the development of a market for sustainable coffee in the netherlands rethinking the contribution of fair trade in recent years researchers have observed the process of mainstreaming fair trade and the emergence of alternative sustainability standards in the coffee industry the underlying market dynamics that have contributed to these developments are however under researched insight into these dynamics is important to understand how markets can develop to favor sustainability this study examines the major developments in the market for certified coffee in the netherlands it finds that in the creation of a market for sustainable coffee decisions that significantly influence market creation are made in the lead companies retailers and coffee roasters these decisions are made possible by the availability of multiple systems of sustainability standards and by the existence of a small segment of loyal fair trade customers that ensured that sustainability remained an issue on the coffee market in the years before the market creation took off fair trade did not become the new rule in this process but it became the benchmark against which companies could compare themselves and the basis upon which they built in adopting or developing new standards that would be more feasible in their business models

the fairwear campaign an ethical network in the australian garment industry in many parts of the world homework is a form of labour characterised by precariousness lack of regulation and invisibility and lack of protection of the workers who are often amongst the world s poorest and most exploited homework is spreading due to firm practices such as outsourcing the analysis and understanding of complex corporate networks may assist with the identification and protection of those most at risk within the supply chain network it can also expose some of the key ethical issues and dilemmas of supply chain management and corporate social responsibility csr based on a case study of the australian fairwear campaign fwc this article identifies an ethical network that aims to increase corporate accountability ca via greater transparency in corporate supply chains and improve work conditions for homeworkers and increase their recognition in the supply chain

management of social issues in supply chains a literature review exploring social issues actions and performance outcomes the social dimension of sustainable development and its impact on supply chains have so far received less attention than the environmental dimension the aim of the research is to explore the intersection between social issues corporate social responsibility csr actions and performance outcomes a structured literature review of social issues in supply chains is presented analysing the research published so far in peer reviewed publications linking csr and supply chain management allows the exploration of strategies and performance outcomes with a focus on social issues the corresponding responsible supply chain actions adopted by firms to address these issues are grouped into communication compliance and supplier development strategies social and economic as well as buyer and supplier performance are identified as the key outcomes but the interactions among these constructs would require further research this paper contributes to the understanding of managing social issues in supply chains by linking social issues responsible supply chain actions and performance outcomes the paper consolidates related research by offering an overarching conceptual framework and points to future research directions and simultaneously provides insights into the management of social issues in supply chains

global feminization through flexible labor abstract the emphasis on structural adjustment and labor flexibility in both developing and industrialized economies is rapidly altering the nature of employment women are being substituted for men and many forms of work are being converted into the kinds of jobs traditionally geared to women international data on recent trends in female economic activity reveal that new types of labor data are needed to highlight the mechanisms of control over workers and the actual economic forms of vulnerability to which women are exposed the paper concludes by posing questions that challenge the traditional concerns of donors and policy makers in many developing countries

fair trade towards an economics of virtue over the past 10 years the sales of fair trade goods particularly those carrying the fair trade labelling organizations international flo certification mark have grown exponentially academic interest in fair trade has also grown significantly over the past decade with researchers analysing the model from a wide range of theoretical perspectives whilst fair trade is generally acknowledged as a new supply chain model it has tended to be studied at the micro organisational level rather than at the macro systems level as a consequence its wider impact as institutional innovation at the field level appears to have been under theorised so far in order to address this research gap this article uses a neo institutionalist perspective to analyse fair trade not simply as a new exchange model working within existing organisational and economic structures but rather as an agent of institutional entrepreneurship at and beyond the field level from this latter perspective fair trade brings a new set of transformational meanings to extant exchange and consumption models and reforms fields of economic exchange by disrupting and then re assembling key institutional elements around modern consumption to roll back commodity fetishism and reconnect consumers and producers the type of institutional change driven by fair trade can be seen as a form of social entrepreneurship

equilibrium analysis and corporate social responsibility for supply chain integration this paper evaluates the profit of coordination between manufacturers on corporate social responsibility csr under network equilibrium a three tier supply chain network with multiple manufacturers distributors and retailers is considered and several mathematical models are established to investigate behavior and profits in a decentralized supply chain network a centralized supply chain network and a supply chain network with csr the system optimal solution of a supply chain network problem is usually not achievable or stable since each member always tries to maximize its own profit in order to make such a system optimal solution in a stable state and ensure the maximization of total profits a strategy of coordination between manufacturers on csr is proposed the amount of payment in csr of each manufacturer is clearly defined a hybrid diagonalization method with a super network representation is proposed and tested with numerical examples the results show that by taking csr the total profits of the whole supply chain network can increase with or without coordination

labour chains analysing the role of labour contractors in global production networks abstract third party labour contractors are increasingly prevalent in global production networks gpns and can provide a channel for new forms of unfree labour review of case study evidence from south african and uk horticulture suggests this often emerges off site through labour intermediaries analytical approaches to labour in gpns and value chains are examined the article argues that labour contracting is driven by the commercial dynamics of global outsourcing a cascade system allows unscrupulous intermediaries to coerce vulnerable workers we examine strategies of civil society alliances and regulatory reform and argue for extending liability of all commercial actors across global boundaries

