embodied hanpp mapping the spatial disconnect between global biomass production and consumption abstract biomass trade results in a growing spatial disconnect between environmental impacts due to biomass production and the places where biomass is being consumed the pressure on ecosystems resulting from the production of traded biomass however is highly variable between regions and products we use the concept of embodied human appropriation of net primary production hanpp to map the spatial disconnect between net producing and net consuming regions embodied hanpp comprises total biomass withdrawals and land use induced changes in productivity resulting from the provision of biomass products international net transfers of embodied hanpp are of global significance amounting to 1 7 pgc year sparsely populated regions are mainly net producers densely populated regions net consumers independent of development status biomass consumption and trade are expected to surge over the next decades suggesting a need to sustainably manage supply and demand of products of ecosystems on a global level

to float or to fix evidence on the impact of exchange rate regimes on growth we study the relationship between exchange rate regimes and economic growth for a sample of 183 countries over the post bretton woods period using a new de facto classification of regimes based on the actual behavior of the relevant macroeconomic variables in contrast with previous studies we find that for developing countries less flexible exchange rate regimes are associated with slower growth as well as with greater output volatility for industrial countries regimes do not appear to have any significant impact on growth the results are robust to endogeneity corrections and a number of alternative specifications borrowed from the growth literature

voluntary governance mechanisms in global supply chains beyond csr to a stakeholder utility perspective poor working conditions remain a serious problem in supplier facilities in developing countries while previous research has explored this from the developed buyers side we examine this phenomenon from the perspective of developing countries suppliers and subcontractors utilizing qualitative data from a major knitwear exporting cluster in india and a stakeholder management lens we develop a framework that shows how the assumptions of conventional buyer driven voluntary governance break down in the dilution of buyer power and in the web of factors rooted in suppliers traditions beliefs local demands and resource dependency we reveal out how success in governing collaborative global supply chains often falls short within the subcontracting stage where a stakeholder management mindset is elusive to most participants we suggest that success in governing collaborative global supply chains is dependent on concepts of stakeholder utility and the presence of shared value that is often at odds with the realities of power information asymmetry and compliance reward systems inherent in the non market coordination of global supply chains our findings offer important insights for delineating the concepts of value creation from csr concepts and practices and for modifying the basic assumptions of conventional supply chain governance

statistical efficiency of double bounded dichotomous choice contingent valuation the statistical efficiency of conventional dichotomous choice contingent valuation surveys can be improved by asking each respondent a second dichotomous choice question which depends on the response to the first question if the first response is yes the second bid is some amount greater than the first bid while if the first response is no the second bid is some amount smaller this double bounded approach is shown to be asymptotically more efficient than the conventional singlebounded approach using data from a survey of californians regarding their willingness to pay for wetlands in the san joaquin valley we show that in a finite sample the gain in efficiency can be very substantial

power the missing element in sustainable consumption and absolute reductions research and action in this essay we aim to demonstrate the value of a power lens on consumption and absolute reductions specifically we illuminate what we perceive to be a troublesome pattern of neglect of questions of power in research and action on sustainable consumption and absolute reductions in pursuit of our objectives we delineate how many of the informal and implicit theories of social change of scholars and activists in sustainable consumption and sustainable development fail to address power in a sufficiently explicit comprehensive and differentiated manner and how that failure translates into insufficient understandings of the drivers of consumption and the potential for and barriers to absolute reductions second we develop the contours of a power lens on sustainable consumption third we illustrate the value of such a power lens with a particular focus on the case of meat consumption

asymmetric international minimum quality standards and vertical differentiation this paper develops a two country model of a vertically differentiated duopoly that spans two countries which are not integrated without additional costs equilibrium qualities prices profits and consumer s surplus are compared when 1 minimum quality standards are identical and 2 standards differ across countries both markets turn out to be connected by the quality choices of the two firms both firms prices in the two countries and their profits are lower whereas consumer s surplus and the two offered qualities are higher in both countries if no firm is forced out of the country s market with the more demanding minimum quality standard copyright 1995 by blackwell publishing ltd

the neoclassical trojan horse of steady state economics the vision of a steady state economy elaborated by herman daly describes an economy that uses materials and energy within the regenerative and assimilative limits of the planet s ecosystems sustainable scale just distribution and efficient allocation are its constitutive theoretical goals this paper is a critique of the theoretical foundations of steady state economics it argues that steady state economics consists in an attempt to squeeze neoclassical economics into a biophysical and ethical corset as a result many fundamental flaws and criticisms of neoclassical economics remain as a consequence steady state economics does not lead to a radical departure from or improvement upon neoclassical theory but rather to fundamental internal inconsistencies between the old economics paradigm and new progressive ecological economic thinking contradictions appear at various levels ranging from ontology and methodology to theory and values as daly has pioneered the foundations of ecological economics with his thinking these ambiguities are not only problematic for steady state economics but ecological economics as a field more generally the paper concludes that ecological economics has to let go of neoclassical foundations as they contradict its core values and ambitions a new and consistent theory of political economy of the environment along heterodox lines is needed

