Personal Connections: What Women in Sustainable Agriculture Value in Their Professional Development

We designed a national sustainable agriculture conference for women farmers and agricultural professionals to provide a supportive environment in which participants felt comfortable to learn, share, contribute, question, network, and make connections affecting their personal and professional lives. Through postconference and later retrospective evaluations, we identified key concepts that Extension professionals and others hosting agricultural events may consider when engaging women participants. Women in sustainable agriculture may prioritize choosing a conference, and are more likely to participate fully, when it is women focused. Women appreciate hands-on experiences and learning from experts and peers but value most the opportunity to connect with other women in similar circumstances

Does the Borda rule provide more than a ranking?

Consider the following problem: a set of candidates {x, y, z} has to be ranked from best to worse by a committee. Each member of the committee provides his own ranking of the three candidates and you decide to use the Borda method to aggregate the rankings. The resulting scores are as follows: 107 for x, 106 for y and 51 for z. Would you conclude that x is better than y? Probably not, because the difference between the scores of x and y is small. The only conclusion you would draw is that z definitely is the worst candidate. But, is it meaningful to consider differences of Borda scores? We characterize the Borda method in this new framework and find conditions that are very close to those characterizing the classical Borda method. Throughout our paper, we consider a generalization of the Borda method designed to aggregate fuzzy relations. © Springer-Verlag 2000.SCOPUS: ar.jinfo:eu-repo/semantics/publishe

Does the Borda rule provide more than a ranking?

Consider the following problem: a set of candidates {x, y, z} has to be ranked from best to worse by a committee. Each member of the committee provides his own ranking of the three candidates and you decide to use the Borda method to aggregate the rankings. The resulting scores are as follows: 107 for x, 106 for y and 51 for z. Would you conclude that x is better than y? Probably not, because the difference between the scores of x and y is small. The only conclusion you would draw is that z definitely is the worst candidate. But, is it meaningful to consider differences of Borda scores? We characterize the Borda method in this new framework and find conditions that are very close to those characterizing the classical Borda method. Throughout our paper, we consider a generalization of the Borda method designed to aggregate fuzzy relations.

The Ordinal Input for Cardinal Output Approach of Non-compensatory Composite Indicators: The PROMETHEE Scoring Method

Despite serious threats as to their soundness, the adoption of composite indicators is constantly growing alongside their popularity, especially when it comes to their adoption in policy-making exercises. This study presents a robust non-compensatory approach to construct composite indicators mainly based, at least with respect to the basic ideas, on the classic Borda scoring procedure. The non- compensatory indicators we are proposing can be seen as aggregation of ordinal non-compensatory preferences between considered units supplying a numerical cardinal comprehensive evaluation. For this reason we define our methodology, the ordinal input for cardinal output non-compensatory approach for composite indicators. To take into account hesitation, imprecision and ill-determination in defining preference relations with respect to the elementary indices, we adopt the PROMETHEE methods, whose net flow score can be seen as an extension to the fuzzy preferences of the Borda score. Moreover, we systematically deal with robustness of the results with respect to weighting and parameters such as indifference and preference thresholds, permitting to define preference relations of elementary indices. In this regard, we couple PROMETHEE methods with the recently proposed σ−μ approach, which permits to explore the whole domain of feasible preference parameters mentioned above, giving a synthetic representation of the distribution of the values assumed by the composite indicators in terms of mean, μ, and standard deviation, σ. μ and σ are also used to define a comprehensive overall composite indicator. Finally, we enrich the results of this analysis with a set of graphical visualizations based on principal component analysis applied to the PROMETHEE methods with the GAIA technique, providing better understanding of the outcomes of our approach. To illustrate its assets, we provide a case study of inclusive development evaluation, based on the data of the homonymous report produced by the World Economic Forum