the potential impact of social accountability certification on marketing a short note social responsibility sa 8000 registration certification is a response by the business community to address consumer and investor perceptions of the importance of emerging global social issues such as child labor worker rights discrimination compensation etc as more u s and european firms outsource production to less developed nations social environmental and reputational issues have become more important sa8000 is a series of behavioral standards that represents a comprehensive and potentially global corporate social responsibility registration system that provides a standard of socially responsible treatment of workers this paper explores how sa8000 adoption may impact a firm s marketing activities

labor markets as gendered institutions equality efficiency and empowerment issues abstract labor markets are gendered institutions operating at the intersection of the productive and reproductive economies participation in labor markets does not automatically empower women reduction in gender differentials in earnings may be the result of harmonizing down rather than up discrimination against women may persist because in the absence of institutional changes it is profitable it is important to distinguish between static and dynamic and micro and macro efficiency labor market regulation has an important role to play in the institutional transformation needed to reconcile goals of efficiency and equality

stakeholders perceptions and future scenarios to improve corporate social responsibility in hong kong and mainland china globalisation has accelerated economic development in emerging economies through the outsourcing of their supply chains and at the same time has accelerated the degradation of environmental and social conditions society expects corporations to play an essential role in creating economic environmental and social prosperity beyond their country of origin in order to regulate outsourcing activities in the supply chain many multinationals are constantly searching for ways to manage their indirect environmental and social impacts accordingly as well as to meet their stakeholder expectations because expectations of stakeholders vary widely across different regions this study intends by engaging with major stakeholders to identify what are the local and regional supply chain stakeholders perceptions and expectations the findings would help in building consensus strengthening the implementation and establishing the future corporate social responsibility csr framework this study collects and analyses data from 21 major stakeholders in hong kong and mainland china the results indicate that local and regional stakeholders perceive that csr is fairly significant to largely export oriented businesses but it is lagging behind the west due to the fact that most local regional companies only become involved in csr when this is a client requirement they see responsible corporations as meeting the local legislative requirement going beyond this requirement is unnecessary a voluntary approach favours multi party partnership initiatives with pilot trust programmes aimed at managers and workers capacity building most stakeholders favour the proposed regional partnership initiative supply chain task forces aimed at bringing together relevant organisations and people with different sets of skills distinct roles of different organisations are identified to assist suppliers to understand csr and only this will bring about long term sustainable change

social accountability 8000 standard certification analysis of worldwide diffusion abstract this study analyzes the worldwide diffusion of the social accountability 8000 standard certification in sixty five countries and sixty six activity sectors from 1999 to 2011 the logistic curve model is used to assess the current situation on both a global scale and a local scale additionally instability and concentration indices are used to analyze whether the diffusion process developed in a homogeneous manner across countries and economic sectors the results i increase the understanding of sa8000 s diffusion ii provide an exploratory descriptive analysis of the current sa8000 diffusion worldwide in both macro and microanalyses compared with other standards and iii identify future trends in sa8000 diffusion concluding that currently sa8000 follows a similar pattern than other standards and in consequence a growing trend is expected in next years these findings suggest some challenges and opportunities the standard must be more flexible to accommodate the differing perspectives of cultures increase the dialogue with stakeholders and include more small companies from developing countries

the reconstruction of the supply side of the labour market the relative autonomy of social reproduction been replaced in recent years by a proliferation of theories about the family and its rela tion to the system of production 1 it is our contention that this work for the most part has done little to establish the family system as an interesting central and dynamic vari able for economic analysis this outcome however is the direct result of the application of two opposing but equally inappropriate methodologies for the analysis of the family system in this paper we examine the main approaches to the analysis of social reproduc tion using the position of women in the system of production and reproduction as the main example of existing work on social reproduction we show that across the whole spectrum of theoretical approaches from neoclassical to marxist and feminist broadly similar methodologies for analysing the relationships between the spheres of production and reproduction have been employed

violence instability and trade evidence from kenya s cut flower sector summary we examine the implications of the violence and instability following the 2007 kenyan elections and how it affected cut flower trade between kenya and the eu using the rotterdam demand model we find that the post election violence had a negative impact on eu imports from kenya equivalent to 33 million which is significant given the importance of flowers to kenya s economy results show that even a short period of violence can have an effect on trade since instability in an exporting country causes importers to source from other countries perceived as less risky persisting even when order is restored

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

corporate responsibility in scandinavian supply chains this article examines corporate responsibility in the supply chains of four of the largest scandinavian multinational corporations ikea nokia novo nordisk and statoilhydro and offers two key findings first these scandinavian companies have all implemented responsible supply chain practices where suppliers in developing nations and the communities of these suppliers are engaged as key stakeholders and treated as partners second these supply chain practices all share the common bond of having honesty and the establishment of trust based relationships at their foundation as a result these scandinavian companies have developed a cooperative advantage in their ability to form successful long term partnerships in their respective supply chains

