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The paper’s objective was to define the main supply sources of organic food processing companies and the barriers occurring in the process of raw produce acquisition. Therefore, in 2019, a survey on organic food processing enterprises was carried out. The survey among 55 processing companies concerned supply in raw organic produce, sales channels, and collaboration within the organic food supply chain. The research results show that the providers of organic food processors are mostly farmers and, to a lesser extent – intermediaries. In the process of provider selection, what is most important for processors are the quality and availability of agricultural products as well as the trust and credibility of a producer. In their opinion, the most important problems occurring in organic food processing are irregularity of deliveries and an inadequate amount of raw produce supplied. Consequently, a number of processors import part of the raw material needed for their production. Therefore, in order to improve the functioning of the processing sphere, measures in the area of farmer and processor collaboration and the improvement of the distribution system need to be introduced or intensified

The objective of the paper is identifying the main organic food sales channels from processing companies and attempting to determine their influence on organic food processing. Recently, the dynamic development of organic farming and its market has been observed. Nevertheless, the elements of this market show a number of weaknesses. One of the weakest links of the studied market is the processing of organic food, which bears a high transaction cost resulting from, among others, low distribution development. The paper presents the results of an inquiry research carried out in the first half of 2019 on 55 organic food processors. Conducted research shows that the production structure of the examined companies, mainly focused on fruit, vegetable and cereal products, is only partly adjusted to consumer expectations, who increasingly prefer organic dairy and meat. The main distribution channel is sales to small retail outlets. Wholesale trade came second, although still too underdeveloped, to assure effective products flow from processors to retail. More than half of the studied processors sell their products abroad, mainly to EU countries, North America and Asia. However, it is low-processed products, which are mostly exported. This is an unfavourable phenomenon from a value-added generating perspective.

Distribution of organic food in Poland has a number of weaknesses resulting from low and irregular supply as well as dispersion of producers and intermediaries. The paper presents the outcomes of research carried out in 2012 in three types of retail outlets offering organic food, i.e. specialist shops, groceries and retail networks. The investigation was conducted in the form of indepth interviews using a standardised questionnaire. As the research shows, only in specialist stores does the product range satisfy consumer needs, whereas in the other outlets it is limited generally to processed products. Wholesalers, organic farms and brokers are the main providers of the surveyed retail outlets; nevertheless, specialist shops use the services of more providers than the other types of outlets. Low supply of organic food results in high retail prices. Specialist shops and groceries apply margins up to 40% on average, while retail networks have margins up to 20%., eISSN 2544-0659

The paper discusses results of the research concerning potential and strategy of competitiveness of companies of fruit and vegetable processing industry located in the Wielkopolskie voivodeship. Special attention was paid to the assessment of the companies’ financial situation, their production resources, management system and adopted development strategies. The investigated companies are characterised by strong domestic market position, which is mainly results of the assessment of their financial situation. They asses competitiveness potential very high, particularly human resources and related with them management skills. Furthermore, most of the companies assess the use of strategy of quality control and specialisation strategy as high or very high.