VOLUNTARY CERTIFICATION SCHEMES AND LEGAL MINIMUM STANDARDS

EU farmers face increasing requests to comply with legal as well as private agribusiness and retail standards. Both requests potentially raise farmer’s administrative burden. This paper discusses the potential synergies between cross-compliance and third-party certification schemes. In selected aspects cross-compliance and several certification schemes ask similar measures. However, both regulatory approaches differ considerably in other areas. The heterogeneous nature of the various certification schemes in place prevent a general conclusion. As a tendency systemic standards like organic agriculture provide the largest overlap with cross-compliance. Certificates of origin, on the opposite side, have no relation with cross-compliance.Cross-compliance, certification schemes, institutional economics, Common Agricultural Policy, Agribusiness, Agricultural and Food Policy, Agricultural Finance, Financial Economics,

The Dynamics of Chinese Rural Households' Participation in Labor Markets

The work focuses on the frequency of each possible transition between labor market participation regimes of rural Chinese households. A continuous hazard approach is applied to empirically evaluate factors, as household, farm, and regional characteristics affecting the frequency of transition between labor market participation states. Results suggest that there are frequent changes of labor market participations regimes among the househo lds. Given the change in external conditions and other factor end owments this might indicate that households quickly response in allocating labor in order to equilibrate the resources. Further, we find that there are good chances climbing out of autarky; however the probability to fall in autarky was also remarkable over time.Labor market participation, dynamic analysis, China, hazard model, rural households, Labor and Human Capital, C41, J60, Q12,

The Economic Costs of Corruption: A Survey and New Evidence

This paper reviews the empirical literature on the economic costs of corruption. Corruption affects economic growth, the level of GDP per capita, investment activity, international trade and price stability negatively. Additionally, it biases the composition of government expenditures. The second part of the paper estimates the effect of corruption on economic growth and GDP per capita as well as on six possible transmission channels. The results of this analysis allows to calculate the total effect of corruption: An increase of corruption by about one index point reduces GDP growth by 0.13 percentage points and GDP per capita by 425 US$.Costs of Corruption, Survey, Empirical Evidence

The Persistence of Poverty in Rural China: Applying an Ordered Probit and a Hazard Approach

The present study investigates the analysis of poverty persistence of Chinese farm households in the well-off Zhejiang province in the southeast. We firstly apply an ordered probit model examining household, farm, and regional characteristics affecting the probability that households are chronically poor. In addition, we apply a hazard approach to identify the risk of falling into and climbing out of poverty. Results indicate that there are increasing chances to climb out of poverty over time, and that the risk of falling into poverty seems to decrease after the household spent some time outside poverty.Poverty persistence, China, rural population, hazard analysis, dynamics, Food Security and Poverty, C23, D1, I32, R29,

Spread of retailer food quality standards: An international perspective

Privately initiated food quality standards are currently important elements in the marketing of food and agricultural products. At the same time, they stand in the centre of a discussion about potential negative effects on small farmers and farmers in developing countries. This study aims at analysing the adoption of two private food standards, BRC Technical Food Standard and GlobalGAP, at an aggregated cross-country level. The results of the econometric analysis reveal some (potential) barriers for developing countries to access this type of organisational innovation. Certificates seem to be issued more probably in larger and wealthier countries, countries with a better institutional quality, better infrastructural conditions and in former UK colonies.standards, food quality, adoption, Food Consumption/Nutrition/Food Safety,

Labour adjustment in agriculture: Assessing the heterogeneity across transition countries

A standard model of labour adjustment in times of economic transition assumes a constant impact of variables like sectoral income differences, unemployment or the relative size of the agricultural sector. This paper shows for a panel of 29 European and Asian transition countries that the standard model fails to take the heterogeneity of determinants of sectoral labour adjustment properly into account. A random coefficients model reveals quite heterogeneous influences of the intersectoral income ratio, the relative size of agricultural employment, the unemployment rate, and the general level of economic development on a measure of sectoral labour adjustment across transition countries. Moreover, for selected determinants the estimated coefficients show opposing signs.Labor and Human Capital,

Labor Market Participation of Chinese Agricultural Households

This work is devoted to the analysis of the different labor market participation regimes of Chinese farm households. Using household data over the period 1986-2000 from the province Zhejiang, we apply a multinomial logit model to empirically examine household, farm, and regional characteristics affecting the probability that farmers employ one of four alternative labor market regimes. Results suggest that labor market decisions are significantly related to several personal, farm, and village attitudes. In addition, we find the more market oriented policy reforms at the end of the 1980s stipulated that households participate in labor markets while the more anti-market reforms during the 1990s led to the opposite and encouraged autarky.China, labor markets, agricultural household, participation, multinomial logit, Consumer/Household Economics, Labor and Human Capital, D13, J24, J43, Q12,

The Dynamics of the Russian Lifestyle During Transition: Changes in Food, Alcohol and Cigarette Consumption

This paper presents evidence on the impact of individual as well as regional characteristics on changes in fat, protein, alcohol and cigarette consumption, and on diet’s diversity between 1994 and 2004. The results from a dynamic econometric model suggest that among individual determinants such as initial levels of consumption, gender, education, household income changes, and access to a garden plot all have a significant impact on the changes in consumption behavior in Russia. Regarding the macroeconomic variables, inflation has a significant impact on changes in alcohol and cigarettes consumption, while unemployment changes significantly impact smoking behavior. Russian consumers only respond to own price changes of fat and protein, but do not respond to own prices for alcohol and cigarettes. Analysis of subsamples conditional on initial consumption behavior reveals significant heterogeneity in consumption patterns, which is important for effective policy targeting different population groups in achieving healthier lifestyle choices in Russia.food consumption; smoking; alcohol; economic transition; Russia

Water Saving Technology in Chinese Rice Production - Evidence from Survey Data

Whereas water is an important input in rice production, China faces severe problems with increasing demand for water and limited water resources. In conventional paddy production, one of the most important irrigated crops, a significant amount of irrigation water is lost due to percolation and evaporation. Therefore, it exist a vivid research in water saving rice technologies. This paper analyzes the adoption of one of these water-saving rice production technologies, the so-called Ground Cover Rice Production System (GCRPS), in the Hubei province. Based on farm survey data several factors which affect the adoption decision could be identified. The adoption decision is treated as a binary choice problem and therefore a probit model is used for the econometric analysis. The main determinants of the adoption decision are the number of previous adoptions, the membership in an extension service and the income of the household. Additionally, soil characteristics show a significant impact on the probability of adoption.China, technology adoption, water, GCRPS, probit, Crop Production/Industries, O30, Q16,

Persistence of full- and part-time farming in Southern China

The goal of this study is to assess the dynamics of rural households' labor market participation in the wake of China's efforts to develop rural labor markets in a manner that is conducive to its transition to a market economy. Based on a theoretical model that emphasizes the impact of duration, i.e. of the number of years households spent part-time farming or full-time farming, respectively, we investigate the shifts between these two states. We also identify socioeconomic factors that determine these shifts. The empirical study is based on discrete time hazard approaches, using micro-level panel data from Zhejiang, Hubei, and Yunnan provinces from 1995 to 2002. Estimation results suggest relatively high chances of shifts from full-time to part-time farming and a considerable lower risk for the shift in the opposite direction. Significant negative duration dependence is found for the move from full-time to part-time farming suggesting lock-in effects. In addition, we find that labor market participation decisions are significantly related to several household, farm and village characteristics. In particular, the likelihood of shifts from full-time farming to part-time farming is positively related to the educational level of households' workforce