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Physiological and behavioural Aspects of Mother - Infant Attachment and emotional Availability: a Study on five Months old Babies
No full textMother-infant bond is essential for the infant survival both physically and emotionally; in fact the attachment between mother and infant is a complex system of behaviours and feelings toward the one to the other that builds a relationship between both. This relationship motivates mothers and infants to undertake behaviours that ensure the infant’s survival, and it is on the base of all mammalian affiliations (Bowlby, 1969). Mothers and infants are equipped with instinctive attachment behaviours that ensure maternal care and the wellbeing, protection and survival of infants. This behavioural system underlies the affiliative system that develops in adulthood and subsequently parental behaviour (Panksepp, 1994). The development of the type of the attachment bond depends on how the mother was receptive to the needs of the child by providing the necessary care. Negayama et al. (2009), have shown that the picking up of the baby is essential for its development because its allows the caregiver to transport him/her, to protect him/her and to love him/her. In relation to this the purpose of this study is to investigate the physiological and behavioural responses of the child during the stimulation provided by the maternal carrying. In our previous study (Esposito et al. 2013) we found that during maternal carrying infants were calmer than during maternal holding (infant held by the mother while sitting). Each situation lasted 20s. Now we are interest in how both infants and mothers react during a longer stimulation of carrying and holding. Furthermore we are interest in mothers and infants quality of communication and connection between the parent and child. We want to deepen this by using the Emotional Availability Scale (EAs) (Biringhen, 1987) which is a research-based, scientifically driven way of understanding the quality of the interaction between the parent and the child. In this study also we aim to have behaviourally and physiologically measures of the EAs. Babies reduce the amount of voluntary movements, the episodes of crying and the heart rate during carrying. For what concern mother’s the heart rate during free interaction there isn’t any correlation between the heart rate of the baby and the mother’s heart rate. What we found is that mothers do not get influenced about their own attachment to their parents for what concern their relationship with their baby. Furthermore the Emotional Availability (EA) is negatively correlated to personality domains of the mother (psychoticism and neuroticism). Infants tend to adapt themselves and to cooperate with the mother during carrying. The calming response highlighted by the carrying has an adaptive value in mother-infant relationship and, as a consequence, in infant survival. Moreover, the present study provides implications for general parenting practices: how to interact optimally with the infant and the calming effect could be use in different situations
Ad bellum Sacri Romano-Germanici Imperii solenne decernendum: Die Reichskriegserklärungen gegen die protestantischen Mächte Schweden und Brandenburg-Preußen in den Jahren 1675 und 1757 - Untersuchungen zum Reichskriegsverfahren zwischen Immerwährendem Reichstag und Wiener Reichsbehörden
No full textLe dichiarazioni di guerra imperiali dal 1674 al 1757
La costituzione del Sacro Romano Impero offriva due possibilità di conservare la pace interna all'Impero: (1) dall'interno, attraverso un'esecuzione imperiale pronunciata dalle corti supreme dell'Impero, la quale ordinava alle province imperiali, mediante esortazioni (Excitatorien), di ristabilire la pace e (2) rispetto all'esterno, mediante la dichiarazione delle guerre imperiali da parte dell'imperatore e della Dieta imperiale le quali, grazie all'azione congiunta degli Stati imperiali, dovevano respingere l'aggressore esterno con una guerra difensiva. In base all'antica costituzione imperiale era quindi possibile difendersi sia dai "nemici imperiali" interni sia da quelli esterni. La costituzione pertanto, contribuendo allo sviluppo dell'integrità territoriale degli Stati imperiali rispetto all'esterno, costituiva per questi un aspetto importante per lo sviluppo statale interno ovvero l'"istituzionalizzazione incentrata sulla sovranità". Nel 1648, la Pace di Vestfalia (Art. VIII §2 [IPO]) segnò una svolta importante nella storia delle dichiarazioni di guerra imperiali garantendo per iscritto - dal punto di vista costituzionale - il dovere di consenso degli Stati alla guerra imperiale e, di conseguenza, definendo chiaramente il quadro costituzionale di tali dichiarazioni di guerra.
