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Purpose: Employing a theoretical model of human behaviour (COM-B), the current study explores the factors influencing farmers' engagement with grass measurement on Irish dairy farms. Methodology: The current study employed a qualitative research design. One-to-one semi-structured interviews were carried out with 21 dairy farmers. Findings: Factors inhibiting farmers from engaging in grass measurement included a high perceived task effort, a lack of skill and self-efficacy to carry out the task, uncertainty over personal value of engagement, a lack of tangible support, and a confidence in, and preference for, existing intuition-based decision-making. Practical implications: Recommendations for communication, extension, education and technology development are offered to tackle the 'high task effort' associated with grass measurement by farmers and to support skill development and self-efficacy of dairy farmers. Theoretical implications: The study proves value in moving from behavioural frameworks which focus solely on individual constructs as 'barriers to adoption' towards using frameworks which also account for the important role of factors external to the individual such as their social and physical surroundings. Value: A comprehensive theoretical framework is offered for understanding dairy farmers' engagement with grass measurement along with evidence-based suggestions for communication, extension, education and technology development.

The current research examines the emergent literature of Critical Data Studies, and particularly aligns with Michael and Lupton's (2016) manifesto calling for researchers to study the Public Understanding of Big Data. The aim of this paper is to explore Irish stakeholders' narratives on data sharing in agriculture, and the ways in which their attitudes towards different data sharing governance models reflect their understandings of data, the impact that data hold in their lives and in the farming sector, as well as their preferences for how data should be governed within agriculture. Seven focus groups were held in 2019 with Irish stakeholders from a variety of backgrounds, including agri-researchers, those working in SMEs, and farmers of varying ages and sectors. The primary activities carried out during these focus groups centred upon asking participants to discuss four different data sharing governance models, and to work their way through a set of value cards relating to these models. Focus group results are studied using an inductive, data-driven form of thematic analysis (Braun and Clarke 2006). Five primary themes cross-cut these focus groups: 1) Desire for a data intermediary, 2) Reversing the value chain, 3) Categorisation of data, 4) The common good, and 5) Potential danger in data sharing. These themes are explored in the paper through a detailed discussion of the focus group results, in which the authors track the manifestation of these themes across focus groups, and the ways they sometimes morphed or changed depending upon the participating stakeholder group. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Employing a theoretical model of human behaviour (COM-B), the current study explores the factors influencing farmers' engagement with grass measurement on Irish dairy farms. The current study employed a qualitative research design. One-to-one semi-structured interviews were carried out with 21 dairy farmers. Factors inhibiting farmers from engaging in grass measurement included a high perceived task effort, a lack of skill and self-efficacy to carry out the task, uncertainty over personal value of engagement, a lack of tangible support, and a confidence in, and preference for, existing intuition-based decision-making. Recommendations for communication, extension, education and technology development are offered to tackle the 'high task effort' associated with grass measurement by farmers and to support skill development and self-efficacy of dairy farmers. The study proves value in moving from behavioural frameworks which focus solely on individual constructs as 'barriers to adoption' towards using frameworks which also account for the important role of factors external to the individual such as their social and physical surroundings. A comprehensive theoretical framework is offered for understanding dairy farmers' engagement with grass measurement along with evidence-based suggestions for communication, extension, education and technology development. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective: As countries struggle to meet the set targets for population salt intake, there have been calls for more regulated approaches to reducing dietary salt intake. However, little is known about how the public perceives various salt reduction policies; an important line of investigation given that the implementation and success of these policies often depend on public sentiment. We investigated the attitudes and beliefs of consumers towards salt reduction and their support for thirteen different government-led salt reduction policies.Design: A cross-sectional online survey measured participants' knowledge, beliefs and attitudes in relation to salt reduction.Setting: The survey was carried out with participants from the Republic of Ireland.Subjects: Five hundred and one participants recruited via a market research agency completed the survey.Results: We found that the vast majority of participants supported eleven of the government-led salt reduction policies, which included measures such as education, labelling and salt restriction in foods (both voluntary and regulated, across a range of settings). The two proposed fiscal policies (subsidising low-salt foods and taxing high-salt foods) received less support in comparison, with the majority of participants opposed to a tax on high-salt foods. A series of multiple regressions revealed that individual attitudes and beliefs related to health and salt were stronger predictors of support than sociodemographic factors, lifestyle or knowledge.Conclusions: The study provides an important evidence base from which policy makers may draw when making decisions on future policy steps to help achieve national salt targets. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]