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on Agricultural Economics |
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Issue of 2013‒02‒03
23 papers chosen by |
| By: | Manevska-Tasevska, Gordana |
| Abstract: | An empirical analysis was conducted on the efficiency of commercial grape-producing family farms in the Republic of Macedonia in order to examine how farm performance is influenced by selected aspects of the current Rural Development Programme (RDP) (2007-2013). The emphasis was on Macedonian grape production on family farms and on instruments for more efficient use of resources, production modernisation, vine revitalisation, and the knowledge and managerial capacity of Macedonian grape growers. A two-stage analysis was carried out on farm-level data for the period 2006-2008. The estimated efficiency scores indicated that substantial efficiency improvements are possible on Macedonian grape-producing farms, with potential for a cost decrease of 29% (20% and 36% with parametric and bootstrapping applied) if farmers manage inputs more efficiently. Farm revenue can be improved by 47% (61% when bootstrapping applied) if farmers manage to increase the value of outputs. More efficient farms used a smaller area, irrigated a smaller proportion of total area, used less hired labour, used and paid less for inputs, but produced a larger quantity, with higher value per hectare. The technically more efficient farmers were: younger farmers, farmers with profit maximisation objectives; farmers with lower expectations of a better future for farming; farmers making choices with other family members; farmers monitoring production on the farm and maintaining bookkeeping records; those attending seminars, and those interested in competence-based knowledge such as plant protection, credit/investments. Interventions in production assortment and quality have potential to influence farm performance. Rural development policies can help improve farm efficiency. RDP measures targeted at achieving stable yield, yield improvement and modernisation of equipment, improving farmers' managerial performance and strengthening the capacity of sources providing non-formal education should be a high priority. |
| Date: | 2011–12 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:sua:ekonwp:8496&r=agr |
| By: | Olper, Alessandro; Fatkowski, Jan; Swinnenm Johan |
| Abstract: | This paper studies the effect of political regime transitions on public policy using a new data set on global agricultural and food policies over a 50-year period (including data from 74 developing and developed countries over the 1955–2005 period). The authors find evidence that democratization leads to a reduction of agricultural taxation, an increase in agricultural subsidization, or both. The empirical findings are consistent with the predictions of the median voter model because political transitions occurred primarily in countries with a majority of farmers. The results are robust to different specifications, estimation approaches, and variable definitions. |
| Keywords: | Parliamentary Government,Labor Policies,Emerging Markets,Political Economy,Population Policies |
| Date: | 2013–01–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wbk:wbrwps:6336&r=agr |
| By: | Kijima, Yoko |
| Abstract: | In Uganda, rice production has increased rapidly in the past 10 years while the yield has been stagnant. To examine this mixed story in detail, we use data on 600 rural households with access to wetlands. The estimation results on the expansion of rice cultivation show that the high population density in upland farm areas has pushed farmers to rice cultivation in wetlands. Although applying proper cultivation practices such as constructing bunds, leveling, and transplanting is considered to be critical in yield enhancement, as well as using chemical fertilizer and improved varieties, such cultivation practices are rarely adopted in Uganda. The rice production function estimation results show that these practices do not increase the yield significantly once village fixed effects are controlled for. This suggests that these practices are not being adopted since the rice yield is not enhanced effectively by the cultivation practices. This is probably explained by the fact that the water supply in wetlands tends to be unstable and to suffer from drought and floods. |
| Keywords: | agricultural intensification , lowland rice , cultivation practices , Uganda |
| Date: | 2012–12–06 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:jic:wpaper:49&r=agr |
| By: | McDougal, Topher (University of San Diego); Caruso, Raul (Catholic University of the Sacred Heart) |
