a subsector approach to small enterprise promotion and research abstract this paper introduces a diagnostic research methodology designed to help target small enterprise development efforts in less developed countries it argues that research should focus on commodity specific subsectors which include the competing channels and supporting input and output linkages of small firms using this approach analysts can improve their understanding of small enterprise dynamics interventions that may promote them at low cost and policies that constrain small firm growth

profits and poverty certification s troubled link for nicaragua s organic and fairtrade coffee producers abstract governments donors and ngos have promoted environmental and social certification schemes for coffee producers as certified market channels are assumed to offer higher prices and better incomes additionally it is presumed that these certifications contribute to poverty reduction of smallholders yet gross margins profits and poverty levels of certified smallholder coffee producers have not yet been quantitatively analyzed applying random sampling techniques our quantitative household survey of 327 randomly selected members of conventional organic and organic fairtrade certified cooperatives in nicaragua is complemented by over a hundred qualitative in depth interviews the results show that although farm gate prices of certified coffees are higher than of conventional coffees the profitability of certified coffee production and its subsequent effect on poverty levels is not clear cut per capita net coffee incomes are insufficient to cover basic needs of all coffee producing households certified producers are more often found below the absolute poverty line than conventional producers over a period of ten years our analysis shows that organic and organic fairtrade farmers have become poorer relative to conventional producers we conclude that coffee yield levels profitability and efficiency need to be increased because prices for certified coffee cannot compensate for low productivity land or labor constraints

development of financial markets and the size distribution of manufacturing establishments international comparisons abstract institutional determinants have largely been neglected in explaining international differences in the size distribution of manufacturing establishments this paper draws on recent developments in institutional analysis to derive certain hypotheses concerning the way in which the size distribution within manufacturing is affected by the degree of development of the markets for debt and equity these hypotheses are tested on the basis of an international cross section of 54 countries the results are generally supportive of the hypotheses especially in the case of developing countries

partial vertical integration risk shifting and product rejection in the high value export supply chain the ghana pineapple sector summary high value export supply chains hold potential to improve smallholders welfare but their relative production inefficiency and moral hazard problems can cause exporters to prefer vertically integrated plantation production however pineapple exporters in ghana produce both for their own account and purchase from smallholders we hypothesize that vertical integration is only partial because exporters face large market risks that smallholders surprisingly are better able to absorb we show empirically that exporters average rejection rate of export quality fruit is high and varies in response to unanticipated fluctuations in european demand these results support the hypothesis and are consistent with theories of partial vertical integration but not the standard principal agent paradigm

the economics of smallholder organic contract farming in tropical africa summary the paper examines the revenue effects of certified organic contract farming for smallholders and of adoption of organic agricultural farming methods in a tropical african context the comparison in both cases is with farming systems that are organic by default survey data from a large organic coffee contract farming scheme in uganda are reported and analyzed using a standard ols regression and a full information maximum likelihood fiml estimate of the heckman selection model the analysis finds that controlling for a range of factors there are positive revenue effects both from participation in the scheme and more modestly from applying organic farming techniques

cost effective compensation to avoid carbon emissions from forest loss an approach to consider price quantity effects and risk aversion abstract analyses were carried out on financial compensation to avoid loss of tropical forests and related carbon c emissions when marginal financial yield declined for land use options with extended areas and when a risk averting perspective modeled according to financial theory around the capital asset pricing model is assumed the approach in this study was to consider natural forest forest plantation pasture and cropland simultaneously to investigate how an optimized land use distribution may reduce the amount of compensation necessary to avoid c emissions from forest loss the financial compensations derived were as high as us 176 per hectare per year when comparing natural forests only with the most profitable alternative croplands however compensation decreased to us 124 for risk neutral decision makers who would strive for optimized land use allocation and to only us 47 per hectare per year for risk avoiders who would look to maximize the reward to variability ratio sensitivity analyses indicated that the compensation under risk aversion increased much less than under risk ignoring when increased productivity of agricultural land use or growing demand for agricultural products was simulated it was concluded that considering appropriate diversification strategies and the well documented human behavior to avoid risks is an important step in developing cost effective compensation policies

small manufacturing enterprises in developing countries emphasis is often placed on the promotion of small enterprises in developing countries particularly as a means of improving the lot of unskilled workers this focus raises questions about the relationship between establishment size and the pattern and efficiency of factor use and about the nature and effects of price differentials in factor markets this article goes some way toward answering these questions with data from surveys of small manufacturing enterprises in india and colombia sponsored by the world bank and relevant material from other countries the article also examines india s long standing policy unusual among developing countries of providing special support and protection for small enterprises analyses based on disaggregated data found that small firms are not reliably more labor intensive than their larger counterparts nor are they consistently more technically efficient in their use of resources in light of these findings and an analysis of factor markets this article discusses the general implications of the research results for industrial policy in developing countries

economic cost of deforestation in semi deciduous forests a case of two forest districts in ghana the ecological economic and socio cultural roles of forests are under threat in ghana due to the high rate of deforestation efforts are being made to combat this problem through rehabilitation measures however the costs of deforestation and restoration benefits are not adequately estimated this paper fills in the gap in knowledge by providing an empirical estimation of the cost of deforestation in monetary terms primary data collected regarding timber non timber forest products and soils in semi deciduous forests were analyzed using opportunity cost and replacement cost techniques the results emphasize differences in the value of these forest goods and services lost annually the largest losses were in stumpage fees edible fruits and avoided carbon emissions values the results show that us 133 650 000 gross revenue equivalent to 2 6 of the 2008 agricultural sector gross domestic product is lost annually it can be concluded that restoring the degraded forest lands would bring benefits particularly to the local communities through increased stumpage revenues and harvest of non timber forest products as well as additional funds from carbon credits it is recommended that stakeholders of forest resources are made aware of these costs in order to raise awareness of what they are losing through deforestation

of contracts and subcontracts small firms in vertically dis integrated production distribution systems in ldcs abstract the increasing complexity in production and distribution which accompanies development provides opportunities for small firms to participate by undertaking a limited range of activities in vertically dis integrated systems through subcontracting arrangements in addition to reducing costs in particular activities this facilitates the growth of production and distribution systems which are more complex than one integrated firm could manage or finance on its own for this pattern to work though contracting difficulties arising from market imperfections must be overcome alternative ways used by third world firms to solve these coordination problems are identified and policy implications suggested