genetically modified crops corporate pricing strategies and farmers adoption the case of bt cotton in argentina this article analyzes adoption and impacts of bt cotton in argentina against the background of monopoly pricing based on survey data it is shown that the technology significantly reduces insecticide applications and increases yields however these advantages are curbed by the high price charged for genetically modified seeds using the contingent valuation method it is shown that farmers average willingness to pay is less than half the actual technology price a lower price would not only increase benefits for growers but could also multiply company profits thus resulting in a pareto improvement implications of the sub optimal pricing strategy are discussed recently genetically modified gm crops have brought about important changes in the global market for agricultural technologies especially seeds prospects of high economic returns and tightened intellectual property rights iprs have provided new incentives for the private sector to invest in crop improvement and extend its business to nontraditional markets the increasingly proprietary nature of seed technologies has implications for farmers adoption and benefit distribution private innovators endowed with a patent on a technology will attempt to capture the gains from their innovation through monopoly pricing moschini and lapan recent studies have looked into the partitioning of welfare created by gm crops among agricultural producers consumers and innovating input firms e g moschini lapan and sobolevsky falckzepeda traxler and nelson in these studies however the market price of the technology is

consumer scapegoatism and limits to green consumerism an axiom that has shaped policy approaches to sustainable consumption has been that if more consumers understand the environmental consequences of their consumption patterns through their market choices they would inevitably put pressure on retailers and manufacturers to move towards sustainable production the result is the proliferation of green consumerism and consumption of green products eco labels to assist consumers in making informed ecologically conscious choices consumer awareness campaigns etc however this paper argues that the dominant focus on green consumerism as against the need for structural changes towards a broader systemic shift is unrealistic furthermore promoting green consumerism at once lays responsibility on consumers to undertake the function of maintaining economic growth while simultaneously even if contradictorily bearing the burden to drive the system towards sustainability given the scope of the sustainability challenge and the urgency with which it must be addressed this paper argues that the consumer is not the most salient agent in the production consumption system and so expecting the consumer through green consumerism to shift society towards scp patterns is consumer scapegoatism this paper draws on the discursive confusion over discourse and practice of sustainable consumption in an attempt to clarify the differences between green consumerism and sustainable consumption and to provide a broadened framework for sustainable consumption policy design that enables wellbeing and ecological sustainability without propagating the economic growth dogma that has a stranglehold on contemporary policy making

adoption of agricultural innovations in developing countries a survey this paper reviews various studies which have provided a description and possible explanation to patterns of innovation adoption in the agricultural sector the survey points out that the tendency of many studies to consider innovation adoption in dichotomous terms adoption nonadoption may not be appropriate in many cases where the actual decisions are defined over a more continuous range more attention needs to be given to the socio cultural and institutional environment in area studies so that their interrelation with economic factors affecting adoption can be inferred the presence of several interrelated innovations is another aspect that needs to be considered more carefully in future research since a number of simultaneous decisions may be involved furthermore the possibility of regular sequential patterns in adopting components of a new technological package should be specifically addressed in future studies finally the impact of differential adoption rates on land holding distribution merits attention in future research

private eco brands and green market development towards new forms of sustainable governance in food retailing abstract this study seeks to analyze the role of retail eco brands in the development of markets for sustainability certified food products building on insights from the new institutional economics nie paradigm but also broader literature in the supply chain management and marketing research we suggest that private eco branding and third party certification can be explained as private institutional arrangements that motivate and enable sustainability governance by retailers both upstream and downstream in the value chain based on semi structured interviews with western european retailers this study reveals critical functions of retailers sustainability oriented brands these functions address a number of inefficiencies pertained to the third party certification making eco branding a private product policy tool to proactively set and implement sustainability in food production and consumption practices at the same time limitations associated with the development and use of private eco brands are identified based on these limitations we suggest that while retailer s eco brands are likely to play an important role in transforming food markets towards higher levels of sustainability in the future the continuous value of third party certification schemes in implementing sustainability in the food supply chain should not be underestimated the role of the latter will be to reduce transaction costs and liability risks associated with retail efforts to govern product sustainability issues upstream in the supply chain

resistance to reform status quo bias in the presence of individual specific uncertainty comment why do governments so often fail to adopt policies which economists consider to be efficiency enhancing our answer to this question relies on uncertainty regarding the distribution of gains and losses from reform we show that there is a bias towards the status quo and hence against efficiency enhancing reforms whenever some of the individual gainers and losers from reform cannot be identified beforehand there are reforms which once adopted will receive adequate political support but would have failed to carry the day ex ante the argument does not rely on risk aversion irrationality or hysteresis due to sunk costs jel d72 f13 why do governments so often fail to adopt policies that economists consider to be efficiency enhancing this is one of the fundamental questions of political economy the answer usually relies on what may be

the modern history of exchange rate arrangements a reinterpretation we develop a novel system of reclassifying historical exchange rate regimes one key difference between our study and previous classifications is that we employ monthly data on market determined parallel exchange rates going back to 1946 for 153 countries our approach differs from the imf official classification which we show to be only a little better than random it also differs radically from all previous attempts at historical reclassification our classification points to a rethinking of economic performance under alternative exchange rate regimes indeed the breakup of bretton woods had less impact on exchange rate regimes than is popularly believed