on the contribution of game theory to the study of sovereign debt and default this paper reviews the lessons learned from the application of the tools of game theory to the theoretical study of sovereign debt and default we focus on two main questions first we review answers to the most fundamental question in the theory of sovereign debt given that there is no supranational institution for enforcing the repayment of debts why do countries ever repay their debts second we review theories of the process by which sovereign debts are restructured with a view to answering the following question why does the process of sovereign debt restructuring appear so inefficient the first question raises issues in the design of self enforcing contracts and on the credibility of threats to punish a country in default the second question involves applications of the theory of bargaining in environments where the parties to a bargain cannot commit to honour the terms of the bargain or even commit to enter into negotiations in the first place copyright 2013 oxford university press

the empire strikes back the evolution of the eastern bloc from a soviet asset to a soviet liability the structure of the soviet bloc would appear to be ideal for the maximization of soviet domestic and foreign interests the actual ledger of soviet gains and losses from control over eastern europe however reveals a different picture over the postwar period eastern european contributions to soviet national security economic growth and domestic stability have declined this decline in the value of empire to the soviets is a function of three factors the first is growing regime society tensions in eastern europe as a result of east europe s dependence on the soviet union and the derivative structures of its stalinist political economies the second is the soviet role within the bloc as a political and economic monopoly and monopsony and the third is the unexpected costs both to the soviet union and to eastern europe that attended the bloc s reunion in the early 1970s with a global capitalist system in crisis

nexus between clean energy consumption economic growth and co2 emissions abstract to investigate the nexus among clean energy consumption economic growth and co2 emissions a newly developed bootstrap ardl bounds test with structural breaks is employed to survey the cointegration and causality for g7 countries we find no cointegration among real gdp per capita clean energy consumption and co2 emissions in canada france italy the us and the uk however cointegration exists in germany when real gdp per capita and co2 emissions serve as dependent variables and in japan when co2 emissions is the dependent variable regarding the results of causality test that we find clean energy consumption causes real gdp per capita for canada germany and the us and co2 emissions causes clean energy consumption for germany besides we find feedbacks between clean energy consumption and co2 emissions for germany and unidirectional causality running from clean energy consumption to co2 emissions for the us our study has important policy implications for g7 countries conducting efficient energy use strategy to reduce co2 emissions

a review of sustainable supply chain management practices in canada there is a growing body of research on the theory and practice of sustainable supply chain management sscm however relatively little research has been conducted on the extent to which corporations have integrated sustainability principles into the management of their supply chain and the evaluation of supplier performance the purpose of this article is to explore the extent to which corporate sustainability principles are integrated into supply chain management scm in corporations canada is used as a case study in this article the study included a content analysis of one hundred canadian corporate sustainable development reports and in depth interviews with 18 canadian experts on sscm the article highlights the wide array of ways in which canadian corporations address sscm issues amongst other topics issues associated with supply chain governance standards for sscm collaboration with suppliers performance measurement and accountability within the supply chain are explored the findings reveal that there are many challenges in integrating sustainability into scm these challenges shed light on possible future directions for research in sscm this article underlines the need for research that reflects the interconnected nature of the economic environmental and social dimensions of sustainability particularly as it relates to measuring supplier performance on sustainability initiatives

do private standards benefit workers in horticultural export chains in peru private standards are spreading rapidly in international food production and trade and are moving beyond food quality and safety aspect to address environmental and social concerns we examine how effective private standards are in improving employment conditions in global food supply chains using panel data from own company and worker surveys and different econometric techniques we analyze how the adoption of a variety of private standards that differ with respect to their focus on labor influences employment conditions in production processing and exporting companies in the horticultural export chain in peru we find that workers employed in companies adopting private labor standards are more likely to be paid a minimum wage to have a contract and to receive training but there is no effect of private standards on the level of the wage and on the employment period we conclude that labor standards are most effective in reinforcing the respect of national labor laws and when there exists a clear cut definition on the employment requirements they push forward despite the existence of labor regulations at the national level and the wide spread use of private labor standards ethical labor concerns do remain an issue in the peruvian horticultural export sector

international investment and colonial control a new interpretation the impact of economic factors on colonial imperialism in the late nineteenth century has long been a topic of debate this article examines the expected relationship between different forms of international investment and different patterns of political ties between developed and developing countries drawing on the literature on relational contracts and collective action it argues that direct colonial control was likely to be associated with cross border investments whose rents were particularly easy to seize or protect and whose protection did not require multilateral action where such rents were difficult to seize or protect unilaterally colonialism is expected to be less likely the most common example of the former sort of investment is primary raw materials or agricultural investment of the latter multinational manufacturing affiliates the argument is weighed against both a survey of the qualitative evidence and some simple quantitative evaluations the approach also has potential applications to more general problems of international conflict and cooperation

stakeholder forces of socially responsible supply chain management orientation this project investigates salient stakeholder forces of socially responsible supply chain orientation srsco in the apparel and footwear sector focusing on fair labor management issues srsco was conceptualized as a composite of internal organizational direction and external partnership for a creation and continuation of fair labor conditions throughout the supply chain primary stakeholders identified were consumers regulation industry and media a total of 209 mail survey responses from sourcing managers of u s apparel and footwear companies were analyzed two dimensions of srsco were confirmed internal direction and external partnership consumer and industry peer pressures were found significantly related to internal direction while industry peers and media were significantly related to the external partnership regulation was not significantly related to either internal direction or external partnerships lack of regulation forces to govern labor issues and roles of consumers industry peers and media in promoting fair labor management are discussed in this article

