203,677 research outputs found
The Farm Input Subsidy Programme (FISP) 2009/10: A review of its implementation and impact
This report reviews the 2009/10 implementation of the Farm Input Subsidy Programme 2009/10 in the context of experience from 2005/6 to 2008/9.
The 2009/10 programme differed from previous years in restriction of fertiliser subsidies to maize production, reduced fertiliser distribution budgets which were also adhered to, large
increases in maize (particularly hybrid) and legume seed distribution, considerable carry forward of fertiliser stocks from previous year purchases, and earlier sales of fertiliser. These changes all have important positive implications for the programme’s effectiveness and efficiency as a result of reduced displacement, improved targeting, reduced programme costs (which also benefited from lower fertiliser prices), improved returns to use of
subsidised fertiliser on hybrid maize, and food security, diversification and soil fertility benefits from the increased legume seed sales. Increased maize and legume seed sales through private retailers should also stimulate input market development. The economic benefit cost ratio for the programme is estimated at 1.12, a respectable result (despite the many difficulties with this analysis and its blindness to many longer term and intangible
benefits) with considerable potential for further improvement. The macro-economic costs of the programme have also been substantially reduced as compared with the previous year and the year on year rises in costs halted.
These are important achievements.
There are two main areas where it is proposed that programme implementation could look for substantial improvements in the future: first in achieving greater transparency in beneficiary identification and coupon issues and second in allowing earlier sales of inputs.
Greater transparency in beneficiary identification and coupon issues should build on achievements over the last four years (for example in improved targeting and use of open meetings) by (a) resolving inconsistencies both in changing MoAFS farm family numbers across regions and with NSO estimates, (b) improving effective communication about
coupon allocation and distribution systems, (c) increasing the transparency and accountability of these processes with, for example, the involvement of different
stakeholders representing farmers, and (d) sharing and implementing good practice in particular districts or areas more widely across the country.
Earlier input sales are important for reducing the costs and risks faced by farmers in redeeming coupons, promoting higher yield responses from earlier planting and fertiliser
application, reducing pressures and costs in fertiliser deliveries to markets, and giving farmers more voice and choice when redeeming coupons. This requires that the 2009/10 improvements in fertiliser deliveries and in seed contracting are sustained and accompanied by earlier finalising of coupon allocations and printing than in 2009/10 – as has already been recognised by strenuous attempts to achieve earlier commencement of sales in 2010
Incremental scoping study and implementation plan
This report is one of the first deliverables from the Incremental project, which seeks to investigate
and improve the research data management infrastructure at the universities of Glasgow and
Cambridge and to learn lessons and develop resources of value to other institutions. Coming at the
end of the project’s scoping study, this report identifies the key themes and issues that emerged
and proposes a set of activities to address those needs.
As its name suggests, Incremental deliberately adopts a stepped, pragmatic approach to supporting
research data management. It recognises that solutions will vary across different departmental and
institutional contexts; and that top-down, policy-driven or centralised solutions are unlikely to prove
as effective as practical support delivered in a clear and timely manner where the benefits can be
clearly understood and will justify any effort or resources required. The findings of the scoping
study have confirmed the value of this approach and the main recommendations of this report are
concerned with the development and delivery of suitable resources.
Although some differences were observed between disciplines, these seemed to be as much a
feature of different organisational cultures as the nature of the research being undertaken. Our
study found that there were many common issues across the groups and that the responses to
these issues need not be highly technical or expensive to implement. What is required is that these
resources employ jargon-free language and use examples of relevance to researchers and that
they can be accessed easily at the point of need. There are resources already available
(institutionally and externally) that can address researchers’ data management needs but these are
not being fully exploited. So in many cases Incremental will be enabling efficient and contextualised
access, or tailoring resources to specific environments, rather than developing resources from
scratch.
While Incremental will concentrate on developing, repurposing and leveraging practical resources to
support researchers in their management of data, it recognises that this will be best achieved within
a supportive institutional context (both in terms of policy and provision). The need for institutional
support is especially evident when long-term preservation and data sharing are considered – these
activities are clearly more effective and sustainable if addressed at more aggregated levels (e.g.
repositories) rather than left to individual researchers or groups. So in addition to its work in
developing resources, the Incremental project will seek to inform the development of a more
comprehensive data management infrastructure at each institution. In Cambridge, this will be
connected with the library’s CUPID project (Cambridge University Preservation Development) and
at Glasgow in conjunction with the Digital Preservation Advisory Board
Pushing the envelope of Optimization Modulo Theories with Linear-Arithmetic Cost Functions
In the last decade we have witnessed an impressive progress in the
expressiveness and efficiency of Satisfiability Modulo Theories (SMT) solving
techniques. This has brought previously-intractable problems at the reach of
state-of-the-art SMT solvers, in particular in the domain of SW and HW
verification. Many SMT-encodable problems of interest, however, require also
the capability of finding models that are optimal wrt. some cost functions. In
previous work, namely "Optimization Modulo Theory with Linear Rational Cost
Functions -- OMT(LAR U T )", we have leveraged SMT solving to handle the
minimization of cost functions on linear arithmetic over the rationals, by
means of a combination of SMT and LP minimization techniques. In this paper we
push the envelope of our OMT approach along three directions: first, we extend
it to work also with linear arithmetic on the mixed integer/rational domain, by
means of a combination of SMT, LP and ILP minimization techniques; second, we
develop a multi-objective version of OMT, so that to handle many cost functions
simultaneously; third, we develop an incremental version of OMT, so that to
exploit the incrementality of some OMT-encodable problems. An empirical
evaluation performed on OMT-encoded verification problems demonstrates the
usefulness and efficiency of these extensions.Comment: A slightly-shorter version of this paper is published at TACAS 2015
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Environmental Standards, Management Systems and the Illusion of Progress
This paper aims to specify the conceptual and operational limits of codified environmental management systems (EMSs). Taking technical standardization as a departure-point, it is argued that key shortcomings regarding the contribution of EMSs towards environmental performance improvement (and thus ecological sustainability) can be identified: First, there are limitations to the self-regulatory framework adopted by organizations. Second, there are problems inherent within the development of EMS from prior management systems approaches, mostly based on a narrow and limited definition of quality. Third, there are errors of implementation and associated certification which compound a lack of progress in environmental improvement and progress towards sustainability. The implications of these limitations are presented and it is demonstrated that they are compounded by an appearance of progress, when in reality, little is changing. The authors point out that this failure of system based self-regulation argues for a move to performance based regime, driven if necessary by regulation
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