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International audience; Cultured meat involves producing meat from animal cells, not from slaughtered animals. This innovation has the potential to revolutionize the meat industry, with wide implications for the environment, health and animal welfare. The main purpose of this paper is to stimulate some economic research on cultured meat. In particular, this paper includes a prospective discussion on the demand and supply of cultured meat. It also discusses some early results on the environmental impacts of cultured meat, emphasizing the promises (e.g., regarding the reduction in land use) but also the uncertainties. It then argues that cultured meat is a moral improvement compared to conventional meat. Finally, it discusses some regulatory issues, and the need for more public support to the innovation.

International audience; Generic Bordeaux red wine (basic claret) can be regarded as being similar to an agricultural commodity. Production volumes are substantial, they are traded at high frequency and the quality of the product is relatively homogeneous. Unlike other commodities and the top-end wines (which represent only 3% of the traded volume), there is no futures market for generic Bordeaux wine. Reliable forecasts of prices can to large extent replace this information deficiency and improve the functioning of the market. We use state-space methods with monthly data to obtain a univariate forecasting model for the average price. The estimates highlight the stochastic trend and the seasonality present in the evolution of the price over the period 1999 to 2016. The model predicts the path of wine prices out of sample reasonably well, suggesting that this approach is useful for making reasonably accurate forecasts of future price movements.

Previous studies on the value of terroir, or more generally geographical indications (GI), used hedonic techniques. We use historical data and exploit temporal and geographical variations in the introduction of wine GIs in early twentieth century France to study the impact on the price of specific wines in the years and decades following their introduction. We find large effects of GIs on prices of some Champagne wines, but no significant impact on Bordeaux or other Champagne wines.

Relative to non-food items, food tends to be cheaper in rich, as compared with poor European countries. This tendency cannot be explained in terms of cost developments or foreign-trade considerations. A positive explanation proposed focuses on demand-income-supply interaction. An analysis of a cross-country price-augmented modification of Engel's Law, econometrically specified, indicates that the relative price of food is related positively to the supply of food items and negatively to that of non-food items. This finding is consistent with "agricultural price scissors", and also casts a different light on the nature of economic development and structural change. JEL Codes: D12, L11, L66, Q11 Keywords: Food, Prices, Moneta e Credito, V. 57, N. 227 (2004)

The study analyses the price formation and market functionality of the Finnish food chain. A significant portion of the report consists of international comparisons. The main comparison countries are the so-called old EU countries (EU15) of Western Europe, the new EU countries (EU12) and the United States. Comparisons are also made with individual countries. After the international comparisons, the price formation of the food chain, degree of concentration, competition, and the position of small producers is analysed for Finland in more detail. The main findings of the study are as follows: 1) a significant reason for the high price of foodstuffs in Finland is the high VAT, 2) the price level without VAT was in 2005 a couple of per cent higher and in December 2009 about 7 per cent higher than the average in the old EU countries, but it is considerably higher than in the new EU countries and the United States, 3) In Finland the price level of foodstuffs is elevated by the weak agricultural competitiveness (northern location and small farm size); on the other hand, the competitiveness of the foodstuffs industry and the wholesale and retail trade is rather good, 4) measured in terms of price-cost margins, competition works in Finland just as well in agriculture, the foodstuffs industry and the wholesale and retail trade as it does in the food chain of the comparison countries, 5) the large share of the wholesale and retail trade in the Finnish food chain is attributable to higher transport costs than in the comparison countries, 6) in Finland the prices of foodstuffs have moved in the same direction as in comparison countries, albeit with a lag of a few months; in 2009 the prices of dairy products, butter and margarine, meat, fish products and food products nevertheless fell by considerably less than in the comparison countries and less than the development of producer prices would have indicated, 7) the foodstuffs industry and the wholesale and retail trade are concentrated sectors; enterprises nevertheless compete with each other and with imports, 8) the degree of concentration, agreement practices and price development should be monitored especially in product groups where consumer prices have not fallen in line with a decline in producer prices, 9) access of small producers to markets is important from the standpoint of competition and consumer choice; the position of small producers can best be improved by fostering the exchange of information within the chain.

