An application of von Thünen's model of agricultural location

Based on quantitative and qualitative fieldwork, this paper analyses how internal and international out-migration of men has affected the position of women left behind in a rural area in southern Morocco. The results generally refute the hypothesis that migration changes gender roles. Although international migration and remittances enable women and their families to live more comfortable and secure lives, internal migration often coincides with increasing workloads and uncertainty. Although their husbands' migration leads to a temporary increase in the tasks and responsibilities of women, this new role is generally perceived as a burden and should therefore not be equated with emancipation in the meaning of making independent choices against prevailing gender norms. In a classical “patriarchal bargain”, women prefer to avoid overt rule-breaking in order to secure their social position. Significant improvements in the position of rural women are primarily the result of general social and cultural change, although migration might have played an indirect, accelerating role in these processes.     

Individual and Situational Determinants of U.S. Consumers’ Buying Behavior of Organic Foods

ABSTRACT

The current study expands on previous research by examining a more comprehensive set of factors that influence consumers’ buying behavior of organic foods. This study focuses on individual and situational factors associated with attitudes and intentions to buy organic foods, which subsequently lead to organic food-buying behavior. Health and environmental consciousness were found to be individual factors that significantly influenced attitudes toward buying organic foods, whereas children’s age and perceived convenience of purchase were recognized as strong situational factors that determined intentions to buy organic foods.     

Security of Property Rights for Whom?

Property insecurity of non-elites can be compatible with or even enhance economic growth, but it also encourages conflict—which can undermine long-term growth and economic development. Using a new set of indicators which measure the property insecurity of marginalized ethno-cultural minority groups, this article demonstrates that the severity of property insecurity for the worst-off group in a country is strongly associated with the onset of armed conflict, and—once civil war is controlled for—property insecurity for marginalized minorities corresponds with higher growth rates. Economic growth can occur when the property rights of elites are secure but marginalized minorities face a high risk of expropriation, as land may be reallocated into the hands of investors with skills and access to capital. However, the potentially growth-enhancing effect of forced displacement and resettlement is reduced, because the property insecurity of minorities also increases the likelihood of armed conflict.     

Where Does Education Pay Off in Sub-Saharan Africa? Evidence from Two Cities of the Republic of Congo

Using first-hand data from the 2009 Employment and Informal Sector Survey (EESIC) in the two largest cities of the Republic of Congo, Brazzaville and Pointe-Noire, we analyze the impact of education on labour market outcomes, and identify the segments where education pays off the most. Multivariate analyses of the risk of unemployment and sectoral choice indicate that young people face serious difficulties in the labour market: for most of them, their only choice is to remain unemployed or to join the informal sector. To measure the specific impact of schooling on earnings, we address issues related to sample selection and endogeneity of education in the earnings function. The results shed light on heterogeneity in the returns to schooling across the two main cities and institutional sectors. An important finding is that the informal sector does not systematically lag behind the formal sectors in terms of returns to education. We emphasize convex returns to education, meaning that the last years in secondary and tertiary schooling yield the highest returns, while those of primary education are generally lower. This convexity is also apparent in the informal sector, where education (albeit on another scale) again appears as an important determinant of earnings.     

. Defazio,郭俊Dept. of N

Dr.VaLidity of Family History Data on Primary Adult-Onset DystoniaMartino D./Aniello M.S./Masi G. et al. [Dr. G. Defazio,Dept. of Neurol. and Psychiat. Sci., University of Bari,Piazza Giulio Cesare 11, 1-70124 Bari, Italy]Background: To our knowledge, no study has assessed thevalidity of family hist ory data provided     

Scientific and Technological Management of Land and Resources

（Bimonthly，Startedin１９８４）２００１CONTENTSNo．１（GeneralSerialNo．９１）PromoteSustainableDevelopmentoftheCauseofLandandResourcesbyMeansofScientificandTechnologicalInnovation……HeadofDepartmentofInternationalCooperationandScienceandTechnology，Min     

Measuring the risk attitude of decision‐makers: are there differences between groups of methods and persons?

Many studies quantifying individual risk preferences of test persons show that results of different measuring methods may vary. Additional reservations about the reliability of the results regarding the risk attitude measurement arise from the fact that most studies are based on convenience groups, such as students or businessmen in developing countries. With this in mind, we systematically compare different measuring methods to answer the question how the choice of method affects the results. Moreover, we compare the risk preferences of German farmers with those of students and Kazakhstani farmers to investigate whether farmers’ risk preferences can be approximated through those of convenience groups. The methods applied comprise an incentive‐compatible Holt‐and‐Laury‐lottery as well as two psychometric methods. Results show that students respond consistently across all three elicitation methods whereas German and Kazakhstani farmers are more inconsistent. Significant differences exist in the responses of German students and German farmers. The comparison of risk preferences between German and Kazakhstani farmers, however, reveals significant similarities with respect to the psychometric methods.     

