The Wine Chain in Puglia: a cluster analysis. JOURNAL OF AGRICULTURAL SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY, 3(10), pp. 696-716, ISSN 1939-1250

The food industry is evolving more towards new forms of organization much more complex and characterized by a greater degree of coordination, whether in the form of vertical integration of explicit or implicit contracts between players of different levels of the industry. Therefore, the aim of this work is the search for mechanisms that can provide value to the production phase to better increase competitiveness of the sector. For the first time, in fact, discussion about food chains have as reference a recognized legal entity, which is the integrated projects of food chain as a result of actions of agricultural policy at community, national and regional levels. The methodology is related to two steps: the administration of questionnaires to the three companies participating in food chain partnerships that have proposed a draft of integrated design of food chain in response to the notice of the Apulia region for the submission of the integrated projects of the food chain; and a cluster analysis in the wine sector of the Italian regions. The results showed, thanks to Network Analysis, the importance for the chain development of relationships formed by market relations and cooperation relations (formal and informal) and the need for more actions for the enhancement of products by research and development activities