money talks supplementary financiers and international monetary fund conditionality what explains the changes in international monetary fund imf conditionality i argue that imf conditionality agreements are influenced by supplementary financiers the imf regularly relies on external financing to supplement its loans to countries facing payments imbalances as a result these supplementary financiers are able to exercise leverage over the imf and the design of its conditionality programs i consider the influence of one type of supplementary financier private financial institutions on imf conditionality conclusions are supported by a data set of 249 conditionality arrangements coded according to their terms and two case studies

the international organization of third world debt third world debt grew very rapidly in the 1970s many states faced with sharply higher costs for energy and manufactured imports borrowed aggressively in unregulated offshore capital markets but what constrains sovereign states to repay this debt to commercial banks creditors do not turn to their home states to enforce payment rather the supervision of sovereign debt is largely a function of commercial banking arrangements especially lenders syndicates and the international monetary fund s conditional lending this political structure which involves unified private sanctions has ensured that no state defaults unless it is insolvent or is willing to accept a radical rupture in its international commercial relationships when the problem is insolvency creditors routinely convene ad hoc conferences in conjunction with an imfapproved stabilization program creditors can renegotiate debt service schedules and provide new financing if necessary these arrangements are distinctive among international economic regimes because they rely on nonstate actors as the primary source of rules norms and procedures

causal interactions between trade openness renewable electricity consumption and economic growth in asia pacific countries fresh evidence from a bootstrap ardl approach abstract this paper applies a new bootstrap autoregressive distributed lag a r d l approach to examine the nexus between trade openness renewable electricity consumption and economic growth for seven countries in the asia pacific region during 1980 2017 period in fact there is no evidence of cointegration among real trade openness electricity consumption and real g d p per capita in countries with the exception of malaysia where real g d p serves as dependent variable however cointegration does manifest in the cases of indonesia japan south korea and thailand when trade openness is used as the dependent variable a similar outcome is observed for indonesia malaysia and thailand when renewable electricity consumption is used as the dependent variable a short run analysis reveals mixed results in term of the direction of the causality among different variables for various countries such results have implications for trade energy and environmental policies one implication is that any environmental policy aiming to reduce the use of non renewable energy and carbon dioxide emissions will inevitably lead to greater renewable energy consumption which in turn may enhance trade openness and ultimately accelerate economic growth

methodologies and perspectives in research on labour relations in global agricultural production networks a review the integration of global south actors into the global agricultural economy has attracted research on labour effects this is because global south actors are often integrated at the level of produc

the transformation of trade the sources and effects of regime change regimes can be analyzed both as outcomes to be explained and as mediating social institutions that affect international transactions in the case of postwar trade the changing outcomes can be predicted simply and with rough accuracy by a hegemonic model yet that model cannot explain the continuing reduction of tariffs the development of new nontariff codes and the persistence of crucial norms rules and institutions these durable features of modern trade suggest that the logic of regime maintenance is distinct from that of regime initiation nor can the hegemonic model account for the regime s highly uneven weakening the most prominent trade barriers are in mature basic industries the least prominent are in industries with differentiated products and extensive research and development expenditures one explanation which usefully complements a hegemonic model is that sectors differ systematically in their capacity to adapt competitively to imports and hence in their need to preserve their position by trade barriers despite the regime s uneven weakening trade volumes have continued their secular growth in sectors where the regime remains strong it has stimulated two way trade in similar products intraindustry trade where the regime is weaker new nontariff barriers diminish hypothetical trade growth but rarely aim at a permanent rollback in market shares or trade volume

women workers industrialization global supply chains and corporate codes of conduct the restructured globalized economy has provided women with employment opportunities globalisation has also meant a shift towards self regulation of multinationals as part of the restructuring of the world economy that increases among others things flexible employment practices worsening of labour conditions and lower wages for many women workers around the world in this context as part of the global trend emphasising corporate social responsibility csr in the 1980s one important development has been the growth of voluntary corporate codes of conduct to improve labour conditions this article reviews from a feminist interdisciplinary perspective the broad academic literature on women workers covering the more classical debate on women workers in the industrialization process and entering into women workers in the global supply chains and women workers and corporate codes of conduct the main argument is that this research on women workers is crucial to frame the issues of business ethics and in particular csr and codes of conduct in the context of women in the global political economy when this crucial knowledge is ignored then the ethical policies of the companies also ignore the real situation of the women workers at the bottom of their supply chains