quality leadership when regulatory standards are forthcoming in many markets governments set minimum quality standards while some sellers compete on the basis of quality by exceeding them such quality leadership strategies often win public acclaim especially when they involve environmental attributes using a duopoly model of vertical product differentiation we show that if the high quality firm can commit to a quality level before regulations are promulgated it induces the regulator to weaken standards and welfare falls our results raise doubts about the social benefits of corporate self regulation and highlight the dangers of lengthy delays between legislative mandates for new regulations and their implementation

is there a pilot in the chain identifying the key drivers of change in the fresh pineapple sector high value export oriented agriculture is today considered as a means of integrating smallholders into the world economy this paper examines the geographic and organisational changes that have taken place in the fresh pineapple sector over the past 50 years we begin with a historical analysis of the changes in leadership among producer countries namely the dethroning of cote d ivoire by costa rica we show that this geographical shift has been accompanied by massive organisational changes the pineapple sector is increasingly driven by large downstream actors who derive their power from the ability to impose their definition of quality to the whole chain and from economies of scale and scope although varietal innovation plays a key role throughout the period commercial and logistical innovation are of increasing strategic importance however because of the constraints imposed by the concerned supply chains small farmers risk being excluded or marginalized

growth empirics a panel data approach a reply research on convergence has indeed proceeded through several stages in the first represented by such works as baumol 1986 convergence was studied under the implicit assumption that all countries of the sample had the same steady state levels of income this notion of convergence later came to be known as absolute convergence in the second stage represented by papers such as barro and sala i martin 1992 and mankiw romer and weil 1992 the concept of conditional convergence was put forward and rigorously defined it was now emphasized that the growth theory did not imply identical steady state levels of income for all countries and that in studying convergence these differences needed to be allowed however differences in steady state levels were considered under the assumption of parametric homogeneity of the underlying production function yet the assumption that all countries have identical production functions and differ only in the value of the variables of this function and not in its parameters was neither appealing nor tenable in the third stage represented by such works as islam 1995 this assumption of strict parametric homogeneity was relaxed and through the use of panel data methodology the aggregate production function was allowed to differ across countries with respect to the productivity shift parameter however this introduction of heterogeneity was still within the general framework of allowing only the steady state level of income to differ across countries and it maintained the assumption that countries shared the same steady state growth rate it is in this latter respect that lee pesaran and smith 1995 and their current comment 1998 on the basis of that work represent a significant change they have extended the use of the panel data method to allow the countries to differ not only with regard to the steady state level but also with respect to the steady state growth rate g when this is done the rate of convergence a according to their maximum likelihood estimation jumps to 0 23 clearly a different estimation method is not the main reason for this substantial increase because when g is

biofuels and food security micro evidence from ethiopia abstract there is considerable controversy about the impact of biofuels on food security in developing countries a major concern is that biofuels reduce food security by increasing food prices in this paper we use survey evidence to assess the impact of castor production on poor and food insecure rural households in ethiopia about 1 3 of poor farmers have allocated on average 15 of their land to the production of castor beans under contract in biofuel supply chains castor production significantly improves their food security they have fewer months without food and the amount of food they consume increases castor cultivation is beneficial for participating households food security in several ways by generating cash income from castor contracts they can store food for the lean season castor beans preserve well on the field which allows sales when farmers are in need of cash or food spillover effects of castor contracts increases the productivity of food crops increased food crop productivity offsets the amount of land used for castor so that the total local food supply is not affected

social insurance and transition the authors study the general equilibrium effects of social insurance on transition in a model in which the process of moving workers from matches in the state sector to new matches in the private sector takes time and involves uncertainty as might be expected adding social insurance to an economy without any improves welfare contrary to standard intuition however adding social insurance may slow transition the authors show that this result depends crucially on general equilibrium interactions of interest rates and savings under alternative market structures copyright 1996 by economics department of the university of pennsylvania and the osaka university institute of social and economic research association

exchange rate regime durability and performance in developing versus advanced economies abstract drawing on new data and advances in exchange rate regimes classification we find that countries appear to benefit by having increasingly flexible exchange rate systems as they become richer and more financially developed for developing countries with little exposure to international capital markets pegs are notable for their durability and relatively low inflation in contrast for advanced economies floats are distinctly more durable and also appear to be associated with higher growth for emerging markets our results parallel the baxter and stockman classic exchange regime neutrality result though pegs are the least durable and expose countries to higher risk of crisis

saving growth and investment a macroeconomic analysis using a panel of countries this paper provides a descriptive analysis of the long and short run correlations among saving investment and growth rates for 123 countries over the period 1961 94 three results are robust across data sets and estimation methods i lagges saving rates are positively related to investment rates ii investment rates granger cause growth rates with a negative sign iii growth rates granger cause investment with a positive sign

minimum quality standards and collusion we model the introduction of a minimum quality standard in a vertically differentiated duopoly we extend the literature in determining the standard endogenously showing that the maximisation of social welfare entails an increase in the surplus accruing to consumers served by the low quality firm and a decrease in the surplus of the remaining consumers then we consider the effects of the standard on the stability of price collusion proving that the standard makes it more difficult for firms to collude if consumers are sufficiently rich