toward improving the design of sustainability standards a gendered analysis of farmers preferences summary recently sustainability standards have gained in importance for export crops produced in developing countries several studies analyzed whether such standards deliver on their promise to improve the livelihoods of poor farmers with mixed results here we ask whether the design of standards could be improved such that farm households benefit more an assessment of what particular features of standards hamper or facilitate participation requires a better understanding of farmers preferences our contribution is twofold first based on a choice experiment we analyze how farmers evaluate actual and hypothetical features of standards data were collected from small scale coffee producers in uganda second this is the first quantitative study on standards employing a gendered research design a gender focus is important because coffee and other certified export crops are often controlled by men the choice experiment included features of standards aimed at reducing gender inequality and was conducted separately with male and female members of farm households results indicate that farmers have positive attitudes toward sustainability standards in general while they dislike bans of productivity enhancing inputs agricultural training and special female support are appreciated many also see requirements that have to be met for certification as a welcome nudge to invest in better farm management and quality upgrading female farmers have a higher preference for standards than male farmers also within households significant preference heterogeneity between women and men is found

final voting in legislatures in representative democracies such as the united states legislatures provide the transmission mechanism through which pressure from private interests becomes public policy considerable attention has been given in the literature to explanations of the relevant forces that appear to be driving the legislative process for example much research has focused on the relative impact of economic vs ideological influences on congressional voting behavior in this approach the way that legislators vote on proposed legislation is modeled as a function of the preferences of various economic and ideological interests groups including the legislator s own preferences for wealth and ideology james kau and paul rubin 1979 joseph kalt and mark zupan 1984 sam peltzman 1985 missing from this approach is the idea that when legislatures are the transmission mechanism they are costly and imperfect organizations for generating political influence gary becker 1983 as such rules and institutions will emerge that are related to problems of internal control within the organization of a legislature in this paper we focus on the role of floor voting from the standpoint of legislator organization and control we seek to expand the interpretation of the meaning of floor voting activity by examining the timing sequence and outcomes of such votes specifically we look at final floor voting in the u s congress the patterns described in the analysis below suggest that a broader analytical perspective on the economic function of floor voting is required the findings also suggest that to identify more precisely the forces that are driving legislator voting behavior it is important to recognize the role of legislative transactional costs and institutional constraints in section i the conceptual framework for the empirical results is discussed in more detail the purpose is not to develop a fullblown theory of legislative organization rather it is to focus the reader s attention on several hypotheses about the function of final floor voting as a device for controlling legislator behavior within the legislature empirical results including an explanation of the timing and sequence of final votes on bills are reported in section ii the data for these tests are drawn from legislative activities in the u s house of representatives during the 96th and 98th congresses some concluding remarks are offered in section iii

capture and ideology in the economic theory of politics the economic theory of regulation long ago put public interest theories of politics to rest these theories have correctly been viewed as normative wishings rather than explanations of real world phenomena they have been replaced by models of political behavior that are consistent with the rest of microeconomics anthony downs 1957 james buchanan and gordon tullock 1965 george stigler 1971 sam peltzman 1976 recently however debate has arisen over whether some version of a public interest theory of regulation will have to be readmitted to our thinking about actions and results in the political arena what is at issue is the empirical importance of the altruistic publicly interested goals of rational actors in determining legislative and regulatory outcomes james kau and paul rubin 1979 kalt 1981 peltzman 1982 this study assesses the nature and significance of publicly interested objectives in a particular instance of economic policymaking u s senate voting on coal strip mining regulations the existence of such objectives is of course no contradiction of the economic view of human behavior kenneth arrow 1972 gary becker 1974 and may well be rooted in genetic biological history becker 1976 jack hirshleifer 1978 generally however individuals altruistic publicly interested goals have been given little attention this reflects the judgment that such goals are so empirically unimportant as to allow the use of occam s razor in positive models or well founded apprehensions that these goals are unusually difficult to identify measure and analyze notwithstanding the latter problem we find that approaches which confine themselves to a view of political actors as narrowly egocentric maximizers explain and predict legislative outcomes poorly the tracking and dissecting of the determinants of voting on coal strip mining policy suggest that the economic theory of politics has been prematurely closed to a broader conception of political behavior

the subcontracting behavior of single vs multiplant enterprises in us manufacturing implications for economic development abstract in this paper we explore the factors shaping the production subcontracting make buy decisions of managers in the plants of both small and large firms in 21 industries that constitute the us metalworking and machinery manufacturing sector descriptive and multivariate statistical analyses of original survey data collected in 1986 1987 lead us to infer that a regional economic development strategy that promotes those manufacturing firms with a single relatively large plant making a diverse range of products and having close ties to customers but limited internal machining capacity has the greatest potential for generating local backward linkages in this respect we find empirical if nuanced support for certain normative aspects of the industrial district or networking approach to economic development policy

the fuelwood market in greece an empirical approach abstract wood has been since ancient times the basic household heating medium nowadays wood remains the primary energy source in rural areas of developing countries mainly in africa in greece the domestic demand of fuelwood is relied mainly on the fuelwood domestic supply especially during the post war period the domestic supply satisfies adequately the domestic demand eliminating the role of imports the present study surveys the long run relationship between the fuelwood prices of different forest species in order to determine the role of the special market conditions in their price formation in addition the error correction model is estimated in order to survey the direction of the granger causality among the prices of the fuelwood forest species the implementation of the impulse response analysis and the variance decomposition confirmed that coniferous and beech fuelwood producer price may account for the volatility of the oak fuelwood producer price this result may contribute greatly to the conservation of oak forest an important carbon storage forest ecosystem

conservation agriculture organic marketing and collective action in the honduran hillsides conservation agriculture ca is often perceived to provide win win outcomes for farmers leading to reduced erosion and off site sedimentation as well as improved soil fertility and productivity however adoption rates for ca in many regions of the world remain below expected levels this article looks at the effects of participation in organic markets and farmers organizations on the adoption of soil conservation practices based on original survey data from 241 small scale farm households in honduras we find that both participation in organic markets and farmer based groups have positive effects on the number of soil conservation practices adopted the results indicate that besides supply oriented policy measures such as the provision of technical assistance and extension demand related factors are likely to play an important role in sustainable soil management demand oriented policy measures include support for labeling initiatives and consumer education to facilitate value added product differentiation and market segmentation jel classifications q01 q12 q13 q16

measuring heterogeneity survey engagement and response quality in preferences for organic products in nigeria abstractthe identification of the market potentials of organic products is important in the drive towards a sustainable agricultural development in sub saharan africa ssa however available evidence shows that valuing attributes of credence goods such as organic products while using stated preference methods faces additional obstacles compared to other normal goods in this study we examine consumers preferences and willingness to pay wtp for health and environmental attributes of organic products in nigeria we employ an approach that allows us to adequately capture the value of organic products by linking part of the heterogeneity across respondents to differences in scale while making use of indicators of survey engagement without risks of endogeneity bias and measurement error that arise from the deterministic methods the empirical results show that market for organic products exists in nigeria with reduction in pesticide residues attribute attracting the highest value followed by the ce

