1,720,976 research outputs found
Multimarket analysis of agricultural policy in Iraq
No full textGovernment intervention in Iraq agriculture takes the form of supporting output prices and subsidizing input prices for producers. At the same time, consumer prices are far below the domestic prices of producers and world markets. While the Government is trying to liberalize agricultural markets because of the heavy budgetary costs associated with price support, Iraq is facing an embargo situation that calls for particular steps towards increasing food self-sufficiency and food security. To analyze the impact of alternative policy scenarios on the markets of related commodities, a multi-market model was constructed to analyze the impacts of the two paths mentioned above (market liberalization versus food self-sufficiency). The model focuses on the production system of five commodities (barley, wheat, sheep and goats, lentil and chickpea) in two main regions (irrigated and rainfed). However, the rainfed area is divided into three sub-regions (high-, moderate- and low- rainfall areas referred to as HRA, MRA, and LRA). Wheat is produced in the three rainfall zones as well as under irrigation. Barley is mainly produced in moderate- and low - rainfall areas as well as under irrigation. Chickpea is only produced in high rainfall areas. Lentil is mainly produced in the moderate rainfall area. Sheep are raised almost everywhere in the country. The structure of the model is summarized in Table 1. Several changes in output and input price policy were investigated. These pricing policy changes are summarized in Table 2. The impact of these specific changes in price policy instruments is summarized below
Agricultural Growth, Sustainable Resource Management, and Poverty Alleviation in the Low Rainfall Areas of West Asia and North Africa
No full textAn international conference was held in Amman Jordan in September 1997 to examine mounting problems of poverty and environmental degradation in the low rainfall areas (LRAs) of the eight Mashreq and Maghreb countries of West Asia and North Africa, and to seek solutions which reconcile economic growth with equity and environmental conservation- the 3E's of sustainable development
The risk management effects of alternative settlement specifications in commodity futures markets
No full text"The economic function of a futures market is performed efficiently only when a high level of competition exists among the participants. The prevention of distortions such as ""squeezes"" or ""corners"" has been an area of major concern for futures institutions. At the heart of such distortions lies the type of settlement system associated with the futures contract. The general objective of the thesis is to analyze the present delivery system in the Chicago Board of Trade corn and soybean contracts, alternative physical delivery systems, and cash settlement systems. More precisely, the specific objectives of the study are: (1) to assess and compare the feasibility of alternative settlement delivery systems for corn and soybeans; (2) to develop a method for estimating optimal weights in a cash settlement index that minimizes basis risk; the value of the weighing scheme will be assessed relative to simple-average weights; (3) to construct an index where locations of the underlying prices are randomly selected in a manner which attempts to maintain a ""consistent"" index while inhibiting manipulation incentives."A theoretical model of futures pricing with delivery option is used to simulate futures prices with different delivery terms and construct cash indices. Several modifications to the current settlement system are made regarding the composition of the delivery set, the size and the nature of the discount/premium used to settle the contract at expiration, and the type of settlement. The results indicate that hedging effectiveness, when measured individually at non-delivery locations, responds to changes in delivery differentials as well as delivery locations. However, as results are aggregated over space, the changes in settlement specifications tend to affect hedging performance only marginally. Results also suggest that cash settlement provides slightly higher levels of hedging effectiveness than any type of multiple physical delivery.Made available in DSpace on 2011-05-07T12:59:48Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 2
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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
Agricultural Exports from Latin America and the Caribbean : Harnessing Trade to Feed the World and Promote Development
No full textThe United Nations estimates that global
food demand will double by 2050, with much of that growth in
developing countries. The world will have 2.3 billion more
people, and given the deep transformation of growth
trajectories in low-income countries, they will be
increasingly affluent, with demands for more, different, and
better food. While countries in Latin America and the
Caribbean (LAC) are quite heterogeneous in their production
potential, overall they are well equipped to contribute to
meeting this challenge. LAC has always maintained a strong
comparative advantage in agricultural production, as
indicated not only by its position as a net food exporter
but also by its high comparative advantage. LAC is also well
endowed in renewable water resources, with about a third of
the 42,000 cubic kilometers worldwide. Per capita, LAC has
the highest endowment of renewable water among developing
regions, though some sub regions in LAC face higher than
average scarcity. This report's in-depth look at
Argentina and Brazil identifies looming logistics and policy
issues that threaten to derail these locomotives of
agricultural growth and some policy choices that have
contributed to their success and that might be worth
emulating. While LAC countries have substantially reduced
the anti-export and anti-agricultural biases in their trade
regimes, this bias remains significant in some countries.
Argentina, a major food exporter, imposes export taxes and
quantitative controls, with considerable adverse
consequences for the sector and the global food trade
system. For LAC countries' agricultural sectors to stay
competitive, it is important to appropriately manage the
real exchange rate to minimize Dutch disease
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
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
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