may the pro poor impacts of trade liberalisation vanish because of imperfect information abstract in this paper we try to evaluate changes in welfare gains and their distribution due to trade liberalisation when imperfect information is considered the results of two versions of a computable general equilibrium cge model using the gtap database and representing goods as well as capital flows are compared in the first version a standard world cge approach is followed in the second version we included risk aversion imperfect information and production lag in the agricultural sector after a brief description of the two versions changes in welfare represented by the income of two types of household middle low and middle high in three regions europe united states rest of the world after agricultural trade liberalisation are presented theoretical and political consequences of the results are discussed

an economic theory of self control the concept of self control is incorporated in a theory of individual intertemporal choice by modeling the individual as an organization the individual at a point in time is assumed to be both a farsighted planner and a myopic doer the resulting conflict is seen to be fundamentally similar to the agency conflict between the owners and managers of a firm both individuals and firms use the same techniques to mitigate the problems which the conflicts create this paper stresses the implications of this agency model and discusses as applications the effect of pensions on saving saving and the timing of income flows and individual discount rates

sps and tbt agreements and international agricultural trade retaliation or cooperation in this article we investigate whether the brazilian notifications to the tbt and sps agreements are characterized as retaliation or as cooperation in international agricultural trade in the period 1996 2008 a generalized method of moments gmm model is used to estimate game models of bilateral trade between brazil and its major partners united states european union and japan from the viewpoint of strategic games the results suggest that the brazilian notifications are forms of retaliation against the united states and regarding the european union the best result for brazil was conciliation on the other hand if the results are interpreted as equilibria of bargaining games they suggest that brazil has great bargaining power in trade with the united states and that cooperation characterized agricultural trade between brazil and the european union in the period analyzed in the case of agricultural trade between brazil and japan only japan has characteristics of a country with significant bargaining power

trq complications who gets the benefits when the eu liberalizes mercosur s access to the beef markets the european union eu and the mercosur countries resumed negotiations on trade liberalization in may 2010 after several years of interruption the article analyzes who stands to benefit and who is likely to lose if the eu liberalizes mercosur s access to domestic beef markets this economic assessment is performed using a partial equilibrium model for beef operating at a low level of product aggregation paying specific attention to the role of tariff rate quotas trqs consultations with experts from the meat sector allowed us to identify the allocation of the quota rents to different stakeholders under an agreement based on the eu s negotiation proposal trade impacts are projected to be small due to the present quota overfill as expected impacts are more pronounced under the conditions set out in mercosur s proposal the results confirm that the distribution of quota rents can be decisive in determining welfare effects

economywide impacts of climate change on agriculture in sub saharan africa two possible adaptation scenarios to climate change for sub saharan africa are analyzed under the sres b2 scenario the first scenario doubles the irrigated area in sub saharan africa by 2050 compared to the baseline but keeps total crop area constant the second scenario increases both rainfed and irrigated crop yields by 25 for all sub saharan african countries the two adaptation scenarios are analyzed with impact a partial equilibrium agricultural sector model combined with a water simulation module and with gtap w a general equilibrium model including water resources the methodology combines the advantages of a partial equilibrium approach which considers detailed water agriculture linkages with a general equilibrium approach which takes into account linkages between agriculture and nonagricultural sectors and includes a full treatment of factor markets the efficacy of the two scenarios as adaptation measures to cope with climate change is discussed due to the limited initial irrigated area in the region an increase in agricultural productivity achieves better outcomes than an expansion of irrigated area even though sub saharan africa is not a key contributor to global food production rainfed irrigated or total both scenarios help lower world food prices stimulating national and international food markets

