Projects

Food systems face a dual challenge: they are responsible for a third of global greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and are at the same time heavily affected by climate change. Agri-food trade across borders plays an important role in this challenge as food systems are globalized, and both the GHG emission intensity of and climate change impacts on agricultural production vary internationally. The overall research objective of the PhD thesis is to ...

This project develops a search and matching model to study the dynamics among intermediate traders in agricultural products in developing countries. The model is used to predict policy implications of regional specialisation, investment in transport and communication infrastructure, and trade reforms for agricultural development. The models will be tested empirically in comparing agricultural policies in Burundi and Rwanda.

STRADA aims at supporting the design of EU trade policies in accordance with European sustainability objectives and global
environmental challenges, and with consideration of other countries’ development objectives. To this end, STRADA will
design novel tools, indicators and analysis, but also enhance the dialogue across diverse stakeholders with different
approaches to agricultural trade sustainability.
STRADA will ...

This interdisciplinary project aims to bridge these two disconnected fields of research. Combining political science

to study the motivations behind EU-decisions (= Brussels) on social trade conditionality with agricultural

economics to study the effects of trade conditions on micro(= farm and farm worker) level, we aim to reach

a more profound understanding of how trade arrangements can contribute to social ...

Nematodes can in some cases transmit viruses that are not desirable - or are even prohibited - in the plant trade sector. The XiphiVIR project aimed to develop a way to detect these so-called nepoviruses, with the following research questions: 1) Which methods are currently already available to detect (nepo)viruses in plants and nematodes, and which of these offer the best options as a ...

Standards are increasingly governing international food production and trade. While public standards are set by public authorities, private standards are set by private companies and non-state actors. Private food standards started to emerge at the end of the 1990s, mainly in response to consumer concerns in high-income countries about food safety and quality, and later expanded to address environmental and ethical concerns. Due to the ...

Since the second world war, agriculture in the EU has become increasingly intensive through the introduction of high-yielding crop varieties, advanced farming techniques, and the replacement of biological functions and services with high inputs of synthetic fertilizers and pesticides. While these practices have boosted agricultural production, food security, food quality, and economic development, they have also resulted in severe ...