does the exchange rate regime matter for real shocks evidence from windstorms and earthquakes abstract does the choice of exchange rate regime affect an economy s adjustment to real shocks exploiting the unpredictability and economic exogeniety of windstorms hurricanes and typhoons and earthquakes this paper assesses the often contrasting answers found in the theoretical literature there is robust evidence that exchange rate flexibility helps an economy better adjust to real shocks and consistent with the channels emphasized in the classic literature on exchange rates and shocks differences in the behavior of the export sector help explain the different reactions between the two regimes

potential impacts of bt eggplant on economic surplus and farmers health in india in this article the potential impacts of bt eggplant technology in indian agriculture are analyzed several proprietary bt hybrids are likely to be commercialized in the near future based on field trial data it is shown that the technology can significantly reduce insecticide applications and increase effective yields comprehensive farm survey data are used to project farm level effects and future adoption rates simulations show that the aggregate economic surplus gains of bt hybrids could be around us 108 million per year consumers will capture a large share of these gains but farmers and the innovating company will benefit too as the company has also shared its technology with the public sector bt open pollinated varieties might become available with a certain time lag this would make the technology more accessible especially for resource poor farmers entailing further improvements in welfare and distribution effects the wider implications of the private public technology transfer are discussed furthermore the potential benefits for farmers health resulting from reduced insecticide applications are examined using an econometric model and a cost of illness approach these benefits are worth an additional 3 4 million per year yet they constitute only a small fraction of the technology s environmental and health externalities more research is needed for comprehensive impact analysis

estimates of the economic returns to schooling from a new sample of twins this paper uses a new survey to contrast the wages of genetically identical twins with different schooling levels multiple measurements of schooling levels were also collected to assess the effect of reporting error on the estimated economic returns to schooling the data indicate that omitted ability variables do not bias the estimated return to schooling upward but that measurement error does bias it downward adjustment for measurement error indicates that an additional year of schooling increases wages by 12 to 16 percent a higher estimate of the economic returns to schooling than has been previously found copyright 1994 by american economic association

governance and trade in fresh vegetables the impact of uk supermarkets on the african horticulture industry production of fresh vegetables for export has grown rapidly in a number of countries in sub saharan africa over the last decade this trade brings producers and exporters based in africa together with importers and retailers in europe large retailers in europe play a decisive role in structuring the production and processing of fresh vegetables exported from africa the requirements they specify for cost quality delivery product variety innovation food safety and quality systems help top determine what types of producers and processors are able to gain access to the fresh vegetables chain and the activities they must carry out the control over the fresh vegetables trade exercised by uk supermarkets has clear consequences for inclusion and exclusion of producers and exporters of differing types and for the long term prospects for the fresh vegetables industry in the two major exporting countries studied kenya and zimbabwe

growth empirics a panel data approach a comment this paper comments on recent developments in the literature on the econometric analysis of international growth and convergence it notes that panel estimates of the neoclassical model accommodating level effects for individual countries through heterogeneous intercepts deal with some of the econometric difficulties arising in some of the earlier cross sectional studies but it notes that in dynamic panels heterogeneity in growth effects and in speeds of convergence renders this estimator inconsistent also the pervasiveness of such heterogeneity is demonstrated in three samples of countries and the effects of incorrectly imposing homogeneity on estimated parameters are illustrated and discussed

capital accumulation and growth a new look at the empirical evidence using annual data for 75 countries in the period 1960 2000 we present evidence of a positive relationship between investment as a share of gross domestic product gdp and the long run growth rate of gdp per worker this result is robust for our full sample and for the subsample of non oecd countries but not for the subsample of oecd countries our analysis controls for time invariant country specific heterogeneity in growth rates and for a range of time varying control variables we also address endogeneity issues and allow for heterogeneity across countries in model parameters and for cross section dependence

using panel data to evaluate growth theories this paper formulates a method for using panel data to compare endogenous growth theories that predict cross country differences in trend growth rates with exogenous growth models that predict parallel balanced growth paths using this method the paper rejects theories that predict even small differences in trend growth rates for a sample of rich countries and a sample of countries with well educated populations exogenous growth theories may thus characterize the growth experiences of these countries by contrast the paper cannot reject theories that predict widely different trend growth rates for a sample of countries with poorly educated populations copyright 1998 by economics department of the university of pennsylvania and the osaka university institute of social and economic research association

the role of private standards for manufactured food exports from developing countries summary the relevance of non tariff barriers for global trade flows has increased in recent decades however the effect of food standards as a particular important non tariff measure on agricultural trade flows remains unclear we contribute to the debate with a unique dataset that contains the number of food processing firms of 87 countries from 2008 to 2013 that are certified with the international featured standard ifs we estimate a gravity model using the one year lag of ifs as well as ifs certification in neighboring countries as an instrument to address potential endogeneity we find that ifs increases c p bilateral exports on average of seven agricultural product categories in both specifications however the effect remains robust only for high and middle income countries and disappears for low income countries hence while ifs increases exports on average low income countries do not benefit in terms of higher export volumes moreover once we separate the dataset by sector the trade enhancing effect remains for bakery dairy and beverage sectors only overall we argue that food standards are not a suitable development tool to integrate low income countries into high value chains per se