in which context is the option clause desirable the option clause is a contractual device from free banking experiences meant to prevent banknote redemption duels it has been used within the diamond and dybvig j pol econ 91 401 419 1983 framework to suggest that very simple contractual solutions can act as an alternative to deposit insurance this literature has however been ambiguous on whether the option clause can replace deposit insurance outside of those two contexts it will be argued that the theoretical clause does not generally affect the likelihood that a solvent bank goes bankrupt because of a bank run as empirical evidence suggests it is already near null and that the exercise of the clause will have the effect of diminishing the size of creditor claims on bank assets because it exacerbates the agency problem of bank debt it will therefore be argued that the clause is only desirable in a free banking systems that are historically devoid of bank runs in the first place and have other means of managing debt related agency problems and b under the unrealistic assumption that bank runs are self fulfilling prophecies it will be argued that the agency problem of bank debt makes the option clause undesirable outside of free banking systems

evaluation of land use based greenhouse gas abatement measures in germany abstract agricultural production contributes 11 to the total german greenhouse gas ghg emissions we compare the efficiency of three different land use based ghg abatement measures in combination and as separately applied measures the production of short rotation coppices of feedstocks for biomethane production and peatland restoration we evaluate these options with respect to the following criteria cost efficiency ghg abatement costs abatement potential and impact on agricultural production we use the regional supply model raumis to investigate the different abatement measures at the sector and regional level up to a reduction of ghg emission of 25 1012 g co2eq peatland restoration is the most cost efficient option short rotation coppice allow some cost efficient mitigation also only at limited scale energy maize is only an option if high abatement targets should be met the joint implementation of several abatement strategies allows meeting specified targets at lower costs the crowding out effect between the options is limited the spatial analysis indicates measure specific regional competitiveness and application e g short rotation coppice in eastern and southern germany peat restoration in northern germany and energy maize production in central germany

assessing agricultural trade policies options with the european union a brazilian perspective brazil has shown interest in agricultural trade negotiations at bilateral regional and multilateral levels this study addresses several important negotiations using the agricultural sector model capri common agricultural policy regional impact analysis to analyze liberalization scenarios between the european union and the mercosur countries focusing particularly on their impacts in brazil four possible agreements between europe and mercosur are simulated including a broader multilateral agreement proposed in the g20 the results suggest that a bilateral scenario involving larger tariff rate quota increase as called for by mercosur generates larger gains than accepting the european union proposal of 2004 or further multilateral trade liberalization based on the g20 proposal however much larger increases in tariff rate quotas for all products are not necessarily justified in all cases moreover brazil s production and export potential is limited by factors other than trade restrictions resume d auteur

market contestability in the presence of sunk entry costs this article extends previous laboratory experimental research to examine the competitive discipline of contested markets with a natural monopoly type cost structure where sunk costs are neither zero nor infinite several alternative conjectures as to how or whether sunk costs can weaken the discipline of contested markets are presented and interpreted in the context of the experimental design sunk costs are found to weaken the support for strong interpretations of the contestable markets hypothesis and thus yield a wide diversity of dynamic patterns of market performance yet the disciplining power of contestability remains impressive with no indications of sustained monopoly pricing

the option clause in scottish banking 1730 65 a reappraisal many writers from adam smith s time on have held that the option clause encouraged overissue of notes and was therefore a source of instability recently proponents of the legal restrictions theory of money and some proponents of free banking have argued that the clause produced a number of desirable effects neither position is consistent with the historical facts these facts indicate that the impact of the clause on the stability of the banking system was limited to discouraging note wars and providing a means by which to deal with specie drains caused by external shocks copyright 1995 by ohio state university press

the macro dimensions of food security economic growth equitable distribution and food price stability abstract rather than asking how to cope with hunger and famine the question might be how to escape their threat altogether important in this regard is recognizing that agriculture and the rural economy are greatly influenced by policies and outcomes in the rest of the economy strategies include economic growth with unchanging income distribution and growth with redistribution the latter encourages balanced growth to create non farm employment opportunities while investing in rural infrastructure