Nel periodo successivo alla Pace di Vestfalia e fino alla dissoluzione dell'Impero nel 1806, il Sacro Romano Impero della Nazione Germanica condusse nove guerre imperiali contro nemici esterni: due contro l'Impero Ottomano, una contro la Svezia e la Francia, cinque contro la Francia e una contro il re di Prussia che potrebbe essere letta anche come esecuzione imperiale. Di queste nove guerre sette fecero seguito alla proclamazione delle cosiddette dichiarazioni di guerra imperiali, infatti con gli Ottomani non furono mai stipulati trattati di pace ma sempre degli armistizi e, di conseguenza, non furono emesse neppure le dichiarazioni di guerra. La Dieta imperiale emise quindi, complessivamente, otto dichiarazioni di guerra imperiali nel periodo che va dal 1674 al 1799: una contro la Svezia, una contro la Prussia e sei contro la Francia.
La storiografia costituzionale moderna, le cui origini risalgono alla pubblicistica imperiale relativa al diritto pubblico dell'epoca, ha dedicato fino ad oggi scarsa attenzione a queste dichiarazioni in quanto oggetto di ricerca legato ai dibattiti sulla questione della legittima difesa e della resistenza nel vecchio Impero. Solamente due saggi, rispettivamente di Klaus Müller e Christoph Kampmann, affrontano nello specifico questa problematica per il periodddo analizzato. E tuttavia, la questione di come si svilupparono le dichiarazioni di guerra imperiali, quali ripercussioni ebbero sul vecchio Impero ovvero quali conflitti e discussioni produssero all'epoca allo scopo di fornire una giustificazione delle misure di difesa legittime dell'Impero, adottate da imperatore, Dieta imperiale e Stati imperiali, tali questioni non sono ancora state poste in relazione tra loro e indagate sistematicamente. Ciò che ancora non è chiaro è l'importanza assunta dalle dichiarazioni di guerra imperiali per la formazione della vecchia costituzione imperiale in generale. Pertanto l'avanzamento della riflessione sul funzionamento e sullo sviluppo della vecchia costituzione imperiale dopo il 1648 richiede un oggetto che consenta di essere esaminato attraverso un lungo periodo di tempo e nel corso della sua evoluzione, senza per questo dover scrivere necessariamente una storia globale dell'Impero. Le dichiarazioni di guerra si prestano perciò particolarmente per tracciare in modo esemplare la questione della dinamica così come dell' "indice di statualità" del vecchio impero. Nel corso dell'indagine si dischiude quindi la possibilità di pervenire a nuove interpretazioni sulla storia costituzionale muovendo dal "concetto di costituzione politica e dinamica", quale viene avanzato da Anton Schindling.Quali ripercussioni ebbero le dichiarazioni di guerra imperiali sulla forma della vecchia costituzione? In che modo tali dichiarazioni influirono sulla situazione esistente nel corpus imperii e quali conseguenze determinarono nella forma costituzionale?
Il progetto di ricerca si è posto come obiettivo quello di colmare tale lacuna svolgendo un'indagine che affronti le dichiarazioni di guerra imperiali dal 1674 al 1757 in rapporto alla loro genesi, un'indagine che intende porsi come punto di sutura tra la riflessione bellicistica e la ricerca sull'Impero (o sulla sua Dieta) e radicarla in una nuova coscienza storica
El Encarcelamiento Masivo : Análisis particular del caso chileno
No full textRESUMEN
Esta tesis analiza el problema del encarcelamiento masivo, centrándose en el caso chileno. La utilización desmedida y selectiva de las penas privativas de la libertad se ha vuelto un mecanismo de control, llenando nuestras cárceles con los excluidos. Luego de un análisis histórico del nacimiento y evolución de la prisión moderna, nos ocupamos de las causas que explican el encarcelamiento masivo: el desmantelamiento social (acompañado de mayor punitividad) y el populismo punitivo (resultado de un discurso demagógico-vindicativo). Sostenemos que la selectividad con la que opera, los efectos que produce y la forma como beneficia a grupos minoritarios la hacen una medida no solo ilegítima, sino también insoportable en una sociedad democrática. Concluimos con una propuesta factible y alternativa al encarcelamiento masivo, compatible con el respeto por la dignidad humana.