the sufficiency strategy would rich world frugality lower environmental impact abstract one alleged weapon against unsustainable environmental impact is for the wealthy to consume less this sufficiency strategy is to complement the efficiency strategy of lowering ratios of resource inputs to economic outputs the former would reduce the affluence factor in i pat the latter the technology factor that the latter strategy suffers from a consumption rebound is widely recognized this paper identifies a similar rebound when the affluence factor is autonomously lowered the lower initial demand lowers prices which in turn stimulates new demand by others the strategy moreover addresses only the rich raising questions of its theoretical maximum efficacy its proponents usually conflate frugality with the north south dichotomy and intra generational with inter generational equity moreover there are difficulties with the supporting arguments that frugality is good for one s own sake as well as for the environment and that the rich should lead the way to living more lightly personal behaviour change is furthermore not a substitute for international political efforts finally since all changes in right side factors of the i pat equation change other right side factors such indirect attacks on impact should be abandoned in favor of supply and emissions quotas

changes in the world distribution of output per worker 1960 1998 how a standard decomposition tells an unorthodox story why have some countries done so much better than others over the recent past this paper sheds light on this issue by providing a decomposition of the change in the distribution of output per worker across countries over the period 1960 1998 we find that most of the change in shape of the world distribution of income can be accounted for by a very substantial increase in the social returns to capital accumulation in contrast we do not find significant effects coming through changes in the effect of initial conditions or through increases in the importance of education

estimating the adoption of bt eggplant in india who benefits from public private partnership the study analyzes ex ante the adoption of insect resistant bt eggplant technology in india farmers willingness to pay wtp is estimated using the contingent valuation method given the economic importance of insect pests in eggplant cultivation the average wtp for bt hybrids is more than four times the current price of conventional hybrid seeds since the private innovating firm has also shared its technology with the public sector proprietary hybrids will likely get competition through public open pollinated bt varieties after a small time lag this will reduce farmers wtp for bt hybrids by about 35 thus decreasing the scope for corporate pricing policies nonetheless ample private profit potential remains analysis of factors influencing farmers adoption decisions demonstrates that public bt varieties will particularly improve technology access for resource poor eggplant producers the results suggest that public private partnership can be beneficial for all parties involved 2006 published by elsevier ltd

ossified materialism introduction to the special volume on absolute reductions in materials throughput and emissions drawing from papers in this special volume sv this introductory paper on absolute reductions argues that the magnitude scope and urgency of the sustainability challenge require a drastic change in global civilisation including a radical transformation of the institutional arrangements and socio technical systems that facilitate the pursuit of wellbeing the authors of this paper identify four main challenges to absolute reductions including the resource intensive conventional template for development macroeconomic structures and trade policies creating burden shifting and inequality a resourceefficiency improvements fallacy and the dominant consumerist culture and lifestyles the paper demonstrates

normative contestation in transitions in the making animal welfare concerns and system innovation in pig husbandry previous studies of system innovations mainly focused on historical cases that were driven by commercial motivations of pioneers and entrepreneurs this article investigates a system innovation in the making that is driven by normative concerns such as sustainability or animal welfare initially formulated by outsiders like special interest groups our central research question is how when and why is normative contestation of existing regimes effective in influencing the orientation of transitions in the making the conceptual framework enriches innovation studies and the multi level perspective with insights from social movement theory smt and political science smt is used to analyze the build up of normative pressure through framing resource mobilization and political opportunity structures from political science we use the notion of multiple streams in our analysis a problem regulatory market and technology stream the research design consists of a comparative case study of pig husbandry systems one case analyses the sub sector of pregnant sows where normative pressures after several decades led to the changes advocated by the contestants the second case concerns the sub sector of pig fattening where normative pressure was less successful the difference is partly explained by the normative pressure for pregnant sows being larger than for fattening pigs the other part of the explanation is that in the first case normative pressure aligned better with the three other streams regulatory market and technology to lead to the changes desired by the contestants 2010 elsevier b v all rights reserved

when are private standards more stringent than public standards retailers private standards are increasingly important for addressing consumer concerns about safety quality and social and environmental issues empirical evidence shows that these private standards are frequently more stringent than their public counterparts this article develops a political economy model that helps explain this stylized fact we show that if producers exercise their political power to persuade the government to impose a lower public standard retailers may apply their market power to install a private standard at a higher level than the public one depending on several factors

preemptive patenting and the persistence of monopoly this article takes a different tack and inquires whether institutions such as the patent system create opportunities for firms with monopoly power to maintain their monopoly power the results apply to other situations such as brand identification spatial location and capacity expansion which share the characteristic that early or preemptive actions may lower the returns to potential competitors

