This paper examines the impact of armed conflict on the tendency and value of investments in farm inputs. We further investigate whether unconditional cash transfers could stimulate investments in ...inputs under the context of armed conflict. Using panel data collected in 2014 and 2016 in Mali, we combine the control function approach with the correlated random effect model to address the time-invariant unobserved heterogeneity in non-linear context and the endogeneity problem of conflict variable. We take advantage of the randomized rollout of a national cash transfer program to investigate if there is any differential impact on farm inputs. We find that conflict has a negative and statistically significant impact on the tendency to use and the value of investments on fertilizers, pesticides and machinery. Interestingly, we find a statistically insignificant impact of the cash transfers on farm input investments. From a policy perspective, productive capacities of households cannot be restored by the cash transfers. Rather, a recovery of markets' operations through the re-establishment of security is a more effective policy measure to increase investments in farm inputs.
Mitigation of CO2 emissions is a global public good that imposes different regional economic costs. We assess the distributional effects of cooperative versus non-cooperative CO2 markets to fulfil ...the Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs), considering different CO2 permit allocation rules in cooperative markets. We employ a global computable general equilibrium model based on the GTAP-9 database and the add-on GTAP-Power database. Our results show the resulting winners and losers under different policy scenarios with different permit allocation rules. We see that in 2030, we can obtain gains as high as $106 billion from global cooperation in CO2 markets. A cooperative CO2 permit market with equal per capita allowances results in considerable monetary transfers from high per capita emission regions to low per capita emission regions. In per capita terms, these transfers are comparable to the Official Development Assistance (ODA) transfers. We also disaggregate the mitigation costs into direct and indirect shares. For the energy-exporting regions, the largest cost component is unambiguously the indirect mitigation costs.
•Economic gains from global cooperation in fulfilling climate pledges.•Global cooperation in reaching the NDCs could lower costs by 60% ($106 bn) in 2030.•Channels of abatement costs differ for energy importing and exporting regions.•Largest welfare losses in energy exporting regions come from changes in fossil prices.•Per capita transfers under carbon egalitarianism are comparable to development aid.
Several studies have investigated projectification and its effects at the firm level, but the macroeconomic implications of project work have scarcely been considered. This paper analyzes the ...macroeconomic effects of firm-level projectification. We study the interlinkages between different sectors by extending standard input-output modeling and analyze the static and dynamic effects of projectification. The results indicate that projectification can have positive macroeconomic implications for production/innovativeness, employment and income that differ across economic sectors, but projectification can also have negative impacts. As a major implication, the use of temporary forms of organizing cannot be recommended without reproach but depends on the economic sector and sectoral interdependencies.
•Input-output analysis to study macroeconomic effects of firm-level projectification•Effects of projectification on production/innovativeness, employment and income•Differentiation between short-term (static) and long-term (dynamic) effects•Projectification has mostly positive macroeconomic implications•In some sectors projectification has negative effects (mainly short-term)
The Food Chain Plus (FoCus) cohort was launched in 2011 for population-based research related to metabolic inflammation. To characterize this novel pathology in a comprehensive manner, data ...collection included multiple omics layers such as phenomics, microbiomics, metabolomics, genomics, and metagenomics as well as nutrition profiling, taste perception phenotyping and social network analysis. The cohort was set-up to represent a Northern German population of the Kiel region. Two-step recruitment included the randomised enrolment of participants via residents’ registration offices and via the Obesity Outpatient Centre of the University Medical Center Schleswig–Holstein (UKSH). Hence, both a population- and metabolic inflammation- based cohort was created. In total, 1795 individuals were analysed at baseline. Baseline data collection took place between 2011 and 2014, including 63% females and 37% males with an age range of 18–83 years. The median age of all participants was 52.0 years IQR: 42.5; 63.0 years and the median baseline BMI in the study population was 27.7 kg/m
2
IQR: 23.7; 35.9 kg/m
2
. In the baseline cohort, 14.1% of participants had type 2 diabetes mellitus, which was more prevalent in the subjects of the metabolic inflammation group (MIG; 31.8%). Follow-up for the assessment of disease progression, as well as the onset of new diseases with changes in subject’s phenotype, diet or lifestyle factors is planned every 5 years. The first follow-up period was finished in 2020 and included 820 subjects.