SOMMARIO
Questa tesi analizza il problema della carcerazione di massa, con particolare attenzione al caso cileno. L'uso eccessivo e selettivo della privazione della libertà è diventata un meccanismo di controllo, riempiendo le nostre prigioni con gli esclusi. Dopo un'analisi storica della nascita e l'evoluzione del carcere moderno, ci rivolgiamo alle cause della carcerazione di massa: lo smantellamento sociale (accompagnato da una maggiore punizione) e il populismo punitivo (risultato di un discorso demagogico-vendicativo). Noi riteniamo che la selettività con cui opera, gli effetti che produce e i vantaggi per gruppi di minoranza lo rendano non solo illegittimo, ma anche insopportabile in una società democratica. Concludiamo con una proposta fattibile e alternativa alla carcerazione di massa, compatibile con il rispetto della dignità umana
Detection and Analysis Methods for unmanned aerial Vehicle Images
No full textUnmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs), commonly known as drones, are aerial platforms that are gaining large popularity in the remote sensing field. UAVs derive from military technology, but in the last few years they are establishing as reference platforms also for civilian tasks. The main advantage of these acquisition systems lies in their simplicity of use. Indeed, a UAV can be used when and where it is needed without excessive costs. Since UAVs can fly very close to the objects under investigation they allow the acquisition of extremely high resolution (EHR) images in which the items are described with a very high level of details. The huge quantity of information contained in UAV images opens the way to develop novel applications but at the same time force us to face new challenging problems at methodological level. This thesis represents a modest but hopefully useful contribution towards making UAV images completely understood and easily processed and analyzed.
In particular, the proposed methodological contributions include: i) two methods devoted to the automatic detection and counting of cars present in urban scenarios; ii) a complete processing chain which monitors the traffic and estimate the speeds of moving vehicles; iii) a methodology which detects classes of objects by exploiting a nonlinear filter which combines image gradient features at different orders and Gaussian process (GP) modeling; iv) a novel strategy to “coarsely” describe extremely high resolution images using various representation and matching strategies.
Experimental results conducted on real UAV images are presented and discussed. They show the validity of the proposed methods and suggest future possible improvements. Furthermore, they confirm that despite the complexity of the considered images, the potential of UAV images is very wide
High Order Direct Arbitrary-Lagrangian-Eulerian (ALE) Finite Volume Schemes for Hyperbolic Systems on Unstructured Meshes
No full textIn this work we develop a new class of high order accurate Arbitrary-Lagrangian-Eulerian (ALE) one-step finite volume schemes for the solution of nonlinear systems of conservative and non-conservative hyperbolic partial differential equations. The numerical algorithm is designed for two and three space dimensions, considering moving unstructured triangular and tetrahedral meshes, respectively. As usual for finite volume schemes, data are represented within each control volume by piecewise constant values that evolve in time, hence implying the use of some strategies to improve the order of accuracy of the algorithm. In our approach high order of accuracy in space is obtained by adopting a WENO reconstruction technique, which produces piecewise polynomials of higher degree starting from the known cell averages. Such spatial high order accurate reconstruction is then employed to achieve high order of accuracy also in time using an element-local space-time finite element predictor, which performs a one-step time discretization. Specifically, we adopt either the continuous Galerkin (CG) predictor, which does not allow discontinuities in time and is suitable for smooth time evolutions, or the discontinuous Galerkin (DG) predictor which can handle stiff source terms that might produce jumps in the local space-time solution. Since we are dealing with moving meshes the elements deform while the solution is evolving in time, hence making the use of a reference system very convenient. Therefore, within the space-time predictor, the physical element is mapped onto a reference element using a high order isoparametric approach, where the space-time basis and test functions are given by the Lagrange interpolation polynomials passing through a predefined set of space-time nodes. The computational mesh continuously changes its configuration in time, following as closely as possible the flow motion. The entire mesh motion procedure is composed by three main steps, namely the Lagrangian step, the rezoning step and the relaxation step. In order to obtain a continuous mesh configuration at any time level, the mesh motion is evaluated by assigning each node of the computational mesh with a unique velocity vector at each timestep. The node solver algorithm preforms the Lagrangian stage, while we rely on a rezoning algorithm to improve the mesh quality when the flow motion becomes very complex, hence producing highly deformed computational elements. A so-called relaxation algorithm is finally employed to partially recover the optimal Lagrangian accuracy where the computational elements are not distorted too much. We underline that our scheme is supposed to be an ALE algorithm, where the local mesh velocity can be chosen independently from the local fluid velocity. Once the vertex velocity and thus the new node location has been determined, the old element configuration is connected with the new one at the future time level with straight edges to represent the local mesh motion, in order to maintain algorithmic simplicity. The final ALE finite volume scheme is based directly on a space-time conservation formulation of the governing system of hyperbolic balance laws. The nonlinear system is reformulated more compactly using a space-time divergence operator and is then integrated on a moving space-time control volume. We adopt a linear parametrization of the space-time element boundaries and Gaussian quadrature rules of suitable order of accuracy to compute the integrals. In our algorithm either a simple and robust Rusanov-type numerical flux or a more sophisticated and less dissipative Osher-type numerical flux is employed.