heterogeneity in consumer perceptions of the animal friendliness of broiler production systems animal welfare based product differentiation through private sector initiatives has led to the introduction of compromise meat products which are produced at beyond regulatory standards for animal welfare but are cheaper than organic meat a variety of production system characteristics serve as parameters to achieve higher animal welfare standards food policies will be more effective if they position compromise products on those production system characteristics that really matter to segments of consumers the present study identifies that three market segments may be discerned one that takes a more inclusive perspective on animal welfare and two that take a more heuristic approach by viewing animal friendliness from a more uni dimensional perspective animal space vs slaughter method these segments do not only differ in their perception of animal welfare but also regarding their background characteristics an interesting finding of the research is that the different segments accord in their perceptions of overall animal welfare levels but do so for different reasons in terms of food policy implications this means that the further development of compromise products would benefit from communicating more specific information on animal space and slaughter method in addition to the overall star based animal welfare classification such communication would serve well to both 50 of the market that takes a more balanced and integrated view on animal welfare and the other half of the market that takes a more uni dimensional perspective space vs slaughter method

exchange rate regimes in the modern era fixed floating and flaky this paper provides a selective survey of the incidence causes and consequences of a country s choice of its exchange rate regime i begin with a critical review of michael klein and jay c shambaugh s 2010 book exchange rate regimes in the modern era and then proceed to provide an alternative overview of what the economics profession knows and needs to know about exchange rate regimes while a fixed exchange rate with capital mobility is a well defined monetary regime floating is not thus it is unclear whether it is theoretically sensible to compare countries across exchange rate regimes this comparison is quite difficult to make empirically it is often hard to figure out what the exchange rate regime of a country is in practice since there are multiple conflicting regime classifications more importantly similar countries choose radically different exchange rate regimes without substantive consequences for macroeconomic outcomes like output growth and inflation that is the profession knows surprisingly little about either the causes or consequences of national choices of exchange rate regimes but since the consequences of these choices are small understanding their causes is of only academic interest jel e52 f33

changing coalitions in value chains and the political economy of agricultural and food policy within this issue of the oxford review of economic policy which focuses on the growing divergence between the agriculture sector and the food sector this paper focuses on how this changing divergence affects the political economy of agricultural and food policies

the dynamics of exchange rate regimes fixes floats and flips the impermanence of fixed exchange rates has become a stylized fact in international finance the combination of the mirage view that pegs do not really peg with the fear of floating view that floats do not really float generates the conclusion that exchange rate regimes are in practice unimportant for the behavior of the exchange rate this is consistent with evidence on the irrelevance of exchange rate regimes for general macroeconomic performance recent studies however show that the exchange rate regime matters this can be understood by considering the dynamics of exchange rate regimes we demonstrate that the mirage view is somewhat misleading and incomplete pegs frequently break but many do last also there is a high degree of flipping that is the re formation of pegs that have broken thus a fixed exchange rate today is a good predictor that one will exist in the future we also investigate the quantitative effect of fixed exchange rates while the fear of floating view suggests little actual difference in fixed and floating rates with respect to exchange rate volatility we show that fixed exchange rates exhibit considerably greater bilateral exchange rate stability than flexible rates both today and in the future 2007 elsevier b v all rights reserved

interest groups power relations and the configuration of value chains the case of biodiesel in india abstract production of biodiesel is technologically simple and the process of value addition from the cultivation of oilseeds to oil extraction and transesterification is straightforward there is however great variation in the socioeconomic configuration of this value chain in some regions of india the cultivation of tree borne oilseeds is organised in a social forestry mode in which poor landless people are paid to perform reforestation tasks and receive usufruct rights to collect oilseeds in other regions peasant cooperatives subcontracting arrangements between farmers and transnational corporations or large scale plantations are promoted there are also many different end uses and ways of processing biodiesel from village level projects for rural off grid electrification to large scale processing this article explains how five indian states have developed biodiesel policies that reflect different political goals and favour different constituencies reflecting the states specific socioeconomic structures power relations norms

willingness to pay estimates using the double bounded dichotomous choice contingent valuation format a test for validity and precision in a bayesian framework the double bounded dichotomous choice db dc contingent valuation format is thought to yield more precise welfare estimates questions remain about its validity the initial bid may represent information with which respondents update their willingness to pay a bayesian model of respondent decision making is estimated for two data sets the results indicate updating or shifts in respondent willingness to pay between iterated valuations nonparametric testing of the welfare estimates reveals that the model incorporating updating yields different values from the standard model the expected increases in the precision of the db dc welfare estimates are lost when updating occurs

material power and normative conflict in global and local agrifood governance the lessons of golden rice in india abstract this special section aims to investigate the interaction of global and local forces in shaping agrifood governance it starts from the recognition that a multitude of actors and norms shape today s agrifood system the resulting opaqueness of the systems makes it extremely difficult to understand and explain processes and outcomes of agrifood governance given the sustainability challenges facing the agrifood system improvements in our understanding of what the interaction of global and local actors and norms means on the ground are urgently needed however the section therefore analyses agrifood governance in india across a selected group of cases it does so by employing a systematic framework emphasizing the material and ideational dimensions of power and their interaction the section has chosen india as the setting in which to analyze this interaction due to the crucial role the food demand and supply of this rising power plays in today s agrifood system this article provides the special sections analytical framework which uses the interplay of material and ideational dimensions of power as a focal lens in addition the article applies this framework to an empirical study of the political conflict around gmo foods in india specifically the case of golden rice