comparing the profitability of organic and conventional production in family farming empirical evidence from brazil abstract several studies have compared the profitability of organic and conventional producers but present very conflicting results although in the majority of these papers selection bias due to observables is accounted for the possibility of selection based on unobservables has been largely overlooked in this paper we compare these two types of producers using a large and unique data of about 4 2 million family farmers in brazil standard propensity score matching techniques are used together with the procedure recently developed by oster forthcoming to address concerns about omitted variables our results confirm the working hypothesis that organic producer s profits are lower than conventional ones

how small enterprises in ghana have responded to adjustment ghana is often cited as an african country that has undertaken major macroeconomic reforms with generally positive results for economic growth within ghana s industrial sector the effects of structural adjustment policies have differed among subsectors and firms little is known however about the impact of adjustment on smaller firms a survey of small scale enterprises sses was carried out in november 1989 to learn more about the impact of the adjustment program on their operations to evaluate their potential contribution to dynamic industrial recovery and to identify appropriate measures that would accelerate the growth of sses in numbers size and productivity specific objectives of the survey were to 1 learn more about the characteristics of small firms and their owners 2 analyze how policy changes have affected small firms highlighting entrepreneurs strategies for adapting to their new environments and 3 identify constraints to the future growth of small firms results show that adjustment policies have forced the sses to become more competitive to survive and that significant structural changes are taking place across subsectors and within firms the overall business environment has generally improved during the adjustment program although shortcomings remain uncertainty about political and economic stability and lack of finance appear to be the most immediate restraints on investment

decentralized industrialization and rural development evidence from taiwan after 3 decades of growth widespread poverty persists in underdeveloped countries one of the major characteristics of the poor is that a disproportionate number of them are located in rural areas since a large number of the rural poor have limited or no access to productive agricultural land raising agricultural productivity alone may be insufficient to reduce rural poverty consequently attention has now turned to rural nonfarm activities as a possible source of rural employment and income this paper uses evidence from taiwan to show that the level of rural nonfarm ac

barriers to the growth of informal sector firms a case study between 1960 and 1974 in the punjab pakistan many artisan units entered the production of small capacity tubewells however having reached a certain stage even the largest and the most enterprising of these firms were unable to expand any further this study seeks to identify the factors that prevented their further growth the article directs attention to the inability of the informal enterprise to adopt techniques that are essential for growth beyond a certain stage the main source of this weakness lies in the fact that many of the skills associated with the use of these techniques are necessarily acquired through formal educational and training channels the inability to expand beyond a certain stage is therefore identified with the inability to cross over into the modern sector the barrier lies in the social and economic background of the informal firm s owner manager which limits his capacity to absorb and attract through the market skills and resources needed to adopt the necessary techni

does ecological economics have a future contradiction and reinvention in the age of climate change abstract this paper addresses the role of neoclassical methodologies in ecological economics and the contradictions these methodologies pose to the field s critical founding principles we first consider robert costanza s treatment of nicholas stern s global deal and then survey climate change related articles published in this journal over the past five years this survey reveals how mainstream neoclassical methodologies dominate discourse and do so by marginalizing more critical political economy analyses this situation imperils the field s founding vision of a no growth steady state it also fails to address the related growth dynamics of capitalism without such a critical treatment the field s formal embrace of methodological pluralism actually entails an ideological empiricism that renders ecological economics theoretically incoherent this situation undermines the field s historical promise as an alternative economic paradigm ecological economics now faces a problematic future its survival in a form faithful to its founding vision will require an explicit choice to address its internal contradictions and reinvent itself in ways relevant to our contemporary context without such a choice ecological economics will likely succumb to an implicit acceptance of the hegemony of mainstream economic methodologies and their pro growth imperatives

investment and economic growth abstract the paper revisits the old question how much does investment contribute to economic growth building on recent work of maurice scott it suggests that the analysis of growth in developing as in the industrial countries would benefit from a capital accumulation approach in the following analysis economic growth is related to three variables all greatly influenced by the quality of economic policies the rate of investment the social rate of return to investment and the investment induced returns to labor

the new institutional economics and its applicability to development abstract the several remarkable developments in the social sciences which have come to be known as the new institutional economics nie have not yet been fully exploited for analyzing the determinants and effects of institutional change in the context of development this paper identifies two important components of the nie and illustrates both a potential complementarities between them and b their applicability to various problems and policies in the long term development of developing countries

the implementation costs of forest conservation policies in brazil abstract tropical forest conservation is considered a low cost option for climate change mitigation but mitigation cost assessments have featured opportunity costs neglecting policy implementation costs here we use official data to identify the brazilian federal government s operational and institutional budgets related to forest conservation policies implemented from 2000 to 2014 we distinguish the allocated and executed budgets of these policies and provide scenario based estimates of their cost effectiveness on average brazil spent us 1 billion year on forest conservation policies at the federal level brazil s substantial reduction in annual forest loss after 2004 was accompanied by a higher operational budget execution of disincentive based policy instruments and an absolute increase in both allocated and executed institutional budgets the post 2004 successful mitigation effort represented additional implementation costs to the brazilian federal government of us 308 923 ha of avoided deforestation or us 0 87 2 60 tco2 of avoided emissions factoring in also approximate municipal and state expenditures these costs increase to us 385 1153 ha or us 1 09 3 25 tco2 we conclude that implementations costs are non trivial in size including compared to estimates of land users opportunity costs this has important implications for redd policy design in the sense that implementation costs need to be adequately considered

organic agriculture and fair trade a happy marriage a case study of certified smallholder black pepper farmers in india summary this study examines whether the joint adoption of organic and fair trade systems adds additional benefits to smallholders in developing countries we use panel data collected from 300 smallholder rural black pepper growers in kerala india to assess household welfare impacts we apply a multinomial endogenous switching regression model along with a counterfactual analysis to estimate certification effects results show that both certification systems have a significant impact on income compared to conventional black pepper farming however membership in fair trade marketing systems does not increase income of organic farmers but has positive effects on asset accumulation of smallholder farmers

effect of certified organic production systems on poverty among smallholder farmers empirical evidence from kenya summary this study evaluates the effect of certified organic production on poverty in smallholder production systems data was collected from cross sectional survey of local market oriented peri urban vegetable and rural honey producers in kenya poverty was measured using the multidimensional poverty methodology and endogenous switching probit model used to assess the effect of certified organic production on multidimensional poverty findings were that certified producers were less likely to be multidimensional poor compared to their counterfactual case of not participating in organic certification schemes additionally noncertified producers would be less likely to be poor if they were to participate in organic certification production

