardized legal framework for circularity labelling, similar to organic certification.

In 2019, Ireland was the third-largest exporter of butter in the world butter market but Irish butter prices have been more volatile compared to other Irish dairy products. Yet, empirical research that examines the market price dynamics and international competitor behavior in the butter market remains scarce. The Vector Error Correction Model was applied to data from 1970–2019, to test the extent to which changes in competitor butter prices and Irish farm milk prices had an impact on Irish butter prices. The results provide evidence of asymmetric price transmissions, Irish butter prices were more responsive to shocks in New Zealand (NZ) butter prices and Irish farm milk prices in the long-run. Declining world milk prices over time, related to milk supply, perishability and storability factors, may prevent symmetric response of Irish milk prices to changes/shocks in Irish butter prices. Moreover, different target markets and EU/NZ policies for Ireland and NZ butter may prevent symmetric response of Irish butter prices to changes/shocks from NZ butter prices. Essentially, the take home message for the butter industry is that Irish butter prices must not be studied in isolation, NZ is a major butter competitor to Ireland in the world market and NZ butter prices play a significant role on how Irish butter prices change.

Automation has always played a significant role in the productivity and efficiency of agriculture. This paper explores the role of automation on farms' technical efficiency (TE) in an expanding dairy sector. We use a representative sample of Irish dairy farms that includes detailed data on automated technologies. We apply a latent class stochastic frontier model to assess technology heterogeneity amongst Irish dairy farms to obtain their TE scores. We identify two classes of farms: smaller, less intensive and larger, and more intensive farms. We find significant differences between the classes in relation to farm characteristics, input use, labour efficiency, and TE scores. Larger, more intensive farms produce closer to their stochastic frontier. Our findings also suggest that automation has a heterogeneous effect on farms' TE depending on farms' classification. Specifically, adopting automated cluster removers and scrapers is associated with higher TE on smaller, less intensive farms. In contrast, automated parlour feeders are positively associated with larger, more intensive farms' TE. Finally, the implications of adopting automated technologies on Irish farms are discussed.

The agriculture and livestock sectors face several challenges related to achieving the current EU environmental objectives. Two of the major policy goals include reducing greenhouse gas emissions and ensuring an increased share of nitrogen, phosphorus, and potassium from renewable sources. Farmers are continuously seeking to adopt technologies and solutions to ensure sustainable food production systems. Adoption of innovation at the farm level based on a circular economy may improve resource efficiency, allow the reuse and recovery of nutrients, and reduce the negative effects of emissions on soil, water, and air. This study aims to identify the factors affecting the adoption of several circular agronomy solutions using a semi-structured questionnaire on a sample of farmers in four EU countries: Spain, Austria, the Czech Republic, and Italy. The results indicated that acceptance of proposed circular innovations is closely related to farmers' environmental objectives, experience, university education, previous experience in innovation adoption, and environmental attitudes. Additionally, institutional support plays a significant role in adoption decisions. Factors affecting adoption decisions may assist policymakers in designing more specific and efficient measures to help farmers meet their current social needs and environmental challenges.

The paper aims to evaluate regional farm efficiency rankings for Ireland which seeks to be a leader in the global dairy industry. It conducts a within-country analysis based on technical and scale efficiency of dairy farms to explore how regional constraints imposed by the milk quota may have affected Ireland's regional farm efficiency levels. The stochastic meta-frontier approach is adopted because of its usefulness in comparing regional technical efficiencies. The findings suggest that policies aiming to promote labor and soil quality improvement in the East region, and that relate to discussion groups in the South region, in addition to management of herd size, would be useful for improving efficiency postquota. Moreover, some farms expanded beyond their optimal scale leading to a reduction in efficiency levels and this points to the need to tailor farm advice and promote caution and prudence in farm expansion decisions, especially in a region like South West. [EconLit Citations: D22, D24, L25, Q1, R1, R58].

This paper investigates the impact of the engagement of individual farmers with Farm Advisory Services (FAS) on total factor productivity (TFP) growth, as a relevant indicator of competitiveness under the vision of sustainable intensification. Using farm-level data from the Irish dairy sector between 2008 and 2017, we estimate a random-coefficients stochastic frontier model and construct a TFP growth index, extending Orea (2002) such that the contribution of FAS becomes an additional component of the index. The results indicate that the main driver of TFP growth was technical change and efficiency gains; a negative scale effect slowed down TFP growth, but this impact was counteracted by the positive contribution of FAS to productivity growth.

There is a need to transform our current food system if we are to feed the rapidly expanding global population while maintaining planetary health. Within the island of Ireland, there is an urgent need to diversify the foods that currently contribute to our populations' protein intake. A Shared Island Innovative Food System approach is required to achieve this in a manner that is sustainable and provides benefits to producers, consumers and other supply chain participants. The Protein-I project employs such an approach, with the paradigm focusing on production of plant food through to human health, while paying particular attention to the development of the rural bioeconomy. Using an interdisciplinary approach, the team will develop strategies to maximise sustainable plant protein production in a traceable/transparent fashion and assess the impact of changes to existing value chains and the development of new value chains for the rural economy. A smart supply chain technology solution tailored to the needs of the agri-food industry will be developed and tested. Additionally, we will co-design consumer-led approaches to diversify plant protein intake, model the impact of changes at the population level and perform human interventions to demonstrate efficacy in terms of achieving adequate nutrition and improved health. Comprehensive engagement with stakeholders is embedded throughout the whole project to embrace the multi-actor approach. Overall, the project will be a key step towards future-proofing our food system on the island of Ireland and moving towards protecting planetary and population health, within the context of a just transition.