on nonlinear dynamics the case of the pork cycle new methods for analyzing nonlinear dynamic processes are used to evaluate the hogcorn price ratio the results present evidence of nonlinear dynamics in the pork cycle moreover while garch processes account for some of the nonlinearities the pork cycle is apparently characterized by more complex dynamic forms the empirical analysis provides some evidence of the presence of chaos in the pork cycle the results also indicate that the dynamic process generating the pork cycle is nonlinear and cannot be adequately characterized by a small number of state variables

the case for methodological pluralism abstract ecology and economics share the same greek root both address complex systems ecology consists of numerous approaches to understanding natural systems energetics population biology food web models hierarchy theory to mention just a few within ecology field knowledge and the reporting of new observations are well respected economics on the other hand is dominated by one pattern of thinking and standard of proof the market model and econometrics within economics field knowledge and observations per se are little valued agreement on a correct method is frequently taken as an indication of the maturity of a science the argument is developed in this paper that all the aspects of complex systems can only be understood through multiple methodologies the agreement on method within economics however seems to reflect stronger pressures within the discipline for conformity than for truth relative to ecology since ecological economics seeks to understand a larger system than either economics or ecology seeks to understand a diversity of methodologies is appropriate and pressures to eliminate methodologies for the sake of conformity should be avoided

when risk generates chaos abstract with risk averse producers the traditional linear cobweb model becomes nonlinear the currently produced quantity is an homographic function of previous years quantities this may result in the market generating chaotic price and quantity series especially if demand is rigid hedging facilities are unable to reduce the magnitude of fluctuations which are socially detrimental especially from the consumers point of view this might justify public intervention on markets such as staple food commodities or health cares

monopoly behaviour decentralized regulation and contestable markets an experimental evaluation this study provides a comparative experimental evaluation of several alternative approaches to the single product monopoly problem we contrast incentive compatible decentralized regulatory mechanisms with notions of market contestability in a decreasing cost environment the decentralized regulatory mechanisms are found to be significantly more effective at restraining monopoly power than is allowing direct contestability but the regulatory mechanisms examined require that the regulatory agency know the market demand curve though not the industry cost curve since this is significantly more information than is required to implement direct contestability an interesting tradeoff is suggested does the greater efficiency in monopoly restraint provided by the regulatory mechanism relative to direct contestability outweigh the former s greater informational requirements

capital market liberalization economic growth and instability summary this paper reviews briefly the arguments for capital market liberalization and identifies their theoretical and empirical weaknesses this provides the foundations for the argument for intervention in short term capital flows the paper concludes with a brief discussion of the various ways in which such interventions may be implemented 2000 elsevier science ltd all rights reserved

flexible and semiflexible consumer demands with quadratic engel curves in this paper we introduce three flexible consumer demand systems in which expenditures on goods are quadratic functions of income we view these alternatives as to the demand systems used heretofore in the empirical modeling of rank three demands namely those in which expenditure shares are quadratic functions of the logarithm of income curvature conditions required by theory can be imposed locally during the estimation for each and a semiflexible version can be estimated for illustrative purposes we estimate various forms of two of the systems using canadian data on seven categories of goods for the period 1947 to 1995

on the asynchronous approvals of gm crops potential market impacts of a trade disruption of eu soy imports due to their high protein content soybeans are important feedstuffs in the european union eu however the cultivation of soybeans using genetically modified gm varieties in non eu countries is increasing and the eu authorization of gm products takes longer than in other countries leading to an asynchronous approval between the eu and non eu countries that might induce soybean trade disruptions this paper uses an integrated modelling system to simulate argentina brazil and the united states ending soybean exports to the eu the impact on world trade and on the eu import prices of soy products is analysed with a computable general equilibrium model eu soy imports are shown to decline and the import price of soybeans in the eu increases the effects on eu agricultural markets are analysed based on a partial equilibrium model feed costs in the eu are found to increase with poultry and pork the most affected production and exports decline and imports increase however the effects of a trade ban are found to be less profound than in many other studies due to compensating substitution effects at various market levels increasing imports from third countries increasing domestic oilseed production and the use of other protein feeds