fair trade organic coffee production in nicaragua sustainable development or a poverty trap abstract this article assesses the impact of fair trade organic coffee production on the well being of small scale farmers in nicaragua studying the results of organic management is crucial for evaluating the advantages of fair trade because approximately half of all fair trade coffee is also organically certified a wide range of farmers representatives of cooperatives and export companies in nicaragua were interviewed during seven months of field work between 2005 and 2008 fair trade organic production raises farmer income when low intensity organic farming is an alternative to low intensity conventional farming however low intensity farming produces very little coffee in the case of the most marginalized farmers keeping these farmers in poverty with higher intensities of management the economic advantages of fair trade organic production largely depend on prices in the mainstream market

urban squatting and community organization in developing countries abstract it is estimated that up to 30 35 percent of the total urban population of the third world about 185 million people live in squatter settlements this paper presents from an economic perspective of tenure choice under uncertainty a unified and consistent theoretical framework of this phenomenon which has heretofore been studied mainly by other social scientists the model is able to explain why land invasions occur furthermore it provides some insights as to why the number of squatters in an urban area depends on a squatter community s ability to form coalitions to fully protect its members rights it is shown in the paper that if a community is successful in controlling its size government efforts which are meant to reduce the number of squatters may lead to the opposite results in particular the imposition of heavier fines or the increase of government expenditures on eviction activity threat campaigns eviction in other jurisdictions etc will likely lead to an increase in the optimal number of squatters unless the decline in expected utility caused by these efforts is so great that squatting no longer becomes viable at any community size

the flip side of fashion used clothing exports to the third world since the early 1970s western countries have increasingly recycled their second hand clothes by exporting to the third world in response some ldc governments have banned used clothing imports to protect their domestic textile industries this article after reviewing the structure and evolution of world used clothing trade examines the consequences for africa s largest importer rwanda in this low income country with its small domestic textile industry displacement is minimal and imported used clothing offers a modest but rare policy lever for directly increasing national income as well as incomes of the rural poor

agroindustrialization of the global agrifood economy bridging development economics and agribusiness research this paper examines the agroindustrialization process from two supposedly disparate views development economics and agribusiness research the evolution of conceptual and methodological approaches emanating from these fields is explored and general observations are made concerning farm economic interdependence institutional and organizational change differing scopes of interest the causes of agroindustrialization orientation and the choice of microanalytic tools terminology and unit of analysis despite an impressive list of hurdles disincentives and disconnects complementarities between the two fields are identified the paper concludes by exploring the potential of bridging development economics and agribusiness research to inform the future agroindustrialization research agenda

explaining the performance of contract farming in ghana the role of self efficacy and social capital abstract self efficacy is the belief of an individual to have the ability to be successful in a given domain social capital is the economic value of a person s relationships in the context of this study self efficacy is the belief of a farmer to be able to improve her income with contract farming which increases her actual ability social capital increases the ability of the farmers through social support we surveyed 400 smallholder pineapple farmers and find that both self efficacy and social capital are decisive for their successful integration into contract farming to identify causal effects we use two instruments which are also of interest on their own the historical presence of 1 cocoa cooperatives and 2 christian missionary schools during ghana s colonial period the british established cocoa cooperatives which differed in their performance as a function of biogeographic factors and thus persistently shaped the self efficacy of the farmers roughly at the same time christian missionaries established missionary schools which impacted the traditional societies so that social capital decreased the finding that self efficacy and social capital are still shaped by historic variables could indicate that these variables are only slowly changing or that they only do so in the absence of policy intervention the latter raises the possibility that effective policies could benefit from strong reinforcing feedbacks once self efficacy and social capital improve

the rural non farm economy prospects for growth and poverty reduction summary policy makers have high expectations for the rural non farm economy rnfe given high income shares growing employment and frequently low capital requirements they see the rnfe as a potential pathway out of poverty for their rural poor yet available evidence suggests that pro poor rural non farm growth does not occur automatically for the poor to benefit from rural non farm growth policy makers must stimulate buoyant rural economies with robust non farm income growth not simply low productivity employment moreover the poor must gain access to growing market niches fluid labor markets provide one important bridge linking the rural poor to growing non farm opportunities

growth of small size enterprises in india its nature and content abstract the paper highlights the nature of growth of small size enterprises in india and discusses how far the growth is accompanied by the fulfillment of objectives such as poverty eradication and the removal of regional imbalances without hampering the long term growth prospects of the economy to facilitate the discussion village cottage and handcrafts enterprises of the small scale sector are separated from its modern component the available evidence as is based on a number of studies in this area suggests that the somewhat unusual and high growth of the small scale sector is not accompanied by efficiency innovativeness and social justice policy bias against largeness seems to explain the growth whereas an elaborate system of subsidies and incentives has had only a marginal role

adoption of organic farming are there differences between early and late adoption based on the fact that not all farmers adopt a technology at the same time it is argued in this paper that the distinction between groups is important because early medium and late adopters respond differently to economic and non economic factors when they consider whether to take up organic farming or not the individual effects on adoption between the groups are identified by the use of multinomial logit analysis the results provide evidence that there are significant differences in the characteristics between the adopter groups the findings also reveal that the factors that affect adoption play a different role for early medium and late adopters particularly with regard to farming intensity age information gathering as well as attitudes of the farmer more specifically early adopters were the youngest to adopt organic farming and their decisions were found to be less profit related compared to other groups late adoption is constrained by risk considerations while environmental attitudes and social learning were identified to be important determinants for all adopter groups overall the findings strongly suggest that for policy measures to be effective the current state of diffusion has to be taken into account

relating external support business growth creating strategies for survival a comparative case study analyses of small manufacturing firms smfs and entrepreneurs using a comparative case study approach this paper presents three of thirty two findings on small plastic manufacturing firms spmfs and entrepreneurs in nigeria the selected firms represent performance differences between firms that have received external support and those that did not due to lack of support some entrepreneurs had to independently sustain themselves through their creativeabilities findings from the study revealed that small plastic manufacturing entrepreneurs in nigeria are constrained by certain external and internal factors ironically these constraints seem to have challenged some entrepreneurs to invent original strategies on their own to cope survive and to remain in business lack of financial capital especially foreign exchange needed to import vital operating inputs from abroad has been the most serious constraint other serious external constraints identified are inadequate infrastructure facilities competition from large firms unfavorable government policies dearth of machines and spare parts and paucity of raw materials internal obstacles like incompetent planning poor organizational skills and limited knowledge among others were common obstacles faced by the entrepreneurs in addition another discovery is that funding assistance to entrepreneurs by relevant institutions concerned is not free from bias on the basis of favoritism it is therefore recommended that funding institutions should give due consideration and encouragement to promising talents two have especially been identified from the study as typical examples of potential avant garde entrepreneurs and such should not be neglected or wasted guidance for further progress through training is another helpful approach to take and give succor to such admirable talents entrepreneurs who qualify for grants from institutions should completely be decided on compliance to standard selection procedures rules and evidence of superior entrepreneurial qualities in addition those who qualify for support should be determined only after feasible business plans have been presented