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

economics and politics of food standards trade and development standards have played an important role in food trade for a very long time their rapid growth in recent years has triggered vigorous debates on their impacts on international trade and development with many arguing that standards are non tariff barriers to trade and that standards are marginalizing the poor i present conceptual frameworks and review empirical evidence on the equity and efficiency effects and the political economy of standards models which incorporate essential aspects of standards yield complex theoretical results and nuanced conclusions careful empirical analyses support such nuanced arguments and find complex effects for trade standards can create welfare gains but also involve rent redistribution which induces lobbying by interest groups to set the standards at their preferred level this makes it difficult to distinguish socially desirable standards from those resulting from political rent seeking for development it is crucial to explicitly account for a the endogeneity of the institutional organization of value chains and b both smallholder contracting and employment creation on large scale farms when considering the impact of standards on development and poverty

the importance of renewable energy consumption and fdi inflows in reducing environmental degradation bootstrap ardl bound test in selected 9 countries abstract this study examines the relationship between renewable energy consumption non renewable energy consumption foreign direct investment economic growth and carbon emissions for the nine countries i e denmark finland france india italy morocco norway portugal sweden identified in the climate change performance index ccpi 2018 report this study mainly aims to demonstrate the role of renewable energy consumption and foreign direct investment on co2 emissions in countries with high scores in the ccpi using the newly developed bootstrap autoregressive distributed lag ardl approach for this purpose the unit root properties of the variables are determined by sharp and smooth structural break unit root test sor shahbaz et al 2018 we then conduct a bootstrap ardl test developed by mcnown et al 2018 to investigate the existence of cointegration we also use granger causality based on the bootstrap ardl approach to identify causal relationships between variables empirical analysis results show only a few cointegration relationships between variables exist however we have identified significant long term relationships between foreign direct investment renewable energy consumption and economic growth in some countries and our study includes important policy implications particularly for relationship among co2 emissions and foreign direct investment inflows

global value chains labor organization and private social standards lessons from east african cut flower industries summary this article examines the opportunities and challenges that private social standards pose for labor organizations it explores different labor responses to private social standards in east african cut flower industries the analysis incorporates the concept of labor agency in global value chain analysis and reveals how retailer driven chains offer more room for labor organizations to exercise their agency than the traditional cut flower value chains labor organizations have been able to influence social standard setting and implementation and to use standards to further labor representation at production sites however labor organizations ability to seriously challenge the prevailing governance structure of the cut flower value chain appears extremely limited

private regulation and trade union rights why codes of conduct have limited impact on trade union rights codes of conduct are the main tools to privately regulate worker rights in global value chains scholars have shown that while codes may improve outcome standards such as occupational health and safety they have had limited impact on process rights such as freedom of association and collective bargaining scholars have though only provided vague or general explanations for this empirical finding we address this shortcoming by providing a holistic and detailed explanation and argue that codes in their current form have limited impact on trade union rights due to i buyers paying lip service to trade union rights ii workers being treated as passive objects of regulation in codes of conduct iii auditing being unable to detect and remediate violations of trade union rights iv codes emphasizing parallel means of organizing v suppliers having limited incentives for compliance and vi codes being unable to open up space for union organizing when leveraged in grassroots struggles our arguments suggest that there is no quick fix for codes limited impact on trade union rights and that codes in their current form have limited potential to improve trade union rights we conclude by discussing ways in which codes of conduct and private regulation of worker rights more generally could be transformed to more effectively address trade union rights

causality between economic growth and immigration an ardl bounds testing approach abstract this paper aims to investigate the causal relationship between immigration and per capita economic growth using the ardl approach to cointegration we find evidence of long run causality from per capita economic growth to immigration but not vice versa

the long run stability of the demand for money italy 1861 1996 this paper examines the stability of the demand for money in italy using a newly extended data set for the period 1861 1996 we examine how the evolution of the financial system in italy and policy shifts have affected the behavior of the long run demand for money and present tests of structural stability we find the demand for broad money to be remarkably stable despite periods of considerable economic turbulence in addition we present evidence on the monetary transmission mechanism our results shed light on attempts to model long run relationships in other countries such as the uk and the us

the scramble for africans demography globalisation and africa s informal labour markets images of an african boom have presented us with labour markets full of dynamic potential a declining dependency ratio low levels of unemployment and a vibrant middle class this buoyant view of african labour markets conceals a less encouraging reality of catastrophic youth unemployment and expanding informality how has the continent known for the world s highest share of informal labour become a beacon of prosperity this article will explore the reality beneath the outbreak of informal economic optimism and consider why african labour markets are being painted in such rosy colours

the ethics of global supply chains in china convergences of east and west this paper addresses ethical issues surrounding global supply chains of multinational companies in developing countries in particular it considers the development and application of industry wide ethical standards and codes of conduct for multinational supply chains in china we describe and analyze the ethical norms and compliance components of such industry wide regimes in the toy textile and consumer electronics industries we argue that this development represents an positive attempt to institutionalize emergent international ethical standards and practices into this component of the chinese economy

horticultural exports female wage employment and primary school enrolment theory and evidence from senegal abstract in this paper we analyse the indirect effects of the boom in horticultural exports in senegal on child schooling the export boom has caused a dramatic increase in female off farm wage employment which led to increased female bargaining power in the household we investigate the causal effect of female wage income on primary school enrolment we develop a collective household model with endogenous bargaining power to show that if women have higher preferences for schooling than men the impact of female wage income on school enrolment will be the result of a positive income effect a negative labour substitution effect and a positive empowerment effect we address the question empirically using original household survey data from senegal we use different econometric techniques and show that female off farm wage income has a positive effect on primary school enrolment for both boys and girls and that female empowerment is specifically important for the schooling of girls our results imply that the horticultural export boom in senegal has indirectly contributed to the second and third millennium development goals of universal primary education and elimination of gender disparities in primary education