addressing negative willingness to pay in dichotomous choice contingent valuation this paper has four purposes first we outline the controversy surroundingthe issue of negative willingness to pay wtp in contingent valuation cv studies second we use monte carlo simulation to examine theperformance of alternative distributionalassumptions in estimating wtp in the presenceof varying proportions of the populationholding negative wtp values we focus ondichotomous choice cv dc cv where negativewtp values may be especially difficult todetect third we extend the simulation toinvestigate the performance of the mixturemodels that have recently been proposed forhandling identifying non positive wtp values fourth we extend the simulation to investigatethe performance of the nonparametric lowerbound turnbull approach results indicate thatthe relative performance of the dc cv modelingalternatives evaluated here which assumepositive wtp varies across the simulationsetting e g proportion of negative wtp butnone can be said to reasonably solve theproblem ex post this underscores theimportance of ex ante efforts to identify ifnegative wtp is likely to be prominent in agiven valuation setting in such cases appropriately handling negative wtp must beaddressed through ex ante survey design andmodeling choices that allow negative wtp

parametric and semi nonparametric estimation of willingness to pay in the dichotomous choice contingent valuation framework standard procedures for extractingwillingness to pay wtp from dichotomouschoice cv questionnaires rely heavily uponparametric assumptions regarding thedistribution and form of wtp in the sampledpopulation however theory provides littleguidance regarding which parametricspecification to use and the resulting wtpestimates can be sensitive to the selectionsmade here we compare and contrast severalparametric and semi nonparametric estimatorsthat have been proposed in the literature examining the sensitivity of the resulting wtpestimates to the underlying distribution ofpreferences and the estimation procedureemployed

surprising similarities recent monetary regimes of small economies in contrast to earlier recessions the monetary regimes of many small economies have not changed in the aftermath of the global financial crisis this is due in part to the fact that many small economies continue to use hard exchange rate fixes a reasonably durable regime however most of the new stability is due to countries that float with an inflation target though a few have left to join the eurozone no country has yet abandoned an inflation targeting regime under duress inflation targeting now represents a serious alternative to a hard exchange rate fix for small economies seeking monetary stability are there important differences between the economic outcomes of the two stable regimes i examine a panel of annual data from more than 170 countries from 2007 through 2012 and find that the macroeconomic and financial consequences of regime choice are surprisingly small consistent with the literature business cycles capital flows and other phenomena for hard fixers have been similar to those for inflation targeters during the global financial crisis and its aftermath

exchange rate flexibility under the zero lower bound an independent monetary policy and a flexible exchange rate generally help a country in adjusting to macroeconomic shocks but recently in many countries interest rates have been pushed down close to the lower bound limiting the ability of policy makers to accommodate shocks even with flexible exchange rates this paper argues that when the zero bound constraint on nominal interest rates is binding and policy lacks an effective forward guidance mechanism a flexible exchange rate system may be inferior to a single currency area with monetary policy constrained by the zero bound a flexible exchange rate exacerbates the impact of shocks remarkably this may hold true even if only a subset of countries are constrained by the zero bound and other countries optimally adjust their interest rate targets for a regime of multiple currencies to dominate a single currency in a zero bound environment it is necessary to have effective forward guidance in monetary policy

agrifood industry transformation and small farmers in developing countries summary this article introduces this special issue on the rapid transformation of the agrifood industry in developing countries and its effects on small farmers we review the literature from the late 1980s to the present and find evidence first of food processing then retail transformation and mixed evidence of impacts on small farmers both inclusion particularly with resource providing contracts and exclusion sometimes from scale constraint sometimes from inadequate non land assets the special issue papers contribute to the debate by confirming the mix of cases of inclusion and exclusion the cases are main in horticulture and dairy key hopes for smallholder development

returns to human capital under uncertain reform good guys finish last abstract this paper models the career decisions of agents heterogeneous in their ability facing the possibility of future drastic changes e g reforms affecting the demand for different professions supposing that the uncertainty arises after educational choices have been made by the cohort of agents we analyze their response to it depending on ability and educational attainment we show that the more able individuals tend to stay in their original profession while their less able counterparts are more likely to switch to an alternative occupation if reform does take place the more able agents will be forced to change careers since they switch late they miss the benefits of learning by doing this adverse selection has important implications for the analysis of labor allocation during transition from central planning to markets in particular it lowers productivity in the emerging market occupations reducing the benefits of reforms

fixed versus flexible exchange rates which provides more fiscal discipline abstract conventional wisdom holds that fixed rates provide more fiscal discipline than do flexible rates in this paper we show that this wisdom need not hold in a standard model in which fiscal policy is endogenously determined by a maximizing fiscal authority the claim that fixed rates induce more discipline stresses that sustained adoption of lax fiscal policies must eventually lead to an exhaustion of reserves and thus to a politically costly collapse of the peg hence under fixed rates bad behavior today leads to punishment tomorrow under flexible rates bad behavior has costs as well the difference is in the intertemporal distribution of these costs flexible rates allow the effects of unsound fiscal policies to manifest themselves immediately through movements in the exchange rate hence bad behavior today leads to punishment today if fiscal authorities are impatient flexible rates by forcing the costs to be paid up front provide more fiscal discipline and higher welfare for the representative private agent the recent experience of sub saharan countries supplies evidence that matches the predictions of the model