coffee value chains on the move evidence in ethiopia abstract important changes have happened to the upstream segment of the coffee sector in ethiopia africa s biggest in the last decade as illustrated by the increasing adoption of improved production harvest and post harvest practices upstream marketing has also improved and there have been large investments in processing capacity shown by the extended coverage of wet mills these improved practices are shown to be associated with positive impacts on coffee productivity and prices changes appear to be linked with multiple factors including local market reform greater presence of public extension agents high international prices and a push for certification by international buyers on the other hand a combination of production lack of improved seedlings weather and disease shocks as well as institutional issues saving constraints and lack of vertical integration and traceability have seemingly impeded more widespread uptake of improved practices and therefore better farm performance the study illustrates the significant complexity in obtaining transformation at the farm level in these settings

mighty oaks from little acorns can microenterprise serve as the seedbed of industrialization abstract how can microenterprises foster the development of an industrial sector featuring a dynamic medium or large enterprise sector we propose two possible mechanisms graduation of microenterprises and savings by microentrepreneurs we examine the barriers to both mechanisms and reexamine policies designed to aid the sector projects aimed at the enterprise level are not likely to remove barriers to firms graduating or saving changes in macro policy may have a positive effect reforms of the legal and regulatory environment may be very important and should be rethought with the mechanisms of the seedbed role specifically in mind

collective efficiency growth path for small scale industry this study is concerned with the growth of small local industry in developing countries and explores one particular route for understanding and fostering such growth it focuses on the clustering of firms and the competitive advantage which they derive from local external economies and joint action captured in the concept of collective efficiency following a conceptual discussion the article explores the economic and institutional conditions which enhance or hinder collective efficiency this includes a case study which suggests that responding to opportunity and crisis requires shifting from mere reliance on external economies to joint action and from ascribed to earned trust

benefits and costs of deforestation by smallholders implications for forest conservation and climate policy deforestation is a leading cause of biodiversity loss and an important source of global carbon emissions this means that there are important synergies between climate policy and conservation policy the highest rates of deforestation occur in tropical countries where much of the land at the forest frontier is managed informally by smallholders and where governance systems tend to be weak these features must be considered when designing policies to reduce emissions from deforestation such as redd deforestation is often accompanied by fires that release large amounts of carbon dioxide these emissions are especially high in the case of peatlands which contain thick layers of carbon rich matter in this paper we derive marginal abatement cost mac curves using data from a farmer survey in sumatra where rates of peatland deforestation are high comparing these results with farmers stated willingness to accept payment not to clear forest to establish oil palm suggests that redd policies may be more expensive than mac estimates suggest the extent to which this is true depends on the types of soils being deforested

growth and barriers to growth among nairobi s small and medium sized garment producers abstract few of nairobi s small and medium sized garment enterprises actually grow understanding why this should be so requires recognition both of their common problems and of the variations in their organization and market relations two factors appear critical for the growth of all of the producers demand for new clothing and the firm s initial capital other growth constraints differ according to the type of firm space constraints are highlighted as especially important for businesses presently operating in market stalls the design of policy and donor interventions needs to consider both the commonalities and the differences among firms

stakeholders incentives for land use change and redd the case of indonesia abstract the opportunity costs of reducing emissions from deforestation and forest degradation redd accruing to different stakeholders in indonesia including companies and the national provincial and district level governments are estimated with particular emphasis on the influence of alternative discount rates a cost benefit analysis of the opportunity costs of avoided deforestation is conducted the three major land use activities considered are commercial logging timber and oil palm plantation the opportunity cost of oil palm plantations on mineral soil preceded by logging of degraded forest is prohibitively high redd measures that impose restrictions on the development of those land use activities would lead to a substantial loss of public revenues at the various government levels the results of this study reveal that land use management in indonesia is rather centralistic where the national government retains most of the revenues from land use alternatives to redd to influence their behaviour towards land use change redd schemes need to create a direct link between the distribution of public revenues and district governments decisions on land use activities in their localities

the dynamics of micro and small enterprises in developing countries abstract the number of people engaged in micro and small enterprises increases as a result of new enterprises being started and through an expansion of existing activities as a partial offset to these increases employment declines when existing businesses cease operations this article draws on recent survey work to examine the magnitude and determinants of enterprise births closures and expansions it explores the ways in which these different sources of change are influenced by the state of the macroeconomy and examines policy and project implications

self command in practice in policy and in a theory of rational choice an increasingly familiar occurrence for obstetricians is being asked by patients to withhold anesthesia during delivery the physician often proposes that a facemask be put beside the patient who may inhale nitrous oxide as she needs it but some determined patients ask that no such opportunity be provided if gas is available they will use it and they want not to be able to the request is interesting for decision theory and raises questions of ethics policy and physician responsibility even if the woman is merely making a mistake if she simply does not know how painful labor will be and how glad she will be even in retrospect if the pain is relieved but some women who make this request have had earlier deliveries during which they demanded anesthesia and received it they are acquainted with the pain they anticipate asking for relief and they want it withheld when they do they expect to regret afterwards any recourse to anesthesia this particular instance of attempted selfdenial has features that are special but many that are common the woman is so far as we know in good health physically and mentally she anticipates a transient period when her usual values and preferences will be suspended or inaccessible she has reasons for wanting to frustrate her own wishes at the critical time she needs cooperation she may ratify her choice afterward by expressing herself grateful that no anesthesia was offered even when requested there are ethical dilemmas and legal issues and there is conflict if say the husband disagrees with the physician in the delivery room about what his wife really wants