social issues in supply chains capabilities link responsibility risk opportunity and performance abstract social issues in the supply chain are defined as product or process related aspects of operations that affect human safety welfare and community development drawing from related literatures basic constructs related to capabilities and risk are defined and used to underpin case research in five multinational firms this data extended our understanding of three key social management capabilities monitoring collaboration and innovation moreover the field research revealed four key linkages that detail how managers actively can work toward mitigating social risks creating new opportunities and improving firm performance collectively these capabilities and linkages establish the basis for an integrative framework and five research propositions

environmental degradation in france the effects of fdi financial development and energy innovations abstract this paper explores the determinants of carbon emissions in france by accounting for the significant role played by foreign direct investment fdi financial development economic growth energy consumption and energy research innovations in influencing co 2 emissions function in this endeavour we employ the novel sor shahbaz et al 2017 unit root test on french time series data over the period 1955 2016 to examine the order of integration in the presence of sharp and smooth structural breaks in the variables we also apply the bootstrapping bounds testing approach recently developed by mcnown et al 2018 to investigate the presence of cointegration and the empirical findings underscore the presence of cointegration among the time series moreover we find that fdi has a positive impact while energy research innovations have a negative impact on french carbon emissions financial development lowers carbon emissions thereby improving the french environmental quality fdi degrades the environment and thus supports the pollution haven hypothesis in france similarly financial development suggests that financial stability is a required condition for improving environmental quality so are energy research innovations contrarily energy consumption is positively linked with carbon emissions however the relationship between economic growth and co 2 emissions is an inverted u which is a validation of the environmental kuznets curve ekc

modeling spatial price transmission in the grain markets of ethiopia with an application of ardl approach to white teff following the agricultural market liberalization policy there is an emerging grain market structure in ethiopia in which the central wholesale market exhibits concentration of power and spatial integration with the local markets due to this it is hypothesized that the central wholesale market influences the long run price movements in the local markets the relationship can be modeled as spatial price equilibrium with the aim to guide subsequent policy decisions with regard to public intervention in the post liberalization period in this study we modeled the spatial equilibrium relationship between the producer and the wholesale prices of white teff a major staple in ethiopia using the autoregressive distributed lag modeling approach to cointegration analysis first the existence of a nonspurious long run relationship in levels between the producer prices in the local market and the wholesale prices in the central market is confirmed second the long run relationship and the error correction model for the producer price are estimated the results reveal that the wholesale price of white teff in the central consumer market is a major short and long run determinant of the producer price in the local supply markets therefore the institutional role of the government with the aim of improving producers marketing margin and the overall performance of the grain markets in the post liberalization period can be influenced through targeted interventions at the central wholesale market

public private partnerships investment in energy as new determinant of co2 emissions the role of technological innovations in china this paper explores the relationship between public private partnerships investment in energy sector and carbon emissions considering the vital role of technological innovations in carbon emissions function for china in doing so we apply bootstrapping autoregressive distributed lag modeling bardl for examining the cointegration between carbon emissions and its determinants the empirical results reveal that public private partnerships investment in energy impedes environmental quality by increasing carbon emissions on contrary technological innovations have negative effect on carbon emissions the relationship between economic growth and carbon emissions is inverted u shaped i e environmental kuznets curve hypothesis exports are positively linked with carbon emissions foreign direct investment impedes environmental quality by stimulating co2 emissions the empirical findings provide new insights for policy makers to direct public private partnerships investment in energy for the betterment of environmental quality in china

are saving and investment co integrated abstract the observation of a strong positive correlation between national saving and domestic investment rates calls into question the assumption of highly mobile international capital i re examine the question of a high correlation by considering the time series relationship between national saving and domestic investment rates in the u s using newly developed co integration techniques national saving and domestic investment appear to be co integrated prior to 1971 but appear not to be co integrated after 1971

corporate social responsibility in global value chains where are we now and where are we going we outline the drivers main features and conceptual underpinnings of the compliance paradigm we then use a similar structure to investigate the drivers main features and conceptual underpinnings of the cooperative paradigm for working with csr in global value chains we argue that the measures proposed in the new cooperation paradigm are unlikely to alter power relationships in global value chains and bring about sustained improvements in workers conditions in developing country export industries after that we provide a critical appraisal of the potential and limits of the cooperative paradigm we summarize our findings and we outline avenues for research purchasing practices and labor standard noncompliance csr capacity building among local suppliers and improved csr monitoring by local resources in the developing world

bootstrapping the autoregressive distributed lag test for cointegration we propose a bootstrap autoregressive distributed lag ardl test by applying the appropriate bootstrap method some weaknesses underlying the pesaran shin and smith ardl bounds test are addresse