We apply the new high order direct ALE finite volume schemes to several hyperbolic systems, namely the multidimensional Euler equations of compressible gas dynamics, the ideal classical and relativistic magneto-hydrodynamics (MHD) equations and the non-conservative seven-equation Baer-Nunziato model of compressible multi-phase flows with stiff relaxation source terms. Numerical convergence studies as well as several classical test problems will be shown to assess the accuracy and the robustness of our schemes.
Furthermore we focus on the following issues to improve the algorithm efficiency: the time evolution, the numerical flux computation across element boundaries and the high order WENO reconstruction procedure. First, a time-accurate local time stepping (LTS) algorithm for unstructured triangular meshes is derived and presented, where each element can run at its own optimal time step, given by a local CFL stability condition. Then, we propose a new and efficient quadrature-free formulation for the flux computation, in which the space-time boundaries of each element are split into simplex sub-elements. This leads to space-time normal vectors as well as Jacobian matrices that are constant within each sub-element, hence allowing the flux integrals to be evaluated on the space-time reference control volume once and for all analytically during a preprocessing step. Finally, we consider the very new a posteriori MOOD paradigm, recently proposed for the Eulerian framework, to overcome the expensive WENO approach on moving meshes. The MOOD technique requires the use of only one central reconstruction stencil because the limiting procedure is carried out a posteriori instead of a priori, as done in the WENO formulation
Tape Mbo'e: A Service Oriented Method
No full textIn developing countries, normally, different e-government applications do not exchange data each other, affecting the quality of service provided to citizens and the transparency.
This situation has motived us to focus on the development of applications in such domain and, more specifically, on the interoperability among these applications. The interoperability has been implemented in e-government context of multiple countries through the Service-Oriented Computing (SOC). In addition to the interoperability, SOC provides considerable benefits. However, developing a service-based e-government application (SBeA) is a complex challenge and requires a software engineering method to manage its development process. The potential method should take into account not only design, construction, and maintenance of SBeA, but also it should consider the context in which it will be used (i.e, developing countries).
In fact, in these countries, the scarcity of economic resources and qualified professionals can impose constraints to carry out e-government projects.
Thus, the adopted methods have to maintain the costs low and to consider aspects related to long-term sustainability of the applications from the beginning. These issues suggest the adoption of Agile Methods (AMs) that have been proved to offer benefits in different projects in developing countries. However, they do not include SOC characteristics. Therefore, we have proposed Tape Mbo'e (TME), that is an extension of the agile method "OpenUP" to support the construction and the maintenance of SBeA in developing countries.
TME has been used in five case studies, which embraced both academia and public organizations in Paraguay. It is important to remark that it was the first application of this type of evaluation in the public sector in Paraguay.
A full validation of TME requires a long-term study, including its applications in a consistent number of e-government projects. This is out of the scope, and the possibility, of the current thesis. Nevertheless, the initial results of the different case studies indicate the feasibility and simplicity of TME when it is applied in this context
Risk-Based Vulnerability Management. Exploiting the economic nature of the attacker to build sound and measurable vulnerability mitigation strategies.
No full textVulnerability bulletins and feeds report hundreds of vulnerabilities a month that a system administrator or a Chief Information Officer working for an organisation has to take care of. Because of the load of work, vulnerability prioritisation is a must in any complex-enough
organisation. Currently, the industry employs the Common Vulnerability Scoring System (CVSS in short) as a metric to prioritise vulnerability risk. However, the CVSS base score is a technical measure of severity, not of risk. By using a severity measure to estimate risk, current practices
assume that every vulnerability is characterised by the same exploitation likelihood, and that vulnerability risk can be assessed through a technical analysis of the vulnerability.
