Journal of Security and Sustainability Issues

Our paper focuses on the issues of food security and agricultural trade. Specifically, we tackle the issue of economic selfsufficiency of a country using an example of the import ban on agricultural production as one form of economic sanctions. Our paper attempts to estimate the impact of sanctions in separate regions, rather then on the aggregate country level. We propose an original methodology of estimating allocation of import ban effects based on the OECD Customer Support Estimate (CSE). Our results demonstrate that in case of some agricultural products (e.g. potatoes) consumers in most of Russian regions were net beneficiaries before 2014, but the magnitude of the benefits decreased significantly after the introduction of sanctions. This provided Russian agricultural producers with more support arising from the market price differential. All in all, we find no significant evidence of the import ban impact, however after 2014 the cumulative cost paid by consumers in different regions declined significantly due to other factors, leaving consumers in the position of net beneficiaries. Our results demonstrate that despite the economic sanctions are important, they do not affect food security of neither of conflicting parties.

In the scientific paper data on assessment of the impact of food enterprise “ALMA” on the environment of Almaty city megalopolis are provided. An approximate level of influence of the harmful substances are emitted by production of food products on the environment is calculated. Mathematical modeling of the dispersion of pollutants in the atmosphere and calculation of the values of surface concentrations were carried out using the unified program for calculation of atmospheric pollution ERA software complex, version 1.7. It is established that the propionic aldehyde emitted in the course of preparation of food products in the amount exceeding standard requirements is dissipated within maximum permissible concentration (MPC) until reaching the boundaries of nearby houses, without rendering harm on human health, and values of background concentration of carbon and nitrogen dioxides fluctuate within MPC.

This paper is devoted to novel scientific findings, which, is properly exploited, can contribute to food security both, locally and globally. Specifically, the presented paper reports on the analytical characteristics of pectic substances derived from Cucurbita cultivated in the Republic of Kazakhstan. The fractional composition of pectic substances, their analytical characteristics and degree of etherification, content of organic acids, sugars, vitamins and mineral substances are studied. The results demonstrated that these raw materials can be considered a source of pectic substances, carbohydrates, vitamin C, a niacin and carotene. Moreover, pectic substances of Cucurbita are low-etherified, a characteristic implicated in expediency of their use as detoxicator.

Agriculture constitutes a very important sector in the Slovak economy that generates in addition to the basic food production also services, provides jobs, has a significant impact on regional development and provides nutrition of the population. One of decisive factors influencing the economic stability of agriculture is production efficiency which is strongly linked to support policy, through which partially is ensured the financial availability of enterprises. The use of subsidies by the EU is very important tool for ensuring economic sustainability of agriculture in the Slovak Republic conditions. The aim of this paper is economic evaluation of primary agricultural production in manufacturing and economic conditions in the Slovak Republic and their alternative comparison with selected EU Member States. The paper also refers to differences in level of subsidies in selected countries in the EU and their impact on possibilities of investing funds into the production development. Our calculations showed that without the intervention of the Common Agricultural Policy of the EU (especially subsidy policy) would be Slovak agriculture economically unprofitable, what could lead to its failure.

The paper reflects on question of regional policy ensuring food security in the context of closely interrelated economic, social and ecological components. Having performed analysis of common agricultural policy, programs for rural development, impact of world trade organization, integrated product policy, question of food security monitoring, influence of multinational companies, genetically modified products, programs for food support; we come to the conclusion that to the main trends of regional policy in the sphere of food security belong: establishing interregional and international import-export food operations, creation of regional reserves of strategically important products, direct/indirect financial and consultation support of agricultural enterprises, development of infrastructure facilities for transporting, storage, distribution of products, food support for socially unprotected groups of population, promoting development of eco-oriented production, implementation of control measures for the prevention of counterfeit in the trading network, control of production and sale of genetically modified products, formation of ecologically oriented thinking population.