1,720,959 research outputs found
Three Essays on Economic Analysis of Production Systems of U.S. Grass-fed Beef Industry
Get PDFThis dissertation research consists of three essays. The first two studies analyze experimental research data based on three pasture systems for grass-fed beef (GFB) production in the Gulf Coast Region. System 1 included bermudagrass and ryegrass; System 2 included bermudagrass, ryegrass, rye, dallisgrass, and clover mixtures (red, white, and berseem clovers); and System 3 included bermudagrass, soybean, sorghum sudan hybrid, ryegrass, rye, dallisgrass, and clover mixtures (red, white, and berseem clovers). Fifty-four Fall-born steers were weaned in May and grouped into nine groups and randomly blocked into treatments and replicates. Inputs and output data were recorded on a daily basis. Greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions in terms of CO2 equivalent emissions from each system were estimated based on the experimental data and literature for the first three years (2009/10 to 2011/12). For the first essay, the three pasture systems were analyzed to maximize the profitability and sustainability of grass-fed beef production. The simplest grazing system yielded higher profit than the most complex, but the most complex system produced the lowest greenhouse gas impact. A trade-off was found between profitability and GHG impact among the systems. In the second essay, the same three pasture systems were analyzed for labor use and profitability based on five years of experimental data (2009/10 to 2011/12). System 1 was more profitable as well as more labor consuming. Systems 1 and 2 were more profitable than System 3 with or without including the labor expenses. Application of simulation and dominance techniques showed that decision makers would choose between Systems 1 and 2 based on their risk preferences. The third essay analyzes the technical efficiency of grass-fed beef farms in the U.S. The study is based on a cost and return survey conducted in 2013. The average technical efficiency of grass-fed beef production was found to be 76%. Technical efficiency is positively affected by farm specialization, and percentage share of grass-fed beef meat in GFB income and negatively impacted by off-farm income and owning cow-calf segment. Increasing return to scale was found in GFB production and larger-scale farms were found to have lower average costs than smaller-scale farms
Going Beyond Counting First Authors in Author Co-citation Analysis
Get PDFThe present study examines one of the fundamental aspects of author co-citation analysis (ACA) - the way co-citation
counts are defined. Co-citation counting provides the data on which all subsequent statistical analyses and mappings
are based, and we compare ACA results based on two different types of co-citation counting - the traditional type that
only counts the first one among a cited work's authors on the one hand and a non-traditional type that takes into
account the first 5 authors of a cited work on the other hand. Results indicate that the picture produced through this non-traditional author co-citation counting contains more coherent author groups and is therefore considerably clearer. However, this picture represents fewer specialties in the research field being studied than that produced through the traditional first-author co-citation counting when the same number of top-ranked authors is selected and analyzed. Reasons for these effects are discussed
Variations on the Author
Get PDF“Variations on the Author” discusses two of Eduardo Coutinho’s recent films (Um Dia na Vida, from 2010, and Últimas Conversas, posthumously released in 2015) and their contribution to the general question of documentary authorship. The director’s filmography is characterized by a consistent yet self-effacing form of authorial self-inscription: Coutinho often features as an interviewer that rather than express opinions propels discourses; an interviewer that is good at listening. This mode of self-inscription characterizes him as an author who is not expressive but who is nonetheless markedly present on the screen. In Um Dia na Vida, however, Coutinho is completely absent form the image, while Últimas Conversas, on the contrary, includes a confessional prologue that moves the director from the margins to the center of his films. This article examines the ways in which these works stand out in the filmography of a director who offers new insights into the notion of cinematic authorship
Appropriate Similarity Measures for Author Cocitation Analysis
Get PDFWe provide a number of new insights into the methodological discussion about author cocitation analysis. We first argue that the use of the Pearson correlation for measuring the similarity between authors’ cocitation profiles is not very satisfactory. We then discuss what kind of similarity measures may be used as an alternative to the Pearson correlation. We consider three similarity measures in particular. One is the well-known cosine. The other two similarity measures have not been used before in the bibliometric literature. Finally, we show by means of an example that our findings have a high practical relevance.information science;Pearson correlation;cosine;similarity measure;author cocitation analysis
Efficiency of U.S. Grass-Fed Beef Farms
Get PDFGrass-fed beef cost and returns survey data from 2012 were analyzed to measure technical efficiency of GFB farms in the U.S. We found all inputs with expected signs. The average technical efficiency of GFB was 70% and the farms are operating with increasing returns to scale
Dispelling the Myths Behind First-author Citation Counts
Get PDFWe conducted a full-scale evaluative citation analysis study of scholars in the XML research field to explore just how different from each other author rankings resulting from different citation counting methods actually are, and to demonstrate the capability of emerging data and tools on the Web in supporting more realistic citation counting methods. Our results contest some common arguments for the continued
use of first-author citation counts in the evaluation of scholars, such as high correlations between author rankings by first-author citation counts and other citation
counting methods, and high costs of using more realistic citation counting methods that are not well-supported by the ISI databases. It is argued that increasingly available digital full text research papers make it possible for citation analysis studies to go beyond what the ISI databases have directly supported and to employ more
sophisticated methods
ANALYSIS OF LABOR USE AND PROFITABILITY IN THREE PASTURE SYSTEMS FOR THE GRASS-FED BEEF PRODUCTION IN THE U.S.
Get PDFAn experiment to compare three pasture systems was conducted at the Iberia Research Station in Jeanerette, Louisiana, for five consecutive years from 2009/10 to 2013/14. System 1 included of bermudagrass and ryegrass pasture; System 2 included bermudagrass, ryegrass, clover mix (berseem, red and white clovers), rye, and dallisgrass; and System 3 included bermudagrass, ryegrass, sorghum sudan, soybeans, clover mix (berseem, red and white clovers), rye, and dallisgrass. Fifty-four May-weaned steers were divided into nine groups of six based on their body weight and randomly placed into one of the replications of the three pasture systems. Detailed records of daily activities along with various inputs, machinery and labor use, and outputs was collected. Analysis was done using the Kenward-Roger Degrees of Freedom method with and without including labor expenses. Systems 1 and 2 yielded higher profit than System 3 in both cases. System 1 consumed the highest labor inputs among the systems. Simulation and dominance analysis showed that System 1 dominated Systems 2 and 3, and System 2 dominated to System 3 without including labor. With labor, the decision between Systems 1 and 2 was based on the risk preference of the decision maker. Again, Systems 1 and 2 dominated System 3. Sensitivity analysis showed that System 2 would be numerically dominant than System 1 when the labor charge per hour was >$32
Analysis of Three Pasture Systems for Grass-fed Beef Production: Labor Use and Profitability
Get PDFThree Louisiana grass-fed beef production pasture systems were evaluated for labor use and profitability for four consecutive years from 2009/10 to 2012/13. Despite requiring greater labor, System 1, which included the lowest number of different forage species, yielded higher profit than System 3, which included the highest number of forage species
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