supermarkets and agricultural labor demand in kenya a gendered perspective abstract many developing countries are experiencing a rapid expansion of supermarkets new supermarket procurement systems could affect farming patterns and wider rural development while previous studies have analyzed farm productivity and income effects possible employment effects have received much less attention special supermarket requirements may entail intensified farm production and post harvest handling thus potentially increasing demand for hired labor this could also have important gender implications because female and male workers are often hired for distinct farm operations building on data from a recent survey of vegetable farmers in kenya a double hurdle model of hired labor use is developed and estimated farmer participation in supermarket channels increases the likelihood of hiring labor by 20 and demand for hired labor by 61 a gender disaggregation shows that positive employment effects are especially pronounced for female laborers who often belong to the most vulnerable population groups rural employment generation can be an important vehicle for poverty reduction

explaining choice of development strategies suggestions from mexico 1970 1982 economic development requires choices among a broad spectrum of alternative strategies and as the recent experience of mexico suggests those choices are not easy a complex politics is involved in the transition from one development strategy to another the international political economy and domestic social coalitions both influence the costs and benefits associated with various development policies they rule out some choices but numerous options still remain how can one explain actual outcomes observers may significantly increase their ability to explain outcomes by incorporating a statist component into their analyses within the very broad parameters set by the international political economy the state influences but does not determine the creation and the demands of the social coalition itself in addition the state may use policy instruments and advantages from the domestic and international arenas to implement policy even in the face of domestic opposition the structure of the domestic political economy determines the space within which the statist perspective contributes to explanatory power eventually it is in a historically based ideology that the chief explanation for the state s choice of policy and the construction of particular domestic coalitions is to be found

implementing supplier codes of conduct in global supply chains process explanations from theoretic and empirical perspectives western buying companies impose supplier codes of conduct scc on their suppliers in developing countries however many suppliers cannot fully comply with scc and some of them even cheat in scc in this research we link contract characteristics price pressure production complexity contract duration to the likelihood of supplier s commitment to scc through a mediating process how the buying companies govern their suppliers our structural equation model analysis shows that the hierarchy relational norms governance is a perfect mediator of contract characteristics effects on the likelihood of supplier s commitment the market governance an insignificant one the managerial implications are provided for successfully implementing scc in global supply chains

a gendered value chain approach to codes of conduct in african horticulture codes of conduct covering the employment conditions of southern producers exporting to european markets mushroomed throughout the 1990s especially in the horticulture sector linking uk and european supermarkets with export firms in africa the majority of employment in this sector is informal a significant proportion of which is female this paper explores the gender sensitivity of codes currently applied in the african export horticulture sector from an analytical perspective that combines global value chain and gendered economy approaches through an analysis of these two approaches it develops a gender pyramid which provides a framework for mapping and assessing the gender content of codes of conduct the pyramid is applied to codes that cover employment conditions in three commodity groups and countries exporting to european markets south african fruit kenyan flowers and zambian vegetables and flowers it concludes that the gender sensitivity of codes needs to be greatly enhanced if they are to adequately address employment conditions relevant to informal and especially women workers

conditional cooperation and climate change it is widely believed that international cooperation can arise through strategies of reciprocity in this paper we investigate whether citizens in the united states and 25 other countries support reciprocity to deal with climate change we find little public enthusiasm for intrinsic reciprocity in which countries restrain their consumption of fossil fuels if and only if other countries do the same in contrast we find significant support for extrinsic reciprocity in which countries enforce cooperation by linking issues citizens support economic sanctions against polluters and are willing to shame them in international forums especially when the polluters are violating a treaty cooperation could therefore emerge from efforts to link climate with other issues and to embed climate commitments in international law

coping with the upheavals of globalization in the shea value chain the maintenance and relevance of upstream shea nut supply chain organization in western burkina faso summary market globalization has had only a weak impact on the regional shea nut supply chain in western burkina faso despite the boom in the shea trade and the arrival of leading foreign firms we show that despite the fact that wholesalers have kept the shea chain locked in an oligarchic organization for the last 50 years they still play an important role in the smooth functioning of the chain and in profit sharing down the chain to the rural poor we suggest that development actors should consider shea traders and their role in the coordination of the chain more carefully 2014 the authors published by elsevier ltd this is an open access article under the cc by nc sa license http creativecommons org licenses by nc sa 3 0

market based governance for sustainability in value chains conditions for successful standard setting in the palm oil sector abstract current production and consumption patterns remain unsustainable global economic growth reaches planetary boundaries and puts increasing pressure on the world s natural resources whereas most economic actors just react to environmental pressures proactive market actors and other non governmental organisations e g greentec firms or fair trade organisations turn them into market opportunities or even create standards or certification schemes as promising problem solving market instruments in global value chains however how legitimate are standards and certification schemes developed by collaborating non state actors for sustainability in global value chains what are conditions for the success of those market based governance mechanisms this paper discusses the legitimacy and effectiveness of standard setting in the case of palm oil and focuses on the roundtable of sustainable palm oil rspo as the first global standard setting initiative in this respect conditions for the success of sustainability standard setting in global value chains are identified based on the concept of non state market driven nsmd governance based on literature review and expert interviews on standard setting results from the case study on rspo highlight strengths and weaknesses of its standard setting process in the light of increasing market demand for palm oil

