IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jsusta/v16y2024i20p9093-d1502817.html

Sustainability Assessment of the Performance of Parmigiano Reggiano PDO Firms: A Comparative Analysis of Firms’ Legal Form and Altitude Range

Author

Listed:
  • Mattia Iotti

    (Department of Veterinary Science, University of Parma, 43126 Parma, Italy)

  • Giovanni Ferri

    (Department of Veterinary Science, University of Parma, 43126 Parma, Italy)

  • Elisa Manghi

    (Department of Veterinary Science, University of Parma, 43126 Parma, Italy)

  • Alberto Calugi

    (Department of Engineering and Architecture, University of Parma, 43124 Parma, Italy)

  • Giuseppe Bonazzi

    (Department of Engineering and Architecture, University of Parma, 43124 Parma, Italy)

Abstract

Geographical indications (GIs), protected by the European Union with the collective marks of PDO (protected designation of origin), PGI (protected geographical indication), and TSG (traditional specialty guaranteed), play an important role in the social and economic system. They not only guarantee food needs, but promote correct consumer information, protect local food, and play a role in the environmental and social sustainability of rural areas. In Italy, Parmigiano Reggiano (PR-RE) PDO cheese is ranked second in foods with the GI protection mark by turnover. This research aims to assess the financial sustainability of the firms registered in the PR-RE PDO consortium using financial statement (FINSTAT) analysis. Financial ratios (FR) and the EM-Score were applied to assess firms’ performance, financial risk, and credit score. The analysis distinguished firms by legal form, cooperative and non-cooperative, and altitude range—plain hill and mountain. The main findings of the research were as follows: (1) a better performance of lowland non-cooperative firms and lower financial risk, (2) a longer duration of the inventory cycle of cooperative firms, and (3) a greater financial risk in mountain cooperatives. The results provide indications for improving firms’ performance and for designing financial instruments for the sector. To our knowledge, this is the first research to carry out an analysis of all the available FINSTATs of firms in the PR-RE PDO sector.