| Abstract: | Widely hailed as a paragon of successful post-conflict development policy, the Government of Mozambique has focused its economic aspirations on the promise of biofuel exports over the past decade. It has made hundreds of agricultural concessions to corporations in the biofuels industry. However, this land use competes with pre-existing local claims on arable land and water resources, possibly heightening food insecurity in rural areas. In response, local groups have sought to oppose the concessions, thus securing their land grants. We investigate whether the magnitude and recentness of wartime violence influence the success of communities in opposing agricultural concessions and securing community land grants. We test this and two alternative hypotheses with districtlevel data on biofuels concessions, recognized community landholdings, and civil war events generated in a geographic information system. Controlling for demographic, geographic, and market access factors, we find that while the recentness of violence may actually galvanize community cohesion and reinvigorate local institutional capacity, the intensity of violence plays a more nuanced role, associated, as it is, with higher levels of both corporate concessions (locally undesirable) and community land grants (locally desirable). We suggest that these findings are consistent with the idea that violence heightens community cohesion, but degrades connections between the local and national levels. |
| JEL: | D74 N47 N57 O13 O25 Q15 Q16 Q18 |
| Date: | 2013–01–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ris:nepswp:2013_001&r=agr |
| By: | Headey, Derek D. |
| Abstract: | The paper provides the first large-scale survey-based evidence on the impact of the global food crisis of 2007-08 using an indicator of self-assessed food security from the Gallup World Poll. For the sampled countries as a whole, this subjective indicator of food security remained the same or even improved, seemingly owing to a combination of strong economic growth and limited food inflation in some of the most populous countries, particularly India. However, these favorable global trends mask divergent trends at the national and regional levels, with a number of countries reporting substantial deterioration in food security. The impacts of the global crisis therefore appear to be highly context specific. |
| Keywords: | Food&Beverage Industry,Food Security,Rural Poverty Reduction,Nutrition,Food&Nutrition Policy |
| Date: | 2013–01–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wbk:wbrwps:6329&r=agr |
| By: | Lev Pustilnik; Gregory Yom Din |
| Abstract: | We present the results of study of a possible relationship between the space weather and terrestrial markets of agricultural products. It is shown that to implement the possible effect of space weather on the terrestrial harvests and prices, a simultaneous fulfillment of three conditions is required: 1) sensitivity of local weather (cloud cover, atmospheric circulation) to the state of space weather; 2) sensitivity of the area of specific agricultural crops to the weather anomalies (belonging to the area of risk farming); 3) relative isolation of the market, making it difficult to damp the price hikes by the external food supplies. Four possible scenarios of the market response to the modulations of local terrestrial weather via the solar activity are described. The data sources and analysis methods applied to detect this relationship are characterized. We describe the behavior of 22 European markets during the medieval period, in particular, during the Maunder minimum (1650-1715). We demonstrate a reliable manifestation of the influence of space weather on prices, discovered in the statistics of intervals between the price hikes and phase price asymmetry. We show that the effects of phase price asymmetry persist even during the early modern period in the U.S. in the production of the durum wheat. Within the proposed approach, we analyze the statistics of depopulation in the eighteenth and nineteenth century Iceland, induced by the famine due to a sharp livestock reduction owing to, in its turn, the lack of foodstuff due to the local weather anomalies. A high statistical significance of temporal matching of these events with the periods of extreme solar activity is demonstrated. We discuss the possible consequences of the observed global climate change in the formation of new areas of risk farming, sensitive to space weather. |
| Date: | 2013–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:arx:papers:1301.6334&r=agr |
| By: | Cuesta, Jose |
| Abstract: | This paper reviews the prospects for long-term food security in Asia, where a significant number of malnourished individuals still live after decades of mixed progress. Evidence shows that poverty reduction on its own will not do the job of eradicating hunger, nor will only increased food production. The region's contribution to high and volatile international food prices is well known, but Asia's potential contributions toward future decreased price uncertainty are much less cited. The changing composition of future food demand in the region will depend on the extent to which poverty reduction effectively leads to middle class expansion, which remains unclear. |
| Keywords: | Food&Beverage Industry,Regional Economic Development,Rural Poverty Reduction,Nutrition,Population Policies |
| Date: | 2013–01–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wbk:wbrwps:6328&r=agr |
| By: | Philip Verwimp (Ecares and Centre Emile Bernheim Solvay Brussels School of Economics and Management,Université Libre de Bruxelles) |
| Abstract: | Civil wars often force people to leave their homes. Displaced populations run higher risk in terms of disease, hunger and death, something that is well-documented. They leave their land, cattle and other assets behind for an uncertain existence in a refugee camp or depend on relatives or friends. But what happens when they return back home? |
