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The purpose of this paper is to provide evidence based guidance to researchers and practice personnel about forming and carrying out effective research partnerships.

A review of the literature, interviews and discussions with colleagues in both research and practice roles, and a review of the authors' personal experiences as researchers in partnership research.

Partnership research is, in some respects, a distinct “approach” to research, but there are many different versions. An analysis of research publications and of their research experience led the authors to develop a framework for planning and assessing the partnership research process, which includes defining expected outcomes for the partners, their roles, and steps in the research process.

This review and analysis provides guidance that may reduce commonly-reported misunderstandings and help to plan more successful partnerships and projects. It also identifies future research which is needed to define more precisely the questions and purposes for which partnership research is most appropriate, and methods and designs for specific types of partnership research.

As more research moves towards increased participation of practitioners and patients in the research process, more precise and differentiated understanding of the different partnership approaches is required, and when each is most suitable. This article describes research approaches that have the potential to reduce “the research-practice gap”. It gives evidence- and experience-based guidance for choosing and establishing a partnership research process, so as to improve partnership relationship-building and more actionable research.

The purpose of this paper is to explain the growing interest of English consumers in local organic food sold through box schemes, by providing insights into the motives of customers of such schemes and examining the relationship with their awareness about problems of the agro-food system.

A mixed methods approach combined in-depth interviews with 22 box scheme customers with a quantitative survey of 416 consumers, analysed by means of principal component analysis and an ordered logit model.

Consumers of small local organic box schemes in England are both altruistically and hedonistically motivated. This includes a strong political motivation to change the current food system, as shown by the strong influence of an anti-globalisation factor and wanting to support small farmers. They perceive local organic food as a more environmentally sustainable alternative to the mainstream food system. The box schemes offer consumers a practical alternative by providing high quality products combined with convenience illustrating the importance of the latter also in local food shopping. This reinforces the possibility to successfully combining the attributes of “local” and “organic”.

The study was conducted in only one country (England) with about 400 consumers of ten organic farmer-led box schemes. It was based on a self-selecting sample of consumers of such schemes, which included a large proportion of females and people with high level of education. Further research is needed to validate the results.

This study is the first academic study investigating the main factors affecting consumers’ choice to purchase local organic food through a number of English box schemes. It identifies that such consumers are ethically and politically motivated and show some differences compared with the general literature on organic food consumption.

The purpose of this paper is to review the literature on the country-of-origin (COO) effect in the context of organic food and develop suggestions for further research in this area. Research has investigated COO effects and consumer responses to organic food, but there is little research on the combination of the two.

A narrative review of two research streams and their intersection, forming the basis for the development of a research agenda.

There are few studies analysing the possible interaction between the effects of organic and COO on consumers’ food preferences and choices. In general, COO seems to lose impact when other quality cues are salient. This suggests a lower impact of COO for organic than for conventional food products. However, there is still no research on the possible impact of organic labelling in categories where products from a foreign country are able to demand a premium, and little is known about consumer preferences for different import countries regarding organic food. Six potential future research directions are suggested.

There is a need for research that more systematically investigates the possible interactions between COO and organic labelling on consumers’ food product preferences and choices. A research agenda is suggested as a starting point.

This literature review highlights the lack of research on the interaction between COO effects and consumer responses to organic food. The literature review creates a basis for future research and a possible research agenda is suggested.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the supply chains for organic milk, apples and pasta in eight European countries and how added value is distributed among market players.

Using secondary data and expert interviews, a market overview for the three products is provided as the basis of a more detailed analysis of the added value in 12 organic supply chain examples. For this, interviews with market players and an “added value calculator” tool are employed.

The farm gate and retail price of organic products is higher than conventional. Supermarkets are the main outlet for organic milk and apples in the countries studied, whereas the situation for organic pasta is varied, suggesting that the use of different sale channels is influenced by the food product. The farmers’ share of added value ranges between 3 and 65 per cent of the added value created in the organic supply chains analysed. Organic offers opportunities to increase the farmers’ share of added value both in supermarkets and alternative sale channels, by developing collaboration, physical infrastructures for organic and integrating operations upstream of the chain.

While more research is needed into a larger number of chains, this paper indicates that there are dynamics and features at supply chain level, such as the distribution of added value and the target markets used, that cannot be interpreted according to the binary division between “mainstream” and “alternative” organic suggested by the conventionalisation hypothesis.

The distribution of added value for existing supply chains in eight European countries is calculated by using an effective added value calculator tool.