Glossary

The One Village, One Product (OVOP) movement, which was initiated in 1979 in Oita prefecture, Japan, is an innovative program in which each local community identifies one or a few products as locally specific, concentrates resources on its production, establishes it as a local brand, and markets it to the entire country or beyond. The movement tries to revitalize depressed local communities by combining the production of commodities with local pride and human resources development. The OVOP and similar movements have also been implemented with some modifications in other APO member countries. In Thailand, the One Tambon, One Product movement is strongly promoted as a core national policy of rural community development.

Inspired by the One Village, One Product (OVOP) movement in Japan, the Thai government has been promoting local industry through the manufacturing of attractive specialty products based on the abundant native culture, tradition, and nature. This campaign is called the One Tambon, One Product (OTOP) movement in Thailand because the target area is the administrative unit called a tambon, the equivalent of village or town in English. The objective of the OTOP movement is to allow people living in communities to use their skills in manufacturing products while the government and the private sector assist in developing the products and exploring the markets to create jobs and income while strengthening communities.

OHSAS stands for occupational health and safety standard. OHSAS 18000 is a series of two standards, OHSA 18001 and OHSAS 18002, which provide requirements and guidelines, respectively, for implementing a safety and health management standard. Based on the British Standard BS 8800, OHSAS 18000 was developed by a group of standard bodies, certification bodies, registrars, and consultants and was first published in 1999. It is not an ISO standard. Although the OHSAS 18000 standards were not developed through the ISO, or using the ISO consensus process, they have gained wide acceptance. In 2002, amendments were made to both standards to consider user demands and better align them with ISO 14001 and ISO 9001.

A niche market is a very focused, often small, segment of a market that is usually not being served by mainstream or traditional markets or providers. A niche market may be conceived as a narrowly defined group of potential customers. Usually niche markets are lucrative because large businesses are not interested in such small segments or may not be aware of the opportunity. Thus niche marketing is finding and serving profitable market segments and designing custom-made products and services for them.

Niche agricultural marketing is the specialization of customers and agrifood products under innovative segmentations of the market. The marketer maneuvers to gain special recognition of the product and communication with the customers. The marketer has the ability to negotiate favorable pricing with customers. The product, customer, production, and delivery of the product are personalized. It is the opposite of bulk, commodity trade in mainstream marketing. Niche market production is generally small by definition. The most distinct feature of niche marketing is the very high inherent value that has been added in the supply process. Niche food markets have grown tremendously in recent years. These markets are very attractive targets for small food producers and processors who naturally find it difficult to compete with large, multinational companies in more traditional markets. Exotic new fruit and vegetables, organic items, and specialty ethnic or lifestyle items all appear to be preferred by growing numbers of consumers and all have the potential to offer profitable niche markets for small farmers.