| Keywords: | Forced Displacement, Food Security, Nutrition, Poverty, Burundi |
| JEL: | D13 |
| Date: | 2012–03 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:rac:wpaper:2012-020&r=agr |
| By: | Antoine Bouet (Larefi - Laboratoire d'analyse et de recherche en économie et finance internationales - Université Montesquieu - Bordeaux IV : EA2954); Carmen Estrades (IFPRI - International Food Policy Research Institute - aaa); David Laborde (IFPRI - International Food Policy Research Institute - aaa) |
| Abstract: | This paper studies the implementation of Differential Export Tax (DET) rates along value chains, in particular in the oilseeds chain (seeds/vegetable oils/biodiesel): this trade policy consists in relatively high export taxes on raw commodities and relatively low taxes on processed goods. This policy may generate public revenues and benefit final consumption by lowering domestic prices of vegetable oils and biodiesel, and also promotes production at more processed stages of transformation, particularly in response to tariff escalation by importing partners. We first study the theoretical justification of this trade policy with a simple international trade model. It shows how implementing a tax on exports of raw agricultural commodity in a country exporting seeds and vegetable oils, augments the sum of profits and final consumers' surplus in the processing sector, of farmers' surplus, and of public revenues. Then we develop a world partial equilibrium model of the oilseed value chain that illustrates these theoretical conclusions. We simulate: (i) the elimination of DETs in Argentina, Indonesia and Ukraine; (ii) the elimination of import tariffs applied by the EU and the US on the same goods; (iii) the elimination of DETs in Argentina, Indonesia and Ukraine and of import tariffs applied by the EU and the US. According to our estimates, both consumers and producers throughout the world benefit from the removal of export taxes in these value chains, respectively 931 million USD and 2.2 billion USD. The third scenario leads to a significant expansion of world production of all activities along the value chain, including the production of biodiesel for which world output would expand by one percent. |
| Keywords: | export tax, tariff escalation, oilseeds, partial equilibrium model |
| Date: | 2013–01–17 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hal:wpaper:hal-00780574&r=agr |
| By: | Dubois, Pierre; Griffith, Rachel; Nevo, Aviv |
| Abstract: | Food purchases differ substantially across countries. We use detailed household level data from the US, France and the UK to (i) document these differences; (ii) esti- mate a demand system for food and nutrients, and (iii) simulate counterfactual choices if households faced prices and nutritional characteristics from other countries. We find that differences in prices and characteristics are important and can explain some di¤erence (e.g., US-France di¤erence in caloric intake), but generally cannot explain many of the compositional patterns by themselves. Instead, it seems an interaction between the economic environment and di¤erences in preferences is needed to explain cross country differences. |
| Keywords: | , , |
| Date: | 2013–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:tse:wpaper:26732&r=agr |
| By: | Cali, Massimiliano; Menon, Carlo |
| Abstract: | Although a high rate of urbanization and a high incidence of rural poverty are two distinct features of many developing countries, there is little knowledge of the effects of the former on the latter. Using a large sample of Indian districts from the 1983-1999 period, the authors find that urbanization has a substantial and systematic poverty-reducing effect in the surrounding rural areas. The results obtained through an instrumental variable estimation suggest that this effect is causal in nature and is largely attributable to the positive spillovers of urbanization on the rural economy rather than to the movement of the rural poor to urban areas. This rural poverty-reducing effect of urbanization is primarily explained by increased demand for local agricultural products and, to a lesser extent, by urban-rural remittances, the rural land/population ratio, and rural nonfarm employment. |
| Keywords: | Rural Poverty Reduction,Population Policies,Regional Economic Development,Achieving Shared Growth |
| Date: | 2013–01–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wbk:wbrwps:6338&r=agr |
| By: | James Fenske; Namrata Kala |
| Abstract: | African societies exported more slaves in colder years. Lower temperatures reduced mortality and raised agricultural yields, lowering slave supply costs. Our results help explain African participation in the slave trade, which predicts adverse outcomes today. We use an annual panel of African temperatures and port-level slave exports to show that exports declined when local temperatures were warmer than normal. This result is strongest where African ecosystems are least resilient to climate change. Cold weather shocks at the peak of the slave trade predict lower economic activity today. We support our interpretation using the histories of Whydah, Benguela, and Mozambique. |