testing the ekc hypothesis for the top six hydropower energy consuming countries evidence from fourier bootstrap ardl procedure abstract environmental degradation is an important threat to sustainable development economic growth and fossil fuel based energy consumption are main factors causing environmental pollution the use of renewable energy as an alternative for fossil fuels can help to reduce environmental pollution and thus sustainable development can be achieved from this point of view hydropower is the most widely used renewable energy source in several countries however the effects of hydropower energy on the environment are controversial to add a new dimension to the discussion this study investigates the relationship between hydropower energy consumption ecological footprint and economic growth for the top six hydropower consuming countries within the framework of the environmental kuznets curve ekc hypothesis the study employs newly developed cointegration and causality tests with smooth structural changes over the period 1965 2016 the findings of the fourier bootstrap ardl procedure demonstrate that no cointegration exist between the variables therefore the ekc hypothesis is not valid for brazil china canada india norway and the us furthermore the findings of the fourier toda yamamoto causality test suggest unidirectional causality running from hydropower energy consumption to economic growth in brazil and bidirectional causality between these variables in china in the case of the top six hydropower consuming countries no evidence was found for a causal relationship between hydropower energy and ecological footprint overall these results are important for policy makers hydropower energy plays a crucial role in china and brazil s economic growth policies on the other hand hydropower energy consumption and economic growth do not have a role in mitigating the ecological footprint in six countries for this reason different types of renewable energy consumption should be taken into consideration by countries for the solution of environmental problems

the role of fairtrade certification for wages and job satisfaction of plantation workers summary worker welfare and employment conditions in the agri food producing and processing sectors in the global south have become an increasing concern for consumers sustainability standards such as fairtrade play an important role in agri food markets of horticultural produce and may be a tool to address these concerns however so far the implications of fairtrade certification for extrinsic and intrinsic employment factors of hired labor on large scale plantations remain hardly understood in this paper we assess its effect on workers hourly wages and their level of job satisfaction with primary survey data from 325 randomly sampled workers from eight different export oriented pineapple companies in ghana we apply a linear linear mixed model and instrumental variable approach to take into account the multilevel characteristics of our data and possible selection bias our findings show that both hourly wages and job satisfaction are indeed higher on fairtrade certified plantations factors of increased job satisfaction are likely driven by higher wages permanent employment contracts training opportunities company services such as medical care and paid leave as well as established labor unions on fairtrade certified plantations

the unconditional most favored nation clause and the maintenance of the liberal trade regime in the postwar 1870s international institutions within the past thirty years become the subject of renewed interest as scholars vigorously dispute their utility neorealists draw on the post world war ii era to advance sweeping general claims of institutional inefficacy this study by contrast deploys the same hard test method grieco applied to the 1970s tokyo round negotiations to the crisis rife 1870s to construct a unique methodological objective a rigorous hard test of nineteenth century institutional autonomy three principal findings emerged first the maintenance of a liberal world economy in the turbulent 1870s is explained by an unlikely commercial instrument and the unprecedented regime design of an unexplored international institution respectively the unconditional most favored nation mfn clause and the informal conventional tariff system cts regime it underpinned not british hegemony second the international trade regime was not a public good unilaterally provisioned by hegemonic britain via the 1846 corn laws repeal the regime was instead a private good that was collectively provisioned by all its constituent member states via the unprecedented interstate practices institutionalized in the 1860 cobden chevalier treaty and then autonomously maintained by a negarchical and self enforcing sanctioning mechanism finally the informal cts regime s enforcement mechanism autonomously altered the interests and behaviors of states in directions incongruent with executive preferences solely through the brute force of rational calculations imposed by decentralized international institutional constraints both the french and british executives in the 1870s believed the regime was normatively inappropriate and unsuccessfully attempted to exit amid eight system threatening crises nonetheless the mfn based regime s self enforcing sanctioning mechanism autonomously induced compliance conceptualized as unitary states behavior deviating from executives first order preference the extraordinarily turbulent 1870s therefore provide an unexplored historical vantage point to make strong institutionalist claims in an era issue area and under conditions that they are least likely to be validated

from chain liability to chain responsibility this article examines whether the involvement of stakeholders in the design of corporate codes of conduct leads to a higher implementation likelihood of the code the empirical focus is on occupational safety and health osh the article compares the inclusion of osh issues in the codes of conduct of 30 companies involved in international framework agreements ifas agreed upon by trade unions and multinational enterprises with those of a benchmark sample of 38 leading multinational enterprises in comparable industries it is found that codes of the ifa group have a higher implementation likelihood in osh than the codes of the benchmark group further european firms culturally more used to stakeholder involvement score higher than their us and japanese competitors and hence are more capable of addressing the safety and health issues in international supply chains the implementation likelihood of codes seems closely related to the type of corporate csr approach

the saving and investment nexus for china evidence from cointegration tests the saving and investment nexus as postulated by feldstein and horioka fh 1980 is revisited the saving investment correlation for china is estimated over the periods 1952 1998 and 1952 1994 the latter culminating in a period of fixed exchange rate regime amongst the key results it is found that saving and investment are correlated for china for both the period of the fixed exchange rate and the entire sample period with high saving investment correlation the results suggest that the chinese economy is in conformity with the fh hypothesis this is a valid outcome for in china capital mobility was fairly restricted over the 1952 1994 period as indicated by the relatively low foreign direct investment