Suggested Citation

  • Mattia Iotti & Giovanni Ferri & Elisa Manghi & Alberto Calugi & Giuseppe Bonazzi, 2024. "Sustainability Assessment of the Performance of Parmigiano Reggiano PDO Firms: A Comparative Analysis of Firms’ Legal Form and Altitude Range," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 16(20), pages 1-41, October.
    • Handle: RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:16:y:2024:i:20:p:9093-:d:1502817
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/16/20/9093/pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/16/20/9093/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Duvaleix, Sabine & Emlinger, Charlotte & Gaigné, Carl & Latouche, Karine, 2021. "Geographical indications and trade: Firm-level evidence from the French cheese industry," Food Policy, Elsevier, vol. 102(C).
    2. F. Canio & E. Martinelli & M. Peruzzini & G. Marchi, 2021. "The use of virtual tours to stimulate consumers’ buying and visit intentions: an application to the Parmigiano Reggiano cheese," Italian Journal of Marketing, Springer, vol. 2021(3), pages 209-226, September.
    3. Paola Bertolini & Enrico Giovannetti, 2020. "L’evoluzione del sistema locale del Parmigiano Reggiano," Department of Economics (DEMB) 0178, University of Modena and Reggio Emilia, Department of Economics "Marco Biagi".
    4. Hüseyin Pamukçu & Ömer Saraç & Sercan Aytuğar & Mustafa Sandıkçı, 2021. "The Effects of Local Food and Local Products with Geographical Indication on the Development of Tourism Gastronomy," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(12), pages 1-13, June.
    5. Alexander J. Stein & Fabien Santini, 2022. "The sustainability of “local” food: a review for policy-makers," Review of Agricultural, Food and Environmental Studies, Springer, vol. 103(1), pages 77-89, March.
    6. Giulio Malorgio & Francesco Marangon, 2021. "Agricultural business economics: the challenge of sustainability," Agricultural and Food Economics, Springer;Italian Society of Agricultural Economics (SIDEA), vol. 9(1), pages 1-4, December.
    7. Mattia Iotti & Giuseppe Bonazzi, 2023. "Financial Sustainability in Agri-Food Companies: The Case of Members of the PDO Parma Ham Consortium," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 15(5), pages 1-31, February.
    8. Paola Bertolini & Enrico Giovannetti, 2020. "L’evoluzione del sistema locale del Parmigiano Reggiano," Department of Economics 0178, University of Modena and Reggio E., Faculty of Economics "Marco Biagi".
    9. Paola Bertolini & enriico Giovannetti, 2020. "L'evoluzione del sistema locale del Parmigiano Reggiano," Center for the Analysis of Public Policies (CAPP) 0171, Universita di Modena e Reggio Emilia, Dipartimento di Economia "Marco Biagi".
    10. Emanuele Schimmenti & Enrico Viola & Cassandra Funsten & Valeria Borsellino, 2021. "The Contribution of Geographical Certification Programs to Farm Income and Rural Economies: The Case of Pecorino Siciliano PDO," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(4), pages 1-32, February.
    11. Chmieliński, Paweł & Faccilongo, Nicola & Fiore, Mariantonietta & La Sala, Piermichele, . "Design and implementation of the Local Development Strategy: a case study of Polish and Italian Local Action Groups in 2007-2013," Studies in Agricultural Economics, Research Institute for Agricultural Economics, vol. 120(01).
    12. Khanal, Aditya R. & Omobitan, Omobolaji, 2020. "Rural Finance, Capital Constrained Small Farms, and Financial Performance: Findings from a Primary Survey," Journal of Agricultural and Applied Economics, Cambridge University Press, vol. 52(2), pages 288-307, May.
    13. Akdogan, Ece C. & Dinc, Dilek Terniz, 2019. "Managing working capital efficiency in Turkish agribusinesses and the impact of globalization: insights from an emerging market," International Food and Agribusiness Management Review, International Food and Agribusiness Management Association, vol. 22(4), June.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Elena Rond'os-Casas & Germ`a Coenders & Miquel Carreras-Sim'o & N'uria Arimany-Serrat, 2025. "The use of financial and sustainability ratios to map a sector. An approach using compositional data," Papers 2509.06468, arXiv.org.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Enrico Giovannetti & Paola Bertolini & Margherita Russo, 2021. "Rights, Commons, and Social Capital: The Role of Cooperation in an Italian Agri-Food Supply Chain," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(21), pages 1-22, November.
    2. Rungsaran Wongprawmas & Enrica Morea & Annalisa De Boni & Giuseppe Di Vita & Cinzia Barbieri & Cristina Mora, 2025. "From Tradition to Sustainability: Identifying Value-Added Label Attributes in the Italian Protected Designation of Origin Cheese Market," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 17(13), pages 1-19, June.
    3. Arru Brunella & Delrio Federico & Furesi Roberto & Pulina Pietro & Fabio Albino Madau, 2025. "Role of environmental, social and governance disclosure in business profitability and cost of debt: An analysis of small Southern Italian agri‐food businesses," Agribusiness, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 41(3), pages 856-895, July.