| Date: | 2012–12–25 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:oxf:wpaper:wps/2012-23&r=agr |
| By: | Wikström, Daniel |
| Abstract: | Firms and organizations, public or private, often operate on markets characterized by non-competitiveness. For example agricultural activities in the western world are heavily subsidized and electricity is supplied by firms with market power. In general it is probably more difficult to find firms that act on highly competitive markets, than firms that are not. To measure different types of inefficiencies, due to this lack of competitiveness, has been an ongoing issue, since at least the 1950s when several definitions of inefficiency was proposed and since the late 1970s as stochastic frontier analysis. In all three articles presented in this thesis the stochastic frontier analysis approach is considered. Furthermore, in all three articles focus is on technical inefficiency. The ways to estimate technical inefficiency, based on stochastic frontier models, are numerous. However, focus in this thesis is on fixed effects panel data estimators. This is mainly for two reasons. First, the fixed effects analysis does not demand explicit distributional assumptions of the inefficiency and the random error of the model. Secondly, the analysis does not require the random effects assumption of independence between the firm specific inefficiency and the inputs selected by the very same firm. These two properties are exclusive for fixed effects estimation, compared to other stochastic frontier estimators. There are of course flaws attached to fixed effects analysis as well, and the contribution of this thesis is to probe some of these flaws, and to propose improvements and tools to identify the worst case scenarios. For example the fixed effects estimator is seriously upward biased in some cases, i.e. inefficiency is overestimated. This could lead to false conclusions, like e.g. that subsidies in agriculture lead to severely inefficient farmers even if these farmers in reality are quite homogenous. In this thesis estimators to reduce bias as well as mean square error are proposed and statistical diagnostics are designed to identify worst case scenarios for the fixed effects estimator as well as for other estimators. The findings can serve as important tools for the applied researcher, to obtain better approximations of technical inefficiency. |
| Date: | 2012–11–16 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:sua:ekonwp:9101&r=agr |
| By: | Astrid Matthey (Max-Planck-Insititute of Economics, Strategic Interaction Group); Tim Kasser (Knox College, Department of Psychology) |
| Abstract: | We study the relation between people's personal values and environmentally friendly consumption behavior. We first assessed subjects' personal values using the Aspiration Index. Then subjects participated in a laboratory supermarket offering organic and conventional food products and different kinds of bags. The results suggest that subjects' personal values are poor predictors of their ecologically-relevant consumption behavior. However, we find that subjects who spontaneously reflected upon power values made less ecologically sustainable consumption decisions than did those who reflected on universalism values. We discuss methodological differences as possible reasons for variations between our results and those of earlier studies. |
| Keywords: | Consumer Behavior, Values, Conservation (Ecological Behavior) |
| JEL: | D12 Q31 Q56 |
| Date: | 2013–01–17 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:jrp:jrpwrp:2013-007&r=agr |
| By: | Zant, Wouter |
| Abstract: | The paper proposes a modification of Baulch's parity bounds model to measure the market integration of food markets in developing countries. Instead of extrapolating a single observation of transaction costs, it estimates transaction costs. Predicted transaction costs compare well with survey data of traders. Probabilities of market regimes, computed on the basis of predicted transaction costs, fluctuate significantly and do not support fixed regime probabilities over time. The probability of market integration with trade decreases consistently during food shortages, increasing either the probability of no trade or loss-making trade or the probability of profitable but unexploited trade opportunities. The data support a negative trend in market integration with trade. |
| Keywords: | Markets and Market Access,Transport Economics Policy&Planning,Debt Markets,Economic Theory&Research,Food&Beverage Industry |
| Date: | 2013–01–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wbk:wbrwps:6331&r=agr |
| By: | Bergès, Fabian; Monier-Dilhan, Sylvette |