public private alliances in biotechnology can they narrow the knowledge gaps between rich and poor abstract in the area of science and technology the knowledge gap between rich and poor countries is wide and increasing in the area of biotechnology research a second gap has recently emerged between private life science companies and public research institutions as a result a gap is rapidly widening between cutting edge research in the developed world and publicly sponsored research being undertaken in the developing world an obvious strategy for narrowing this gap is to form public private research alliances to overcome intervening obstacles public research institutions in the developing world need to adopt creative new approaches to the process of negotiating with their potential private partners these approaches must focus on leveraging the complementarities and potential synergies between their knowledge assets and those of the private sector concurrently institutional arrangements must be set in place that are geared toward managing the risks and dangers of greatest concern to their constituencies

private voluntary standards in the food system the perspective of major food retailers in oecd countries abstract the paper examines the main economic and institutional incentives which have driven major oecd food retailers in their use of private voluntary standards and discusses their growing role in shaping the agri food system it is based on interviews with quality and safety directors of major oecd retailers and a brief survey of retailers actual buyer practices though not all retailers are included these firms account for over 70 of retail food sales in oecd countries we find that the growing voice of civil society changing legal and institutional frameworks increased market concentration and buying power as well as their integration with financial markets has provided the setting for development of private standards while food safety and quality standards are seen as key to maintaining and improving reputation as well as against legal liabilities additional standards such as labour environmental and animal welfare are also gaining ground as strategies for customer loyalty and market shares the grass roots retailer move in the harmonization of food safety standards is seen as an initial step towards a global approach to managing the food system with harmonization of other standards likely in the future given their buyer power these developments can be viewed as a way of governing the food system and will be important for both oecd and non oecd food and agricultural sector evolution in the coming years

cross country evidence on the link between volatility and growth this paper presents empirical evidence against the standard dichotomy in macroeconomics that separates growth from the volatility of economic fluctuations in a sample of ninety two countries as well as a sample of oecd countries the authors find that countries with higher volatility have lower growth the addition of standard control variables strengthens the negative relationship the authors also find that government spending induced volatility is negatively associated with growth even after controlling for both time and country fixed effects copyright 1995 by american economic association

do fixers perform worse than non fixers during global recessions and recoveries there is an important debate about how economies with different exchange rate regimes performed during the great recession and its ensuing recovery while economic theory suggests that economies with fixed exchange rates are more affected and recover more slowly from global shocks than economies with non fixed exchange rates the empirical evidence on the most recent global recession has been mixed this paper examines the exchange rate and economic growth nexus and assesses how this relationship is affected by the four global recessions and recoveries the world economy has experienced post bretton woods while there is no robust long term relationship between exchange rate regimes and growth there is evidence that fixers recover from global recessions at a weaker pace than non fixers

duopoly and quality standards abstract in the absence of sunk costs a low quality producer benefits from a mildly restrictive quality standard whereas a high quality producer suffers from it consumers welfare increases if the firm producing the higher quality does not increase its quality significantly in response to the increase in quality by its rival a sufficiently severe standard causes exit from the industry when there are no sunk cost the high quality producer exits first

the causality between investment and economic growth abstract this paper tests for causality between investment and economic growth the results show that growth is predominantly caused by investment in machinery and equipment whereas investment in non residential buildings and structures is predominantly caused by economic growth

impact of bt cotton on pesticide poisoning in smallholder agriculture a panel data analysis while substantial research on the productivity and profit effects of bt cotton has been carried out recently the economic evaluation of positive and negative externalities has received much less attention here we focus on farmer health impacts resulting from bt related changes in chemical pesticide use previous studies have documented that bt cotton has reduced the problem of pesticide poisoning in developing countries but they have failed to account for unobserved heterogeneity between technology adopters and non adopters we use unique panel survey data from india to estimate unbiased effects and their developments over time bt cotton has reduced pesticide applications by 50 with the largest reductions of 70 occurring in the most toxic types of chemicals results of fixed effects poisson models confirm that bt has notably reduced the incidence of acute pesticide poisoning among cotton growers these effects have become more pronounced with increasing technology adoption rates bt cotton now helps to avoid several million cases of pesticide poisoning in india every year which also entails sizeable health cost savings

biodiesel value chain and access to energy in ethiopia policies and business prospects abstract similar to many net oil importing sub sahara african countries ethiopia s economy is rural and as it stands today it is far from being a fossil fuel based economy instead the economy is largely powered by traditional burning of solid biomass despite its small share in the overall energy supply 7 imported fuel absorbs half of ethiopia s foreign currency earnings the common justifications behind the development of biofuels such as energy source diversification foreign currency saving rural poverty alleviation through employment and technology transfers were all appealing for ethiopian policy advisers in 2007 mostly influenced by the global discourse ethiopia launched a biofuel expansion strategy and a massive ad hoc investment promotion of two biodiesel crops castor and jatropha in this paper we synthesize the various biodiesel development initiatives and modes of production and point out at the gaps in policy formulation and project implementation evaluating the prospect and constraints for biodiesel production in ethiopia we conclude that most of the prerequisites for a viable biodiesel industry still need to be met we identify key areas and priorities to further strengthen the development of the biodiesel sector