    4. Chunyan Li & Jianmei Gao & Lanqing Ge & Weina Hu & Qi Ban, 2023. "Do Geographical Indication Products Promote the Growth of the Agricultural Economy? An Empirical Study Based on Meta-Analysis," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 15(19), pages 1-21, October.
    5. Yuhong Guo & Xiu-e Zhang & Yuting Liang, 2025. "The Impact of Green Entrepreneurial Orientation on Agribusiness Performance: An Empirical Analysis Based on Multidimensional Green Innovation," Journal of the Knowledge Economy, Springer;Portland International Center for Management of Engineering and Technology (PICMET), vol. 16(4), pages 14406-14426, October.
    6. Adamashvili Nino & Fiore Mariantonietta & Contò Francesco & La Sala Piermichele, 2020. "Ecosystem for Successful Agriculture. Collaborative Approach as a Driver for Agricultural Development," European Countryside, Sciendo, vol. 12(2), pages 242-256, June.
    7. Mara Giua & Luca Salvatici & Cristina Vaquero-Piñeiro & Roberto Solazzo, 2025. "Do Territories with Geographical Indications Trade Better?," Italian Economic Journal: A Continuation of Rivista Italiana degli Economisti and Giornale degli Economisti, Springer;Società Italiana degli Economisti (Italian Economic Association), vol. 11(1), pages 31-64, March.
    8. De Filippis, Fabrizio & Giua, Mara & Salvatici, Luca & Vaquero-Piñeiro, Cristina, 2022. "The international trade impacts of Geographical Indications: Hype or hope?," Food Policy, Elsevier, vol. 112(C).
    9. Mariana Borcoman & Daniela Sorea, 2023. "Ethnic Soups from Rupea Area (Romania) as Resources for Sustainable Local Development," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 15(2), pages 1-21, January.
    10. Chmielinski, Pawel & Gospodarowicz, Marcin, 2018. "Regional Approach to Rural Development? A Study of Regional and Rural Development Programs in Poland in 2007–2015," Village and Agriculture (Wieś i Rolnictwo), Polish Academy of Sciences (IRWiR PAN), Institute of Rural and Agricultural Development, vol. 181(4), December.
    11. Fazari, Erika & Musolino, Dario, . "Social farming in high mountain regions: The case of the Aosta Valley in Italy," Economia agro-alimentare / Food Economy, Italian Society of Agri-food Economics/Società Italiana di Economia Agro-Alimentare (SIEA), vol. 24(3).
    12. Joshua Hurtado Hurtado & Pasi Heikkurinen & Toni Ruuska & Sophia E. Hagolani‐Albov & Kari Koppelmäki, 2025. "Counter‐hegemonic ethics for sustainable business," Business Ethics, the Environment & Responsibility, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 34(4), pages 1913-1927, October.
    13. Elina De Simone & Mara Giua & Cristina Vaquero-Piñeiro, 2024. "Eat, visit, love. World heritage list and geographical indications: Joint acknowledgement and consistency as drivers of tourism attractiveness in Italy," Tourism Economics, , vol. 30(6), pages 1531-1556, September.
    14. Furmankiewicz, Marek & Hewitt, Richard J. & Kazak, Jan K., 2021. "Can rural stakeholders drive the low-carbon transition? Analysis of climate-related activities planned in local development strategies in Poland," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 150(C).
    15. Reginald Holland & Aditya R. Khanal & Purushottam Dhungana, 2022. "Agritourism as an Alternative On-Farm Enterprise for Small U.S. Farms: Examining Factors Influencing the Agritourism Decisions of Small Farms," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(7), pages 1-12, March.
    16. Alexandru Olar & Mugurel I. Jitea, 2021. "Enabling Factors for Better Multiplier Effects of the LEADER Programme: Lessons from Romania," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(9), pages 1-14, May.
    17. Mattia Iotti & Elisa Manghi & Giuseppe Bonazzi, 2024. "Debt Sustainability Assessment in the Biogas Sector: Application of Interest Coverage Ratios in a Sample of Agricultural Firms in Italy," Energies, MDPI, vol. 17(6), pages 1-34, March.
    18. Iotti, Mattia, . "Financial evaluation and credit access of agricultural firms," Economia agro-alimentare / Food Economy, Italian Society of Agri-food Economics/Società Italiana di Economia Agro-Alimentare (SIEA), vol. 25(2).
    19. Fabrizio Ferretti & Giulio Malorgio, 2024. "Food policies: balancing health and market in the era of ubiquitous ultra-processed foods," Agricultural and Food Economics, Springer;Italian Society of Agricultural Economics (SIDEA), vol. 12(1), pages 1-13, December.
    20. Isabel Salavisa & Maria Fátima Ferreiro & Sofia Bizarro, 2021. "The Transition of the Agro-Food System: Lessons from Organic Farming in the Lisbon Metropolitan Area," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(17), pages 1-20, August.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:16:y:2024:i:20:p:9093-:d:1502817. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: MDPI Indexing Manager The email address of this maintainer does not seem to be valid anymore. Please ask MDPI Indexing Manager to update the entry or send us the correct address (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.mdpi.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.