In this Thesis we argue that this is not the case, and that the economic forces that drive the attacker are a key factor in understanding vulnerability risk. In particular, we argue that attacker's rationality and the economic infrastructure supporting cybercrime's activities play a major role in
determining which vulnerabilities will the attackers massively exploit, and therefore which vulnerabilities will represent a (substantially higher than the rest) risk.
Our ultimate goal is to show that `risk-based' vulnerability management policies, as opposed to currently employed `criticality-based' ones, are possible and can outperform current practices in terms of patching efficiency
without losing in effectiveness (i.e. reduction of risk in the wild). To this aim we perform an extensive data-collection work on vulnerabilities, proof-of-concept exploits, exploits traded in the cybercrime markets, and
exploits detected in the wild. We further collaborated with Symantec to collect actual records of attacks in the wild delivered against about 1M machines worldwide. A good part of our data-collection efforts has been also dedicated in infiltrating and analysing the cybercrime markets.
We used this data collection to evaluate four `running hypotheses' underlying our main thesis: vulnerability risk is influenced by the attacker's rationality (1), and the underground markets are credible sources of risk
that provide technically proficient attack tools (2), are a mature (3) and sound (4) from an economic perspective.
We then put this in practice and evaluate the
effectiveness of criticality-based and risk-based vulnerability management policies (based on the aforementioned findings) in mitigating real attacks in the wild. We compare the policies in terms of the `risk reduction' they entail, i.e. the gap between `risk' addressed by the policy and residual risk.
Our results show that risk-based policies entail a significantly higher risk reduction than criticality-based ones, and thwart the majority of risk in the wild
by addressing only a small fraction of the
patching work prescribed by current practices
Renewable Energy and the Smart Grid: Architecture Modelling, Communication Technologies and Electric Vehicles Integration
No full textRenewable Energy is considered as an effective solution for relieving the energy crisis and reducing the greenhouse gas emissions. It is also be recognized as an important energy resource for power supplying in the next generation power grid{smart grid system. For a long time, the unsustainable
and unstable of renewable energy generation is the main challenge to the combination of the renewable energy and the smart grid. The short board on the utilities' remote control caused low-efficiency of power scheduling in the distribution power area, also increased the difficulty of the local generated renewable energy grid-connected process. Furthermore, with the rapid growth of the number of electrical vehicles and the widely established of
the fast power charging stations in urban and rural area, the unpredictable power charging demand will become another challenge to the power grid in a few years. In this thesis we propose the corresponding solutions for the challenges enumerated in the above. Based on the architecture of terminal power consumer's residence, we introduce the local renewable energy system into the residential environment. The local renewable energy system can typically support part of the consumer's power demand, even more. In this case, we establish the architecture of the local smart grid community based on the structure of distribution network of the smart grid, includes terminal power consumer, secondary power substation, communication links and sub data management center. Communication links are employed as the data transmission channels in our scheme. Also the local power scheduling algorithm and the optimal path selection algorithm are created for power scheduling requirements and stable expansion of the power supply area. Acknowledging the fact that the information flow of the smart grid needs appropriate communication technologies to be the communication standards, we explore the available communication technologies and the communication requirements and performance metrics in the smart grid networks. Also, the power saving mechanism of smart devices in the advanced metering infrastructure is proposed based on the two-state-switch scheduling algorithm and improved 802.11ah-based data transmission model. Renewable energy system can be employed in residential environment, but also can be deployed in public environment, like fast power charging station and public parking campus. Due to the current capacity of electrical vehicles (EV), the fast power charging station is required not just by the EV drivers, but also demanded by the related enterprises. We propose a upgraded fast power charging station with local deployed renewable energy system in public parking campus. Based on the queueing model, we explore and deliver a stochastic control model for the fast power charging station. A new status called "Service Jumped" is created to express the service state of the fast power charging station with and without the support from the local renewable energy in real-time