We show that the monotonicity condition is conceptually important in Stochastic Frontier Analysis (SFA). Despite its importance, most empirical studies do not impose monotonicity—probably because ...existing approaches are rather complex and laborious. Therefore, we propose a three-step procedure that is much simpler than existing approaches. We demonstrate how monotonicity of a translog function can be imposed regionally at a connected set (region) of input quantities. Our method can be applied not only to impose monotonicity on translog production frontiers but also to impose other restrictions on cost, distance, or profit frontiers.
The aim of the present study was to examine to what extent different social network mechanisms are involved in the pathogenesis of obesity and insulin-resistance.
We used nonparametric and parametric ...regression models to analyse whether individual BMI and HOMA-IR are determined by social network characteristics.
A total of 677 probands (EGO) and 3033 social network partners (ALTER) were included in the study. Data gathered from the probands include anthropometric measures, HOMA-IR index, health attitudes, behavioural and socio-economic variables and social network data.
We found significant treatment effects for ALTERs frequent dieting (p<0.001) and ALTERs health oriented nutritional attitudes (p<0.001) on EGO's BMI, establishing a significant indirect network effect also on EGO's insulin resistance. Most importantly, we also found significant direct social network effects on EGO's insulin resistance, evidenced by an effect of ALTERs frequent dieting (p = 0.033) and ALTERs sport activities (p = 0.041) to decrease EGO's HOMA-IR index independently of EGO's BMI.
Social network phenomena appear not only to be relevant for the spread of obesity, but also for the spread of insulin resistance as the basis for type 2 diabetes. Attitudes and behaviour of peer groups influence EGO's health status not only via social mechanisms, but also via socio-biological mechanisms, i.e. higher brain areas might be influenced not only by biological signals from the own organism, but also by behaviour and knowledge from different human individuals. Our approach allows the identification of peer group influence controlling for potential homophily even when using cross-sectional observational data.
The allocation of regional policy funds varies dramatically across regions even when one controls for regional development indicators. We investigate the impact of local government performance as ...well as spillovers in knowledge, financial means and social relations as determinants of regional fund absorption. Government performance is derived within a Data Envelopment Analysis approach. Spillovers are investigated using a spatial Durbin model. Results show that government performance has a positive impact on fund absorption. Spillovers occur in knowledge as well as in financial means. The empirical analyses focus on Special Accession Program for Agriculture and Rural Development in Slovakia using panel data.
We develop a farm household model to analyze price responses of farm households. This model incorporates various types of transaction costs as well as labor heterogeneity. Nonproportional variable ...transaction costs or labor heterogeneity imply that production and consumption decisions become nonseparable, even when the household buys or sells labor. An empirical model is estimated using data from Midwest Poland. The results show that nonproportional variable transaction costs and labor heterogeneity significantly influence household behavior. Not all price elasticities, however, change significantly if these are neglected.
Abstract
Using empirical data from a nationally representative farm household survey in Senegal, this study evaluated the impact of different risk management strategies employed by farm households on ...technical efficiency (TE). The findings of the study suggest that risk management has implications for TE. We find that the use of ex-post risk management strategies is associated with relatively higher technical efficiencies with respect to the meta-frontier compared to other risk management strategies. Households employing only ex-ante risk management strategies were observed to be the least technically efficient in comparison to households employing other risk management strategies. The findings also suggest that managing production risks using multiple strategies does not necessarily result in the highest TE gain compared to the use of single strategies. The findings underscore the need to evaluate the trade-offs and likely consequences of risk management approaches used by farm households to provide countermeasures to deal with any adverse related effects.
We argue that in the presence of transaction costs, observed productivity measures may in many cases understate the true productivity, as production data seldom distinguish between resources entering ...the production process and resources of a similar type that are sacrificed for transaction costs. Hence, both the absolute productivity measures and, more importantly, the productivity ranking will be distorted. A major driver of transaction costs is poor access to information and contract enforcement assistance. Social networks often catalyse information exchange as well as generate trust and support. Hence, we use measures of a firm’s access to social networks as a proxy for the transaction costs the firm faces. We develop a microeconomic production model that takes into account transaction costs and networks. Using a data set of 384 Polish farms, we empirically estimate this model and compare different parametric, semiparametric, and nonparametric model specifications. Our results generally support our hypothesis. Especially, large trading networks and dense household networks have a positive influence on a farm’s productivity. Furthermore, our results indicate that transaction costs have a measurable impact on the productivity ranking of the farms.
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