welfare impacts of maize pigeonpea intensification in tanzania this article examines the driving forces behind farmers decisions to adopt improved pigeonpea and maize and estimates the causal impact of technology adoption on household welfare using data obtained from a random cross section sample of 613 small scale farmers in tanzania we use seemingly unrelated and recursive bivariate probit regressions to test the endogeneity and joint decision making of pigeonpea maize production a double hurdle model is used to analyze the determinants of the intensity of technology adoption conditional on overcoming seed access constraints to address the impact of adoption on welfare the article employs both propensity score matching and switching regression techniques results from bivariate probit models show that unobservable factors cause both decisions to be correlated but the finding does not support the conjecture that both decisions are made jointly overall the analysis of the determinants of adoption identifies inadequate local supply of seed access to information human capital and access to private productive asset as key constraints for pigeonpea technology adoption the causal impact estimation from both the propensity score matching and switching regression suggests that maize pigeonpea adoption has a positive and significant impact on income and consumption expenditure among sample households

bayesian learning in an infant industry model abstract most analyses of the infant industry argument assume that production early on benefits subsequent production in deterministic fashion this paper presents an alternative framework for evaluating the infant industry argument that focuses on imperfect information as a barrier to entry initial entrants provide information of social value by reducing uncertainty for potential followers about the suitability of local conditions in contrast to earlier work i show that factors that increase the informational barrier to entry may lower the optimal subsidy to the infant industry and that the standard test of the success of infant industry policy is not always valid 1997 elsevier science b v

linkage heterogeneity and income determinants in petty trading the case of calcutta abstract to understand the income determinants of the various subgroups and to identify the most vulnerable groups in low income activities the analysis of backward linkages has to be combined with an analysis of the different survival strategies adopted and the sociodemographic composition of the sector this is because as the petty traders show individuals and groups choose a set of allegiances which maximize gains and minimize survival risks the methodological implication of this argument is that attempts to identify vulnerable groups in low income activities must be multidimensional so as to incorporate the interaction of production relations with the demographic structure of the sector social links ethnicity and class

redd policy impacts on the agri food sector and food security recent research shows that the combined contributions of deforestation forest degradation and peat land emissions account for about 15 of greenhouse gas emissions the redd policy which preserves forests and values standing forests enables substantial emission reductions since agricultural production and area expansion is a primary driver of tropical deforestation redd policies might limit the expansion possibilities of agricultural land use and therefore influence competitiveness of the agricultural sector agricultural prices trade patterns agricultural production and therefore food security in the world this paper studies the impact of redd policies on the agri food sector and food security with a global cge model called magnet using a scenario approach it focuses on the restrictions on agricultural land expansion within the redd policy package simulation results show that redd policies start to affect the agri food sector in some lower developed countries if more than 15 of potentially available agricultural areas are protected from deforestation a stringent redd policy that protects 90 of land reserves that could potentially be used for agriculture production results in a global real agricultural price increase of almost 7 6 and a worldwide agricultural production decrease of 1 7 regional differences are large with real agricultural price changes ranging from 4 in north america to about 24 in sub saharan africa and south east asia food access rapidly deteriorates for low income population in these regions in the case of high forest protection levels compensatory payments are necessary from a food security point of view if the level of forest protection increases our results indicate that from a food security perspective redd policy should stop short of trying to protect more than 40 of global carbon if the compensation mechanism is not effectively implemented within redd

on helping small enterprises in developing countries abstract given the increasing interest in the role that small scale and informal economic activities play in the development process the paper suggests a particular growth strategy not considered in the typical demand and supply strategies in the past referring to those small informal sector enterprises that employ workers as distinct from those that employ only family members the paper suggests giving credit to owners through the workers on certain conditions as a way of inducing economic growth with a certain conception of justice it is felt that not only will this provide those at the bottom the prideful sense of feeling independent it will also discourage a way of life that has a natural tendency to exploit those in an even more unfavorable position

the economic sustainability of certified coffee recent evidence from mexico and peru consumers increasingly act on preferences for a more just and sustainable world by purchasing certified agricultural products using survey data from coffee growers in mexico and peru we explore the economic sustainability of certified coffee looking at conventional fair trade organic and rainforest alliance certified growers the analysis reveals that yields rather than price premiums are most important for increasing net cash returns for coffee growing households given the link between net returns and producer participation in certified coffee schemes the findings suggest that certification norms that permit improving yields are essential for improving grower welfare and attracting and maintaining growers

understanding the uptake of organic farming accounting for heterogeneities among irish farmers abstract this paper examines the decisions of irish farmers to convert to organic farming by applying the theory of planned behaviour to control for social influence and technical constraints cluster analysis and principal component analysis are utilised to account for sample heterogeneity and to identify heterogeneities in farmer beliefs regarding adoption of organic methods the results indicate that the impact of economic incentives and technical barriers varies while social acceptance of organic farming constrains adoption these findings suggest that policy incentives mainly based on subsidy payments may be insufficient to increase the organic sector in the presence of social and technical barriers

transaction costs of credit to the small scale sector in the philippines discussions on the cost of credit in less developed countries seldom include the transaction costs of lending these costs consists of the cost of administering credit and the cost of risk of default this study attempts to present estimates of these transaction costs of lending to the small scale sector by different financial institutions in the philippines recipients of the loans are subdivided by size and activity the problem of extending credit to the small scale sector is that the real cost of lending to small farmers is three times and to small scale industry is twice that of lending to large scale industry therefore lending to the smalll scale sector is feasible only under one or a combination of the following financial arrangements high interest rates cheaper funds from the central bank or cross subsidization the philippine experience shows that certain specialized lending institutions are an appropriate vehicle for extending credit to the small scale sector rural banks are a particularly good example since administrative costs are low and price or allocative efficiency is sufficiently higher than that of private development banks

nudging farmers to use fertilizer theory and experimental evidence from kenya we model farmers as facing small fixed costs of purchasing fertil izer and assume some are stochastically present biased and not fully sophisticated about this bias such farmers may procrastinate post poning fertilizer purchases until later periods when they may be too impatient to purchase fertilizer consistent with the model many farmers in western kenya fail to take advantage of apparently profit able fertilizer investments but they do invest in response to small time limited discounts on the cost of acquiring fertilizer free deliv ery just after harvest calibration suggests that this policy can yield higher welfare than either laissez faire policies or heavy subsidies

reducing emissions from deforestation and degradation in cameroon assessing costs and benefits a new momentum is underway to account for emissions from avoided deforestation and degradation at the united nations framework convention on climate change unfccc this paper assesses the feasibility of one of the reducing emissions from deforestation and degradation redd mechanisms currently discussed namely that of compensated reduction in the case of cameroon here we assess the differential revenues that a farmer could get from 1 ha of land out of two alternative land uses shifting cultivation the traditional land use pattern in southern cameroon or carbon credits as compensation for the conservation of primary forest it is found that a break even price of 2 85 t of carbon dioxide equivalent would level shifting cultivation with compensated reduction this result suggests that at current carbon prices and independently form variations in the discount rate it could already be more profitable to preserve the primary forest rather than to log it in order to grow crops 2008 elsevier b v all rights reserved

