Sustainability Assessment of Organic Vegetable Production Using a Qualitative Multi-Attribute Model

Ileana Iocola, Gabriele Campanelli, Mariangela Diacono, Fabrizio Leteo, Francesco Montemurro, Alessandro Persiani and Stefano Canali
Additional contact information
Ileana Iocola: Consiglio per la Ricerca in Agricoltura e L’analisi Dell’economia Agraria, Centro di Ricerca Agricoltura Ambiente (CREA-AA), Via della Navicella 2-4, 00184 Roma (RM), Italy
Gabriele Campanelli: Consiglio per la Ricerca in Agricoltura e L’analisi Dell’economia Agraria, Centro di Ricerca Orticoltura e Florovivaismo (CREA-OF), Via Salaria 1, 63030 Monsapolo del Tronto (AP), Italy
Mariangela Diacono: Consiglio per la Ricerca in Agricoltura e L’analisi Dell’economia Agraria, Centro di Ricerca Agricoltura Ambiente (CREA-AA), Via Celso Ulpiani 5, 70125 Bari (BA), Italy
Fabrizio Leteo: Consiglio per la Ricerca in Agricoltura e L’analisi Dell’economia Agraria, Centro di Ricerca Orticoltura e Florovivaismo (CREA-OF), Via Salaria 1, 63030 Monsapolo del Tronto (AP), Italy
Francesco Montemurro: Consiglio per la Ricerca in Agricoltura e L’analisi Dell’economia Agraria, Centro di Ricerca Orticoltura e Florovivaismo (CREA-OF), Via Salaria 1, 63030 Monsapolo del Tronto (AP), Italy
Alessandro Persiani: Consiglio per la Ricerca in Agricoltura e L’analisi Dell’economia Agraria, Centro di Ricerca Agricoltura Ambiente (CREA-AA), Via Celso Ulpiani 5, 70125 Bari (BA), Italy
Stefano Canali: Consiglio per la Ricerca in Agricoltura e L’analisi Dell’economia Agraria, Centro di Ricerca Agricoltura Ambiente (CREA-AA), Via della Navicella 2-4, 00184 Roma (RM), Italy

Sustainability, 2018, vol. 10, issue 10, 1-20

Abstract: Organic agriculture is perceived as environmentally sustainable, but, under its umbrella, different production systems exist ranging from simplified organic productions to well diversified systems with a full implementation of agro-ecological approaches. Among several developed tools for agriculture sustainability assessment, multi-criteria models are increasingly gaining importance. In this study, we evaluated the use of the multi-criteria DEXi-BIOrt tool, coupled with data from long-term experiments, for the sustainability assessment of different organic vegetable production scenarios. These scenarios were applied in two Italian areas: the Adriatic coast of Marche Region and the Metaponto plan of Basilicata Region. Despite the presence of some critical issues, DEXI-BIOrt proved to be a valid tool for the sustainability evaluation of organic vegetable productions. In both areas, the most sustainable scenarios resulted the well diversified organic systems characterized by proper rotations, inclusion of agro-ecological service crops, cultivation of local and different cultivars, and presence of short supply chain mechanisms. Conversely, the implementation of the simplified organic substitution scenarios does not guarantee a suitable level of sustainability. The findings of this study could support decision makers in the implementation of appropriate measures for enhancing organic production sustainability in the framework of post-2020 Common Agricultural Policy.

Keywords: long term experiments; multi criteria analysis; organic farming; sensitivity analysis; strip cropping; sustainability indicators (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2018
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (4)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/10/10/3820/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/10/10/3820/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:10:y:2018:i:10:p:3820-:d:177376

Access Statistics for this article

Sustainability is currently edited by Ms. Alexandra Wu

More articles in Sustainability from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().