Die Wertschöpfungskette Milch in Deutschland steht vor der Herausforderung, sich in einem zunehmend liberalisierten Milch- und Milchproduktmarkt zu behaupten. Neben der Milchproduktion hat in der Wertschöpfungskette vor allem die Milchverarbeitung eine zentrale Funktion. Diese veredelt den international relativ homogenen Rohstoff Milch zu sehr unterschiedlichen Produkten. Die speziellen Produkteigenschaften von Milch (geringe Transportwürdigkeit und Lagerfähigkeit) erfordern zudem eine sehr enge Kopplung der beiden Wertschöpfungsstufen Milchproduktion und -verarbeitung. Dabei stehen sich in der Wertschöpfungskette viele Landwirte und einige Molkereien einem stark konzentrierten Lebensmitteleinzelhandel gegenüber. Die Molkereistruktur ist in Deutschland mittelständisch geprägt und weist einen abgeschwächten Strukturwandel auf. Dabei haben sich Konzernstrukturen gebildet. Die Konzentration der Unternehmen ist im europäischen Vergleich gering. Bei der Produktionsausrichtung sind regionale Schwerpunkte in Deutschland festzustellen. Im Norden werden tendenziell mehr Trockenmilcherzeugnisse und im Süden mehr Milchmischprodukte erzeugt. Insgesamt werden entsprechend der Verzehrsentwicklungen in Europa immer mehr Käse und Frischmilchprodukte produziert. Der Absatz von Milchprodukten in Deutschland ist dabei international orientiert, wobei der europäische Binnenmarkt im Vordergrund steht. Bei einzelnen Milchproduktgruppen, wie beispielsweise Käse, werden vor allem günstige Produkte exportiert und höherpreisige Produkte importiert. Die Molkereiunternehmen sind im Absatz mit einem stark konzentrierten Lebensmitteleinzelhandel konfrontiert. Im Lebensmitteleinzelhandel sind ein starker Verdrängungswettbewerb und ein zunehmender Trend hin zu Handelsmarken sowie eine Sortimentspolarisierung hin zu Handelsmarken und Premiummarken festzustellen. Deutsche Lebensmitteleinzelhandelsunternehmen sind international wettbewerbsfähig und expandieren zum Teil weltweit. Qualitätsmanagementsysteme sind dabei weit verbreitet und wichtige Vorraussetzungen für Absatzmöglichkeiten. The German dairy supply chain has to meet the challenge of a liberalising dairy market. Besides milk production milk processing plays a vital role in the dairy supply chain, within which milk, an internationally relatively homogeneous commodity, is processed into various products. The specific product properties of milk (low suitability for transport and storage) demand a very close linkage between dairy production and processing. At the same time there are a lot of milk producers and some dairies facing a high concentrated food retailing sector. The German milk processing structure is medium-sized and shows a weakened structural change. Thereby company structures have formed. In comparison with other European countries the companies are low concentrated. In Germany regional milk processing focuses on different orientations. In the north there is a relative high production of dry dairy products and in the south production concentrates on cheese and fresh dairy products. Overall more and more fresh dairy products and cheese are manufactured according to the development of the European food pattern. German distribution of milk products is internationally orientated, but mainly with a focus on the EU market. In case of single milk products, for example cheese, cheap products are exported and more expansive products are imported. Dairy companies are confronted with a high concentrated food retailing sector. Within the food retailing sector a strong crowding out takes place and the sales trend shows product polarisation in retail labels and brands. German retailing companies are internationally competitive and some are showing expansion world wide. Quality management systems are common around the world and are required in retailing.

Der Preisauftrieb auf den internationalen Märkten für Getreide, Milch und Milcherzeugnisse hat bei Landwirten eine Aufbruchstimmung aufkommen lassen, bei Verbrauchern und bei den Unternehmen der betroffenen Wirtschaftszweige aber Verunsicherung bewirkt. Unsicherheit besteht vor allem in der Einschätzung, ob es sich gegenwärtig um eine eher zufällige und vorübergehende Konstellation auf den Märkten handelt, oder ob eine Wende auf den Weltagrarmärkte eingetreten ist. Der Beitrag zeigt die verschiedenen Wirkungszusammenhänge auf, die die bisherige Markt- und Preisentwicklung bestimmt haben und die zukünftige Entwicklung beeinflussen.