In assenza di politiche familiari: l'influenza della famiglia sul lavoro di uomini e donne in un confronto fra Italia e Stati Uniti
No full textL'oggetto di studio della tesi è rappresentato dell'analisi delle conseguenze degli eventi familiari sulle carriere individuali, sia riguardo alla partecipazione al mercato del lavoro, sia riguardo agli esiti che il lavoro produce. Gli eventi familiari considerati sono: 1) l'inizio di una nuova unione familiare, 2) la nascita dei figli e 3) le dissoluzioni familiari (separazioni e divorzi). Il lavoro empirico è costruito attorno alla comparazione fra Italia e Stati Uniti: due contesti in cui lo Stato non promuove attivamente la conciliazione tra famiglia e lavoro e il sostegno pubblico all'occupazione femminile è limitato, sebbene il problema della mancanza di sostegno statale, in Italia trova risposta nella (o viene scaricato sulla) famiglia, mentre negli Stati Uniti è in gran parte risolto dal mercato. L'analisi empirica è condotta su dati di tipo longitudinale raccolti a livello nazionale: per l'Italia si è fatto ricorso all'indagine «Famiglie e Soggetti sociali» effettuata nel 2009 dall'ISTAT nell'ambito delle Indagini multiscopo sulle famiglie, mentre le analisi relative agli Stati Uniti sono state svolte sul Panel Study of Income Dynamics (PSID). Le principali tecniche di analisi adottate comprendono la panel data analysis e l'event history analysis. L'appartenenza dell'Italia e degli Stati Uniti rispettivamente al regime di welfare conservatore nella sua variante «mediterranea» e al regime di welfare liberale emerge come l'elemento istituzionale che meglio aiuta a interpretare i principali risultati empirici emersi in questo lavoro. Al di là del ruolo del regime di welfare nel determinare i tassi di occupazione femminili (Esping-Andersen 1990, 1999) esso ha un ruolo rilevante nel determinare le traiettorie occupazionali delle donne lungo il corso di vita. Nell'ambito della comparazione degli assetti istituzionali di Italia e Stati Uniti questo lavoro ha contribuito al dibattito circa le conseguenze lavorative degli eventi familiari in quattro direzioni: 1) si ritiene di aver fornito una misura dell'effetto dei figli sui tassi di occupazione femminili più accurata rispetto ai precedenti studi: In Italia, in particolare, si è stimato un effetto negativo superiore a quanto riscontrato in letteratura; 2) ci si è posto per la prima volta l'obiettivo di analizzare in maniera sistematica, per l'Italia, l'effetto del divorzio sull'occupazione femminile. Si è stimato un effetto positivo che persiste anche nel medio termine, limitato però alle donne senza figli in età prescolare; 3) questo lavoro non si è limitato a considerare gli effetti degli eventi familiari solo sulle carriere delle donne, ma ha allargato l'analisi alle conseguenze sul lavoro degli uomini. 4) Infine, è stato dimostrato che negli Stati Uniti le traiettorie occupazionali delle donne appartenenti alle coorti più recenti sono meno sensibili alla nascita dei figli, mentre in Italia accade l'esatto opposto. Nello specifico, in Italia la penalizzazione occupazionale della nascita di un figlio è significativamente più forte per le donne appartenenti alle coorti più recenti. Il risultato ha una grande rilevanza se si considera che nonostante a) le trasformazioni intervenute negli ultimi decenni riguardo al lavoro delle donne, b) la crescente presenza dei temi della conciliazione nel discorso pubblico e nella retorica politica e c) le timide politiche implementate a sostegno della famiglia, la conciliazione famiglia-lavoro è oggi più difficoltosa in Italia di quanto non fosse per le donne della generazione precedente
Agricultural Advisory Services in Eastern Ethiopia: Access, Impact, and Willingness to Pay
No full textIn developing countries, public agricultural advisory services (AASs) have been one of the key components of local development in terms of enhancing production and productivity, achieving food security, contributing to poverty reduction, and improving livelihoods in the face of economic, social, and environmental challenges. However, the benefit that farmers obtain out of participating in AASs and the resulting impact depend, to a great extent, by the (intensity of) farmers’ direct and indirect access to these services. The issue of intensity of farmers’ involvement in AASs is also especially important considering the various stages involved in farming – land preparation to post-harvest management. In this regard, the extent of farmers’ participation in such services and the determinants of their intensity of participation are not very well documented in the context of many developing countries. On the other hand, recent studies have shown that the impact of AASs is mixed and that some empirical investigations lack methodological rigor. Furthermore, there is a dearth of context-specific empirical