the option clause in scottish banking a key question raised by the modern literature on laissez faire money and banking is whether unregulated fractional reserve banks could protect themselves from bank runs by purely contractual means if so banking stability would not require government to provide deposit insurance or to act as a lender of last resort one possible run proofing device discussed in the literature is an option clause or notice of withdrawal clause allowing a bank temporarily to suspend the redeemability of some or all of its liabilities notes or demand deposits provided the bank pays a prespecified penalty rate of interest on the suspended liabilities before the practice was outlawed in 1765 many scottish banks issued notes bearing option clauses in an informative reappraisal of the option clause in scottish banking james a gherity 1995 suggests that his findings contradict other recent discussions in particular gherity disputes three propositions that he attributes to us and others 1 that option clauses were vital to preventing runs in scotland 2 that run proofing was the purpose that motivated scottish banks to employ option clauses and 3 that option clause notes were accepted by the public without prejudice to set the record straight we note here that we and several other authors gherity cites have in fact avoided making claims 1 and 2 the conflict between gherity s view and ours is thus much smaller than he suggests we would defend claim 3 however and argue that the evidence gherity offers against it does not suffice to refute that claim 1 the potential and historical roles of the option clause an option clause can keep a solvent bank from being run upon by providing a contractual circuit breaker by allowing an illiquid bank to suspend for enough time to liquidate assets without fire sale losses it prevents a run from forcing a sol

the effects of direct storage subsidies under limited rationality a general equilibrium analysis we study here the effects of a public subsidy to private storage set up at world level to simulate the welfare effects and impacts on market fluctuations of this subsidy we use a dynamic computable general equilibrium model assuming imperfect expectations we also perform different statistical analysis based on our cge results and show that the storage subsidy can have the undesired effect of destabilizing agricultural markets depending on the form of economic agents price expectations and on the structure of the shocks impacting the agricultural production

nitrogen tax and set aside as greenhouse gas abatement policies under global change scenarios a case study for germany the ambitious climate policy objectives of the cop21 agreement require the design and the implementation of effective and efficient policy instruments the effectiveness and efficiency of agricultural abatement options depend on regional climate and natural conditions changes in the global economy global agricultural markets and regional agricultural production thus the assessment of abatement options requires consideration of the global scale the market scale and the regional producer scale we investigate two abatement options discussed controversially in literature both have been partially applied to reduce environmental pollution from agriculture a tax on nitrogen and the obligatory set aside of agricultural land our study provides an assessment of the ecological effectiveness and the economic efficiency of both abatement options under different global scenarios in our policy analysis we combine three applied policy simulation models to develop an integrated economic model framework this model framework considers the global the national and the regional scale and consists of the global general equilibrium model dart bio the partial equilibrium model capri and the regional supply model raumis in the different global scenarios the results show that both abatement options create relatively high marginal abatement costs and that the maximally reached abated greenhouse gas emissions represent only 15 of the quantity required to fulfill the policy targets compared to the obligatory set aside option the nitrogen tax is in both scenarios the more efficient policy with respect to impacts on production and environment a nitrogen tax is less forecastable than the obligatory set aside option our study illustrates the relevance of considering global economic and market change in the assessment of producer targeting environmental policies

informal barriers and agricultural trade does monetary integration matter eu enlargement and the recent sovereign debt crisis of euro zone countries have revived the debate around the european monetary union emu in this article we ask how informal barriers to agricultural and food trade have changed since the introduction of the common european currency and whether this evolution can be attributed to monetary integration we focus on the foreign trade of the 11 emu founder countries over a nine year period covering the creation of the emu and find a diminishing marginal trade impact of both information and institutional barriers we find a lower level of trade barriers but cannot attribute this outcome to the introduction to the euro

externalities and corrective policies in experimental markets this paper reports on the behaviour of simple laboratory markets which have an externality experiences with these markets provide some help in answering two broad questions 1 do markets with externalities behave in accordance with the law of supply and demand 2 how do the pollution tax pollution standard and pollution licenses compare as methods for correcting the externality