| Abstract: | The expansion of organic agriculture has been a key issue in sustainable development. We study consumers’ motives for purchasing organic agricultural products by analysing a basket of goods from a panel of French households. Buying organic products can be motivated by altruism, where the purchase reflects concerns for sustainable development, or by self-interest, where the purchase reflects concerns for health and/or product quality. The altruistic motivation can be analysed by looking at the purchase of “Fair Trade” products, whereas the latter two motivations can respectively be analysed by examining the purchase of healthy and higher quality labeled products. Our results indicate that buyers of organic products are motivated by altruism. Furthermore, higher education levels promote altruistic motives for this kind of purchase, and have a positive impact on the self-interested motives related to the quality of the product. However, income level and family size do not reinforce the strong complementary relationship that exists between the purchasing of organic and fair trade products. |
| Keywords: | organic agriculture, consumer’s behavior, discrete choice model |
| JEL: | C25 D12 Q01 |
| Date: | 2013–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:tse:wpaper:26743&r=agr |
| By: | Ping-Yu Chen (Department of Applied Economics National Chung Hsing University, Taiwan); Chia-Lin Chang (Department of Applied Economics Department of Finance National Chung Hsing University, Taiwan); Chi-Chung Chen (Department of Applied Economics National Chung Hsing University, Taiwan); Michael McAleer (Econometric Institute Erasmus School of Economics Erasmus University Rotterdam and Tinbergen Institute, The Netherlands and Institute of Economic Research Kyoto University, Japan and Department of Quantitative Economics Complutense University of Madrid, Spain) |
| Abstract: | The main purpose of this paper is to evaluate the effect of crude oil price on global fertilizer prices in both the mean and volatility. The endogenous structural breakpoint unit root test, ARDL model, and alternative volatility models, including GARCH, EGARCH, and GJR models, are used to investigate the relationship between crude oil price and six global fertilizer prices. The empirical results from ARDL show that most fertilizer prices are significantly affected by the crude oil price while the volatility of global fertilizer prices and crude oil price from March to December 2008 are higher than in other periods. |
| Keywords: | Fertilizer Price, Oil Price, Volatility. |
| JEL: | Q14 C22 C58 |
| Date: | 2013–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:kyo:wpaper:844&r=agr |
| By: | Brenda López Cabrera; Martin Odening; Matthias Ritter; |
| Abstract: | Many business people such as farmers and financial investors are affected by indirect losses caused by scarce or abundant rainfall. Because of the high potential of insuring rainfall risk, the Chicago Mercantile Exchange (CME) began trading rainfall derivatives in 2011. Compared to temperature derivatives, however, pricing rainfall derivatives is more difficult. In this article, we propose to model rainfall indices via a flexible type of distribution, namely the normal-inverse Gaussian distribution, which captures asymmetries and heavy-tail behaviour. The prices of rainfall futures are computed by employing the Esscher transform, a wellknown tool in actuarial science. This approach is flexible enough to price any rainfall contract and to adjust theoretical prices to market prices by using the calibrated market price of risk. This empirical analysis is conducted with U.S. precipitation data and CME futures data providing first results on the market price of risk for rainfall derivatives. |
| Keywords: | Weather derivatives, precipitation, Esscher transform, market price of risk |
| JEL: | G19 G29 G22 Q59 |
| Date: | 2013–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hum:wpaper:sfb649dp2013-005&r=agr |
| By: | Carlsson, Mattias |
| Abstract: | As a response to policy requirements to improve energy security, and to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, the use of bioenergy in Sweden has more than doubled since 1980. In 2008 bioenergy use in Sweden amounted to 108 TWh, or 18% of the total supply of primary energy. Nearly all of this bioenergy supply originates from the domestic forest sector. There is still a desire from policy makers to continuously increase the use of renewable energy. Further increases in demand for forest based bioenergy – either as an effect of direct subsidies, renewable energy supply targets, rising fossil fuel prices, or increasing costs for carbon emissions – could, however, lead to implications for the availability of raw materials and costs, for the wood processing industries. A static partial equilibrium model of the Swedish forest sector – based on the EFI-GTM model structure – is developed to derive supply cost curves for further increases in the use of bioenergy from the forest sector in Sweden. In addition, the implications of increased use of forest based bioenergy on the traditional wood processing industries are analyzed. Model simulations indicate that the cost – in terms of losses in producer and consumer surplus – of an increase in the use of forest based bioenergy by 5 TWh/year in Sweden is 30 million SEK/year, while a 30 TWh/year increase would cost 620 million SEK/year. The marginal cost of increased use is estimated to be 0.011 SEK/kWh at 5 TWh/year, rising to 0.044 SEK/kWh at 30 TWh/year. The costs of reaching a target for increased forest based bioenergy use are highly dependent on the availability of pulpwood imports. An import restriction – requiring the target to be reached through domestic resources only – would increase the costs by up to five times above the unrestricted case. Policy driven increases in the demand for forest based bioenergy will have considerable effects on wood board producers, while the implications for pulp and paper producers, and sawn goods producers, are relatively small; at least as long as the increase in forest based wood fuels is less than 20 TWh/year. |
