This article investigates the nature of youth perceptions and their influence on youth's intentions of engaging in agripreneurship. The study findings reveal that the youth held positive economic perceptions of the agricultural sector. Along with the provision of secondary school agricultural education and a significant amount of financial support, these perceptions positively influenced their intentions to participate in agripreneurship. The findings affirm the need for improving awareness of the economic opportunities available in the agricultural sector. The study recommends that programmes that aim to encourage agripreneurship target both the socioeconomic and cognitive limitations of youths.

The evolving impact of plant breeders’ rights was investigated in a bid to provide a basis for understanding the complex relationship that exists between scientific, legislative and market matters that shape the peach and nectarine fresh fruit sector. The results show that there is complementarity among varietal legislation, deregularisation, international trade policies, market trends and research intensity. Plant varietal legislation is found to play a facilitative role in ensuring the growth in the sector which has evolved from merely facilitating access to better quality cultivars which were bred beyond South Africa’s borders, to the provision of good quality germplasm that aids in the breeding of locally bred varieties which better meet the production needs of local farmers. The results of the analysis show that strengthened varietal legislation has contributed significantly to cultivar development, reduced varietal concentration, increased resource (land) utilisation and increased export revenue generation and market penetration. The study warns of the negative effects that widening the scope of the Plant Breeders’ Rights Act would have on innovation and cultivar access by poor farmers. Because of the strong ties existing between innovation and R and D investment, the recommendation is for an increase in R and D investment in the local research institution.

No abstract

The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) have shone a spotlight on the importance of adaption to climate change. However, progress in achieving SDG 12 which calls for, “responsible consumption and production” has been stalled by the unavailability of indicators that adequately capture and motivate increased responsible consumption. To fill this gap, this article presents an alternative indicator that makes use of cultivar characteristics and uses South African fresh peach and nectarine exports as a focus area. Principal component analysis is used to extract and summarize the product value propositions identified in composite indices that were constructed by weighting the proportional use of cultivars in exports between 1956 and 2017. The indices acquired from the analysis were found to measure the provisions for sustainable consumption, good-quality fruit and off-peak fruit supply. The study’s results show that progress was found in the provisions for sustainable consumption and this was mainly driven by improvements in cultivars’ climate change adaptability. However, the last two decades have been characterized by years of successive lower readings on this index. Improvements in fruit quality index were found to be attained at the expense of farm enterprise productivity. The study concludes that strategies be developed to encourage the use of cultivars that promote responsible consumption as, if left uninfluenced, market forces will spur unsustainable production.

No abstract