land tenure differences and investment in land improvement measures theoretical and empirical analyses this article develops a theoretical framework to examine the relationship between land tenure arrangements and households investment in soil improving and conservation measures it then analyzes this relationship with a multivariate probit model based on detailed plot level data from villages in the brong ahafo region of ghana a major hypothesis tested is that investment in productivity enhancing and conservation techniques are influenced by land tenure arrangements the theoretical analysis and empirical results generally reveal that land tenure differences significantly influence farmers decisions to invest in land improving and conservation measures the findings also show that tenure security does affect farm productivity

obstacles to developing indigenous small and medium enterprises an empirical assessment the article reports the results of field surveys conducted in sri lanka s leather industry and tanzania s furniture industry it outlines an approach to learning how small and medium enterprises smes perceive the impact of financial regulatory technical marketing and other input constraints and to evaluating the results in relation to other empirical indicators lack of access to finance emerges as the binding constraint for smaller less established firms in sri lanka and for all of tanzania s smes not only is informal financing limited for tanzania s firms even firms of adequate size and experience have difficulty borrowing from banks and if they do borrow have difficult relations with their lenders in tanzania regulatory and tax constraints appear largest for the smallest firms declining somewhat as firms grow because enforcement is comprehensive the bureaucratic burden of negotiating with government officials is greatest for small firms by contrast in sri lanka the regulatory burden rises with firm size because enforcement is more stringent for the larger and more visible firms constraints on physical inputs continue to inhibit sri lankan smes a legacy of excessive vertical integration by parastatals technical constraints are appraised as most significant by relatively educated entrepreneurs with some involvement in high quality market niches

the changing structure of petty production in ecuador abstract this article deals with the extent to which the economic activities of the urban poor in third world cities will disappear stagnate or increase as capitalism develops first it seeks to develop a theoretical framework which allows us to make sense of the economic changes which are taking place in the cities of the developing world this is followed by an empirical analysis which shows that while the number of petty manufacturing workshops in key areas of quito remained remarkably constant over a seven year period of rapid economic growth this stagnation was the net result of gross changes in the structure of production whereby production of the means of subsistence declined and production of the means of production increased in addition the nature of the latter was modified in terms of the type of work undertaken the changes which took place varied across the city and were inadvertently affected by government housing policy

deagrarianization and rural employment in sub saharan africa a sectoral perspective abstract sub saharan africa is steadily becoming less rural in character for decades development thinking has prescribed industrialization as the virtuous path leading away from economic dependence on agriculture but africa s industrial record has been plagued with underperformance an alternative perspective centered on the process of deagrarianization and attendant rural employment generation may offer more explanatory power and policy direction this paper outlines key theoretical components and practical concerns of a deagrarianization approach the nature and incidence of deagrarianization in sub saharan africa is contrasted with that experienced in developed industrial countries conceptual approaches dealing with rural non agricultural employment are identified within different social science disciplines through a thematic review of the literature the conclusion highlights the need for more focused study of the deagrarianization process and rural service sector development

incorporating finance into a modified subsector framework the fertilizer subsector in the gambia abstract the subsector analytical framework as currently employed is usually limited to examining a subsector in a single market product or input the framework often excludes an explicit analysis of financial markets due to the assumptions that they function in a competitive environment or are considered less important than other features of the subsector these assumptions are inappropriate in most developing countries where financial markets are imperfect and access to financial services is rationed this paper proposes a modified subsector framework that incorporates the financial markets affecting a given subsector to more fully explain operational efficiency and market technology the framework is used to study the fertilizer subsector in the gambia

how much more do growers receive for fair trade organic coffee abstract i use a representative sample of coffee growing households in southern mexico to estimate the price premium and gross income gain from participating in fair trade organic markets through grower cooperatives for the 2004 2005 season ft organic growers received an average premium of 12 8 cents per pound yielding a gross income gain of 5 of total household income or about 26 dollars per household member the gain is net of the costs of cooperative participation but not of other costs incurred to become certified and suggests that price premiums alone have a limited potential to increase household returns from growing coffee more broadly speaking the finding raises questions about the persistence of substantial price premiums associated with social or environmental labeling initiatives

growth constraints on small scale manufacturing in developing countries a critical review abstract the question raised in this review is whether small scale producers in developing countries can expand or whether they are up against constraints which stunt their growth most of the literature has been optimistic on this score while internal constraints e g lack of managerial ability or external constraints e g discrimination from government are identified expansion is seen as an open ended process in other contributions this view has been severely criticized some allege that the small producers are exploited through various mechanisms others suggest that their road to expansion is blocked as a result of factors such as the pre existence of very advanced technology the control of large firms over product markets or difficulties in access to raw materials in discussing the arguments put forward in the debate an attempt is made to assess their theoretical bases and examine the extent to which they are supported empirically while most studies express explicitly or implicitly a definite view on the growth potential of small producers such judgement is rarely based on a comprehensive examination of the context which determines this potential

will they buy it the potential for marketing organic vegetables in the food vending sector to strengthen vegetable safety a choice experiment study in three west african cities abstract considering the hazardous use of synthetic pesticides in vegetable production in urban west africa this research investigated the marketing potential of organic vegetables in the food vending sector of cotonou benin accra ghana and ouagadougou burkina faso certified organic production and marketing was examined as a potential strategy to improve chemical food safety a stratified random sampling strategy was applied to study the preferences of food vendors n 180 and consumers n 360 vegetable use risk perception choice preferences and willingness to pay wtp for organic certification were specifically analyzed the results showed that awareness of chemical contamination risks was generally low appearance of a product was central to vendor choice consumers attributed similar utility to taste and organic certification consumer wtp was calculated to be a premium of 1 04 usd per plate if the food served contained only certified organic vegetables in restaurants this would mean an average premium of 19 for a meal if certified organic vegetable production is to make a positive impact on food safety in urban west africa we suggest concentrating marketing efforts on the educated elite who frequent restaurants however considering that restaurant owners exhibited a lower preference for organic certification than lower class food vendors the marketing situation is difficult we therefore conclude that demand from the food vending sector alone will not institutionalize domestic certification mechanisms this underlines the need for public commitment to facilitating such change

informality size and regulation theory and an application to egypt the paper shows how when the enforceability of regulationsis size sensitive price competition can lock firms into informality and thus smallness depending on the form of the production function in thatcontext exogenous help packages targeted to informal firms promote micro and small enterprises i e increase their numbers but do not develop them i e foster their growth the help only generates ashort term span of abnormal profits for existing informal firms and a long term income transfer toward informal market consumers the model istested in the context of egypt s micro and small enterprise sector