| Date: | 2012–10 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:sua:ekonwp:9117&r=agr |
| By: | Gren, Ing-Marie |
| Abstract: | This paper applies the replacement cost method for calculating the value of stochastic carbon sink in the EU climate policy for mitigating carbon dioxide emissions. Minimum costs with and without carbon sinks are then derived with a safety-first approach in a chance constrained framework for current system with an emission trading system and national allocation plans and a hypothetical system where all sectors trade. The theoretical results show that i) the value of carbon sink approaches zero for high enough risk discount, ii) relatively low abatement cost in the trading sector curbs supply of permits on the ETS market, and iii) large abatement costs in the trading sector create values from carbon sink for meeting national targets. The empirical application to the EU commitment of 20% reduction in carbon dioxides shows large variation in carbon sink value depending on risk discount and on institutional set up. Under no uncertainty, the value can correspond to approximately 0.45% of total GDP in EU under current policy system, but it is reduced to one third if all sectors are allowed to trade. The values are unevenly allocated among countries, but in different ways depending on EU policy; under current system countries make gains from reduced costs of meeting national targets, under a sector wide trading scheme buyers of permits gain from reductions in permit price and sellers make associated losses. |
| Date: | 2012–12 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:sua:ekonwp:9328&r=agr |
| By: | Säll, Sarah; Gren, Ing-Marie |
| Abstract: | This paper designs and evaluates the environmental impacts of a tax on meat consumption in Sweden which reflects environmental damage at the margin. Three meat products are included, cattle, chicken and pork, and three pollutants generating environmental damages; green house gases, nitrogen, and phosphorus. The calculated unit taxes on meat products correspond to 28%, 26%, and 40% of the price per kg of beef, pork, and poultry in 2009. Consumer responses to the taxes are calculated by means of econometric estimates of a linear demand system of the meat products. The results indicate relatively high own price and income elasticities of the meat products and complementarity in consumption. A simultaneous introduction of taxes on all three meat products can decrease emission of GHG, nitrogen, phosphorus and ammonia by at least 27%. If only one meat product can be taxed, a tax on pork meat gives the largest reductions in emission of all pollutants, which to a large extent is explained by the high complementarity in consumption. |
| Date: | 2012–12–06 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:sua:ekonwp:9294&r=agr |
| By: | Lee J. Alston; Krister Andersson; Steven M. Smith |
| Abstract: | The use of Payment for Environmental Services (PES) is not a new type of contract but they have become more in vogue because of the potential for sequestering carbon by paying to prevent deforestation and degradation of forest lands. We provide a framework utilizing transaction costs to hypothesize which services are more likely to be provided effectively. We then interpret the literature on PES programs to see the extent to which transaction costs vary as predicted across the type of service and assess the performance of PES programs. As predicted we find that transaction costs are the least for club goods like water and greatest for pure public goods like carbon reduction. Actual performance is difficult to measure and varies across the examples. More work and experimentation is needed to gain a better outlook on what elements support effective delivery of environmental services. |
| JEL: | Q15 Q54 Q57 Q58 |
| Date: | 2013–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:18740&r=agr |
| By: | Jaimovich, Dany |
| Abstract: | A unique dataset of social and economic networks collected in 60 rural Gambian villages is used to study the ways in which households with links outside the village (that are considered as a proxy for market connections) behave in the locally available exchange networks for land, labor, input and credit. Using measures gleaned from the social network analysis literature, the econometric results at both household and link (dyadic) level provide evidence of: (i) substitutability between internal and external links, and (ii) substitutability between internal reciprocation and external links. These findings provide support for the transformation process of primitive economies described in a long tradition of anthropological work as well as recent theoretical models. |
| Keywords: | Social Networks; Missing markets; Gift economy; Economic Anthropology; West Africa |
| JEL: | Z13 C31 O12 |
| Date: | 2013–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:44080&r=agr |