Farm‐level impacts of prolonged drought: is a multiyear event more than the sum of its parts?

A multiyear discrete stochastic programming model with uncertain water supplies and inter-year crop dynamics is developed to determine: (i) whether a multiyear drought's impact can be more than the sum of its parts, and (ii) whether optimal response to 1 year of drought can increase a producer's vulnerability in subsequent years of drought. A farm system that has inter-year crop dynamics, but lacks inter-annual water storage capabilities, is used as a case study to demonstrate that dynamics unrelated to large reservoirs or groundwater can necessitate a multiyear model to estimate drought's impact. Results demonstrate the importance of analysing individual years of drought in the context of previous and future years of drought.     

Safeguarding species richness vs. increasing the use of renewable energy—The effect of stump harvesting on two environmental goals

Deadwood is recognized as one of the most important resources affecting forest biodiversity. Its absence from the forest landscape is, therefore, of concern, such that one official Swedish environmental objective is to increase the volume of deadwood. However, increasing the use of renewable energy sources, another environmental goal, is likely to work against this biodiversity objective. In this study we utilize a regional economic forest sector model, focusing on northern Sweden, in order to estimate the effect of a large scale introduction of stump harvest on the future use of forest fuel. In addition, an ecological model, describing the relationship between the availability of stumps and the abundance of saproxylic beetles, is linked to the economic model.The parameters used in the economic model are derived from a data set spanning 28 years while the ecological model is derived from a survey of ten clear cuts, undertaken seven years after the clear cutting, in order to investigate the abundance of saproxylic beetles in stumps. We simulate the effects of an increased demand for wood fuels in northern Sweden, with or without stump harvest. The two scenarios have different effects on all major round wood markets in the region, as well as on the abundance of saproxylic beetles. More specifically, the harvest of stumps is associated with a 5% reduction in the mean abundance of saproxylic beetles living in deadwood on future clear cuts and a 3% increase in the use of renewable energy recourses in heating plants.     

Determinants of dairy-product trade: Do subsidies matter?

Given the recent changes in the supply and demand of dairy products, many opportunities arise for exporting and importing countries. This paper examines determinants of dairy-product trade by applying the Poisson Pseudo-Maximum Likelihood (PPML) method to the gravity model using panel data on 49 exporting and 235 importing countries for the 17 years from 2000 to 2016. The gravity model is estimated using both interval data and dynamic analyses. The results show that domestic subsidies have a modest, but significant, impact on dairy-product trade across the models. For example, a 1% increase in subsidies leads to a roughly 0.02% increase in trade for an average country. Memberships in trade agreements, market size factors, and government institutions also positively affect dairy-product trade. However, tariffs are insignificant in the main model specification. Results from the lag-policy analysis show that the impact of subsidies disappears after the second year of distribution; whereas for the lead-policy analysis, results suggest at least 3 years of anticipatory effects on domestic subsidies.     

Scientific and Technological Management of Landand Resources 2004 CONTENTS

StrengthenStudyandSurveyofMineralResourcesinQinghai-TibetanPlateautoSecureSupplyofNationalResources………………PANGui-tang,DINGJunetal.(1)ADiscussiononLandPropertyHandlinginSystemReformofState-ownedEnterprises……………………………………………TANWu-ying,SHIYong-liang(5)AnAnalysisofInvisibleLandMarketfromEconomics ………………………………………………………………………………ZHOULing,YANGGang-qiao(9)AStudyofDynamicEquilibriumofIndustrialLand………………………………………………     

FIRST ANNOUNCEMENT The ⅩⅩⅤⅡ International Conference of Agricultural Ecnomists

16-22 August 2009,Beijing International Convention Center,Beijing,CHINA International Association of Agricultural Economists Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences     

Sustainability dimensions related to agricultural-based development: the experience of 50 years of intensive farming in Almería (Spain)

In the context of the current agri-food market, several factors have made it increasingly difficult to balance the components of sustainability in agricultural-based development. These factors include increasing internationalization, tighter control of distribution and frequent changes in agricultural policies. Indeed, in the framework of European rural policy there has been considerable debate in recent years concerning the role of the agricultural sector and how it should face the following challenges: productivity-competitiveness, environmental protection and socio-economic development. There is, therefore, a growing need for practical analyses that adopt a holistic approach. This paper analyses how this sector in the province of Almería (Spain), based on horticultural family farms, has risen to the above issues over recent decades. This case study provides some insights into the different trade-offs and synergies between sustainability dimensions. In particular, the integration of ecological, social and economic components may prove useful in helping other regions to adapt their agricultural systems, especially where these are characterized by small-scale farming.