Modernas variantes de la regla de votación de Borda

La regla de Borda es uno de los métodos de votación más antiguos y referentes en el campo de la Elección Social. A partir de esta regla de votación, basada en puntuaciones otorgadas por los agentes participantes según sus preferencias, se han ido desarrollando numerosas variantes, que en parte tratan de conciliar las discrepancias entre el ganador de Borda y el ganador de Condorcet. Y, por otra parte, es interesante idear nuevos métodos un tanto novedosos a partir de la regla de Borda original, con objeto de facilitar y ampliar el contexto de aplicación. Por tales motivos, este trabajo pretende desarrollar las recientes variantes de la regla de Borda y constatar la viabilidad y comodidad de su puesta en práctica donde se lleve a cabo una votación y se precise un ganador que resulte elegido de acuerdo con la puntuación obtenida según el método seleccionado y los criterios establecidosThe Borda rule is one of the oldest referential voting methods in the field of Social Choice. From this voting rule, based on scores awarded by the participating agents according to their preferences, several variants have been developed, which in part try to reconcile the discrepancies between the Borda winner and the Condorcet winner. On the other hand, it is interesting to devise new and somewhat novel methods based on the original Borda rule, in order to facilitate a broaden application context. This are the reasons why this work aims to develop the recent variants of the Borda rule and to verify the feasibility and convenience of its implementation where a vote is carried out and a winner is required under a selected method, according to the score obtained taking in to account the established criteria.Departamento de Economía AplicadaGrado en Economí

The Ordinal Input for Cardinal Output Approach of Non-compensatory Composite Indicators: The PROMETHEE Scoring Method

Despite serious threats as to their soundness, the adoption of composite indicators is constantly growing alongside their popularity, especially when it comes to their adoption in policy-making exercises. This study presents a robust non-compensatory approach to construct composite indicators mainly based, at least with respect to the basic ideas, on the classic Borda scoring procedure. The non- compensatory indicators we are proposing can be seen as aggregation of ordinal non-compensatory preferences between considered units supplying a numerical cardinal comprehensive evaluation. For this reason we define our methodology, the ordinal input for cardinal output non-compensatory approach for composite indicators. To take into account hesitation, imprecision and ill-determination in defining preference relations with respect to the elementary indices, we adopt the PROMETHEE methods, whose net flow score can be seen as an extension to the fuzzy preferences of the Borda score. Moreover, we systematically deal with robustness of the results with respect to weighting and parameters such as indifference and preference thresholds, permitting to define preference relations of elementary indices. In this regard, we couple PROMETHEE methods with the recently proposed σ−μ approach, which permits to explore the whole domain of feasible preference parameters mentioned above, giving a synthetic representation of the distribution of the values assumed by the composite indicators in terms of mean, μ, and standard deviation, σ. μ and σ are also used to define a comprehensive overall composite indicator. Finally, we enrich the results of this analysis with a set of graphical visualizations based on principal component analysis applied to the PROMETHEE methods with the GAIA technique, providing better understanding of the outcomes of our approach. To illustrate its assets, we provide a case study of inclusive development evaluation, based on the data of the homonymous report produced by the World Economic Forum

Generalizaciones y extensiones de la Regla de Votación de Borda

Se estudia la regla de votación de Borda clásica y variantes más sofisticadas que consideran preferencias graduales o lingüísticas en las opiniones de los agentes. Además se traza la evolución del método, prestando especial atención al análisis del precursor ilustrado José Isidoro Morales. El tratamiento histórico penetra el estudio teórico y hace patente la bondad de la regla de Borda frente a sistemas de votación al uso incuestionablemente peores, por ser más rígidos e incompletos. Como el método la Borda se implementa en dos fases (correspondientes a contadores individuales y colectivos en su formulación) se analiza su idoneidad atendiendo primeramente a la representatividad respecto de las preferencias individuales y a su relación con la transitividad de los agentes. Por otra parte, ya desde un punto de vista agregado, se realiza un análisis de tipo Condorcet. Finalmente se contrastan empíricamente los resultados anteriores, corroborándose y matizándose los aspectos teóricos tratadosDepartamento de Economía Aplicad