evidence on the impact of new approaches to AAS provision. One such approach is the Farmers’ Training Centers (FTCs) implemented by the government of Ethiopia to improve smallholder farming systems. Although public AASs have been hailed to be a key constituent of agricultural development and poverty reduction strategies in many developing countries, due to declining public budget allocation, alternative ways of providing AASs have been sought and implemented. One way of diversifying AASs is through a fee-for-service arrangement, which proved useful in many developed countries. In the context of developing countries, however, the potential for payment for AASs has yet to be explored in full. This is especially relevant considering the current economic crisis, large number of farmers relying on agriculture for their livelihoods, inefficiencies of public AASs, and specialized needs of market-oriented producers. In order to address these issues that relate to intensity of farmers’ access to on-farm AASs, impact of FTC-based AASs on outcome indicators, as well as willingness to pay for improved FTC-based AASs, this study is carried out in Haramaya district of eastern Ethiopia. More specifically, a field-based household survey was conducted from May to October 2013 on a total sample of 340 farm households. In relation to the first objective of the investigation, i.e., analyzing the predictors of farmers’ intensity of participation in on-farm training and demonstration, due to the nature of the outcome variables (i.e., count outcome data) both the Poisson regression and the negative binomial regression models are employed on data collected from the full sample. The findings of the investigation indicate that a host of factors – relating to human capital, financial capital, physical capital, social capital, and access to infrastructure and services – influence the farmers’ differential involvement in these services. With regard to the impact evaluation, the study made reference to a sub-sample within the full sample (i.e., 90 households trained at FTCs in 2009 and 160 control respondents selected for this purpose). Using the same data collection instrument in both treatment and comparison areas, data were generated specifically for the purposes of impact evaluation. Due to the non-random allocation of FTCs and self-selection issues as well as the cross-sectional nature of data collected, the propensity score matching (PSM) procedure was employed to estimate the causal effect of an FTC-based modular training on farm income. The results of the analysis show a positive and statistically highly significant gain of farm income (excluding chat) by the participants of the modular training, which is between Birr 9,557.47 and Birr 10,387.53 per household, on average.
Lastly, in order to analyze whether a payment for improved AAS scheme is a possible way towards diversifying the institutional options for providing AASs, a choice experiment was conducted to estimate the farmers’ willingness to pay (WTP) for services describing improved FTC-based provision of AASs. By using the best-worst approach to elicit preference data from 120 households selected from treatment areas, applying the solemn oath procedure to mitigate hypothetical bias, and estimating the random parameters logit (RPL) model, the WTP estimates are derived for advice, training, and demonstration provided by the FTCs. In doing so, the study shows that the largest WTP values are associated with demonstration, followed by training. A small premium price is also associated with advice in the group that is not exposed to the solemn oath (i.e., the control treatment). Moreover, it is found that signing on a solemn oath form reduces the mean WTP values compared to not signing (but agreeing to tell the truth) and the control treatment.
This dissertation consists of three essays: Essay 1 “Predictors of Smallholder Farmers’ Intensity of Participation in On-farm Agricultural Advisory Service Provision in Haramaya District, Eastern Ethiopia”; Essay 2 “Improving Smallholder Farmers’ Income through Farmers’ Training Centers: an Impact Evaluation in Haramaya District, Eastern Ethiopia”; and, Essay 3 “Smallholder Farmers’ Willingness to Pay for Agricultural Advisory Services: Investigating the Effect of Solemn Oath in Mitigating Hypothetical Bias in Best-Worst Choice Experiments in Haramaya District, Eastern Ethiopia”. Each of the three essays begins with an introductory section where the background to the problem and gaps in previous empirical investigations are discussed. In Essays I & III, there is also an additional discussion on this under the section ‘literature review’. The ‘research methodology’ section in each essay presents a detailed account of the sampling procedure, survey design and methods, as well as empirical strategy and estimation. Immediately following this is the result and discussion section where the main findings of the study are presented and discussed. Finally, the conclusion and recommendation section provides some policy implications of the studies