The increasing policy interest and academic debates on non-tariff measures (NTMs) has stimulated a growing literature on how NTMs affect agri-food trade. The empirical literature provides contrasting and heterogeneous evidence, with some studies supporting the 'standards as catalysts' view, and others favouring the 'standards as barriers' explanation. To the extent that NTMs can influence trade, understanding the prevailing effect, and the motivations behind one effect or the other, is a pressing issue. We review a large body of empirical evidence on the effect of NTMs on agri-food trade and conduct a meta-analysis to disentangle potential determinants of heterogeneity in estimates. Our findings show the role played by the publication process and by study-specific assumptions. Some characteristics of the studies are correlated with positive significant estimates, others covary with negative significant estimates. Overall, we found that the effects of NTMs vary across types of NTM, proxies used for NTMs, and levels of detail of studies. The estimated effects are also influenced by methodological issues and publication processes.The importance of understanding the trade effects of NTMs in agri-food sector is attested by the large and increasing number of papers hosted in top journals (e.g.

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Barley is an important cereal worldwide cultivated since about 10,000 years. Barley crop is the fourth most important cereal in the world, after wheat, corn, and rice. It could be a food source for millions of people even though today it is mainly used as animal feed and brewing. So, recently, more than 70% of barley crop has been used for feed; about 21% has been intended to malting, brewing, and distilling industries; lesser than 6% has been consumed as human food. In addition, a growing interest in renewable energy has led to the modest use of barley grain for the production of fuel ethanol. The prominence of barley as food is mainly due to its potentialities in the production of healthy food, as an excellent source of dietary fiber, and a functional food ingredient such as β-glucan. The purpose of this chapter is to carry out an analysis of barley market and to present, in summary, its principal uses.

Food-borne infections cause a considerable amount of illnesses, heavily affecting healthcare systems. Given the spread of food-borne infections, assessing food risks is a relevant issue for the food industry and policymakers. Following a systematic and meta-analytical approach, we evaluate how different sources and types of risks (i.e. objective and subjective) are valued by consumers, in order to emphasise to what extent information on food risks may be efficiently transferred to consumers. The results show that information on food safety, conveyed through labels, exerts a positive influence on the premium prices for food safety. Consumers would be willing to pay a price premium up to 168.7% for food products that are treated against a specific food-borne risk factor, certified to be safe, tested or even inspected by public or third parties. However, we also find that labels are inefficient instruments of information on food safety, particularly when products are likely to be affected by hazardous and risky events and consumers correctly perceive risks. The results suggest that consumers exposed to relevant risk information about food safety tend to increase their risk perception and to decrease their premium prices for information on food safety.Including labels on food safety may fill the information gap and thus lower the mismatch between (objective) scientific-based risks and (subjective) perceived risks.

The Geographical origin of agri-food products has become astrategic tool of differentiation: it is a unique attribute which makes productsdifficult to reproduce, and presumed to be a quality cue for agri-food products. Consumer studies on the relevance of geographical labelling provide heterogeneous evidence on the relevance of this extrinsic attribute as compared to the relevance of other product characteristics. A systematic review of consumer studies on the relevance of geographical labelling has been conducted, and collected data have been quantitatively analysed through a meta-regression approach, in order to assess drivers of differences in relevance of geographical labelling across studies. An ad hoc index has been built to measure the relevance of geographical labelling as compared to other attributes of a product. Several chosen control factors allowed to explain differences in the relevance of geographical label across studies in terms of characteristics of studies (structural heterogeneity), methodological issues (methodological heterogeneity), and publication processes. Results show that the relevance of geographical label, although not biased by publication selection, is influenced by the structural characteristics of studies and, to a lower extent, by issues related to the publication process. In particular, the attitude of consumers towards geographical labels tend to be productand origin-specific: geographical labelling is the main differentiation tool for expensive products (e.g., wine), but is of low relevance for several countries depending on country-specific factors (e.g., nationality, culture, image and reputation). Managerial and policy implications are provided.