This thesis examines the global governance of sustainable biofuels, with a specific focus on Brazil and the European Union (EU) as major players in the production, trade and use of first-generation liquid biofuels. Biofuels are solid, liquid or gas fuels derived from biomass sources such as starch, sugars, fat, wood, or waste. So-called first gener...
Agriculture in the lowlands of south Brazil is of strategic importance at the national level, since it supplies around 80% of the rice consumed by the Brazilian population. In Rio Grande do Sul, the southernmost state in Brazil, three million hectares of lowlands are ready for grain-based agriculture. Of this area, about half is fallow, partly used...
In the last decades consumers preferences have continuously triggered changes in quality regulations and the implementation of various private quality standards. New quality demands also imply new coordination arrangements to support transactions between food companies and their suppliers. To coordinate these transactions, food companies (i.e. buye...
Earthlings like to measure everything (especially now that we are undergoing the era of big-data revolution) maybe because it is such a nice hobby... although a more serious school of thought believes that when measuring our environment we get to understand physics and ourselves. This thesis explores the uncertainties in rainfall measurements from ...
The objective of the research was to explore factors determining cattle farmers' intention to adopt improved natural grassland in Brazil. The research was carried out in the state of Rio Grande do Sul, in the south of Brazil.
In deze studie wordt de duurzaamheid van de (gespecialiseerde) Nederlandse vleesveehouderij kwalitatief vergeleken met twee andere dierlijke Nederlandse productiesectoren (varken en vleespluimvee) en met de vleesveehouderij uit Ierland en Brazilië, de belangrijkste exporteurs waarmee de Nederlandse sector op de Nederlandse markt concurreert. Deze v...
Summary In this PhD thesis I studied the influence of biochar discourses on the political practices in Brazil and the impact of biochar on soil organic carbon (SOC) stocks, thus contributing to the current debate on the potential of biochar to mitigate climate change. Biochar is the solid material obtained from the carbonization of biomass. The del...
Keywords: Strategy evaluation, global networks, supply chains, policy Delphi, conjoint analysis, economic development, competitiveness, beekeeping, interventions, uncertainty, upgrading. Competition for the end-customer nowadays takes place more among networks of firms than among individual firms. The analysis of competing firms, thus, has to go be...
Sustainability Performance of Soybean and Beef Chains in Latin America The objective of this thesis, was to analyze the sustainability performance of soybean and beef production chains in Latin America (LA). First identifying a set of sustainability issues of soybean and beef production chains in a LA-EU context was carried out. Sustainability issu...
Executive summary The advancement of regulatory instruments providing for farm animal welfare measures has been marked by various political and regulatory constraints in both domestic and international settings.In an attempt to overcome some of these constraints, a number of innovative governance arrangements have been developed over the two last d...