farmers adoption of integrated crop protection and organic farming do moral and social concerns matter we investigate empirically the role of moral and social concerns in farmers decision to adopt integrated crop protection ip and organic farming of a survey questionnaire has been sent to 1286 fruit growers and vegetable producers located in the french areas of alpes de haute provence hautes alpes and vaucluse analysis of individual responses n 243 shows that although economic concerns play a strong role a significant number of respondents give high importance to moral and social ones we also examine how these considerations matter according to different crop protection strategies that is conventional farming ip and of using a multinomial logistic regression we find that 1 social concerns e g showing to others one s environmental commitment drive both ip and of adoption 2 moral concerns e g do not feel guilty about one s choices increase the probability of organic farming adoption only and 3 farmers who give high importance to economic concerns e g cutting production costs are less likely to adopt of

productive decentralization or indigenous growth small manufacturing enterprises and regional development in central portugal lewis j r and williams a m 1987 productive decentralization or indigenous growth small manufacturing enterprises and regional development in central portugal reg studies 21 343 361 small firms are crucial to the portuguese economy and have been important in the recent expansion of industrial activity away from core regions a survey of the formation and development of manufacturing enterprises in four contrasting rural locations within the central region tested the relevance of explanations based on north italian evidence of productive decentralization and spatial spread however analysis of employment characteristics inter firm linkages and conditions of firm formation reveals the dominance of independent and indigenous growth in the present wave of industrialization variations in firm characteristics between industrial sectors and economic environments indicate the need for more effective promotion policies not least to contain intra regional inequalities lewis j r et williams a m 1

assessing sustainable forest management under redd a community based labour perspective abstract reducing emissions from deforestation and forest degradation plus redd encourages economic support for reducing deforestation and conserving or increasing existing forest carbon stocks the way in which incentives are structured affects trade offs between local livelihoods carbon emission reduction and the cost effectiveness of a redd programme looking at first hand empirical data from 208 farming households in the bolivian amazon from a household economy perspective our study explores two policy options 1 compensated reduction of emissions from old growth forest clearing for agriculture and 2 direct payments for labour input into sustainable forest management combined with a commitment not to clear old growth forest our results indicate that direct payments for sustainable forest management an approach that focuses on valuing farmers labour input can be more cost effective than compensated reduction and in some cases is the most appropriate choice for achieving improved household incomes permanence of changes avoidance of leakages and community based institutional enforcement for sustainable forest management

the economics of biodiversity conservation a study of a coffee growing region in the western ghats of india this paper analyses the economics of biodiversity conservation in the context of a tropical forest ecosystem in the western ghats region of india where coffee is the main competitor for land use using primary data covering a cross section of coffee growers the study notes that the opportunity costs of biodiversity conservation in terms of coffee benefits foregone are quite high even after including external costs due to wildlife damages and defensive expenditure to protect against wildlife the npvs and irrs from coffee for all land holding groups were high including external costs these npvs across different land holding groups ranged between rs 17 thousand to over rs 106 thousand per acre at 12 discount rate and the irrs between 16 6 and 23 even if the expected benefits were to decrease by 20 and costs rise by a similar proportion still the irrs from coffee were quite high 19 5 20 1 the study notes that the external costs accounted for between 7 and 15 of the total discounted costs of coffee cultivation and smaller holdings proportionately incurred higher external costs as compared to large holdings the study also notes high transaction costs incurred by the growers to claim compensation for wildlife damages notwithstanding these disincentives the study notes that the local community had a positive attitude towards biodiversity conservation and were willing to pay in terms of spending time for participatory biodiversity conservation taking elephants a keystone and threatened species in asia and the study region for the contingent valuation survey the study notes that the respondents are willing to spend 25 8 humandays per household annually which works to over rs 6003 per household per annum in terms of the income foregone they also preferred a decentralized government institution for participatory biodiversity conservation d 2004 elsevier b v all rights reserved

what ever happened to poverty alleviation abstract the failure of many programs directed toward alleviating poverty is better understood than the successes this paper identifies the traits that characterize several better performing programs funded by the ford foundation traits that are not commonly found in such programs all focused narrowly on a particular trade or activity in the beginning used credit as an entry point started by brokering loans rather than lending directly and had leadership linked to powerful institutions participants were already engaged in the economic activities supported by the programs marketing channels existed and powerful consumer groups were often in favor of production by beneficiary groups though these findings seem obvious few programs funded by donors display these characteristics suggesting that donors choose programs and organizations more carefully and not limit their funding to the nongovernmental sector

small firms and their helpers lessons on demand abstract small enterprise se programs are currently the rage because of their potential to create employment they are typically supply driven providing standardized training technical assistance credit but most cases of se based growth have involved demand driven support provided by large customers firms traders government agencies state enterprises this article argues that such inherently customized support constitutes a better way to deliver services to ses and is more likely to stimulate sustained se growth with respect to se favoring procurement by government in particular we show that this can be done without running up against the problems of similar attempts in the past and in a way that also reduces the costs of running government we draw for illustration from a successful case of se favoring procurement in the brazilian state of ceara

organic certification agro ecological practices and return on investment evidence from pineapple producers in ghana the recent empirical literature on economic sustainability of certified export crops shows that certification standards that enhance yields are important for improving farm revenues and household welfare however limited evidence exists on the impact of organic certification on the adoption of agro ecological practices in this study we use unique farm level data from pineapple producers in ghana to examine the impact of organic certification on the use of agro ecological practices such as organic fertilizers organic pest and weed control crop rotation and soil and water conservation as well as how using these measures affect farm outcomes such as return on investment our empirical results reveal that organic certification increases agro ecological practice use although from a very low starting point using a generalized propensity score approach we show that there is a positive but nonlinear relationship between the intensity of agro ecological practice use and return on investment

small industry in developing countries a discussion of issues abstract this paper first examines the changing size distribution of industry in developing countries by region and over time and by reference to firm level surveys it discusses the underlying causes the importance of markets generated by the growth of agriculture and rural incomes for the regional development of industry both small and large scale is noted second it discusses the entrepreneurship issue arguing that while small and largefirms alike are highly responsive to the growth of markets the measured entrepreneurial response is neither as full nor as efficient as is desirable the third and last part discusses small industry programmes and their relation to development policy financing and extension programmes are considered in detail and there is a discussion of the risks involved some parallels with agricultural credit are discussed in particular the default problem and the problems associated with concessionary finance it is also argued that small industries and by implication the programmes intended to support them would stand to benefit from more efficient and also more labour demanding policies towards agriculture and industry