Property rights, collective action, and agroforestry

"In this brief, we explore the role that social institutions — specifically property rights and collective action — may play in the developmentment of agroforestry.... In the future, property rights and collective action will play increasingly pivotal roles in defining rights and responsibilities over the externalities of tree management practices. As stakeholders recognize the need for effective management of, for example, the erosion resulting from tree felling or rights to carbon sequestration from tree planting, they will increasingly value and depend on the institutions that protect their property rights." from Text.Property rights ,Tree planting ,Public goods ,Poverty alleviation ,Collective action ,

Golden Rice: A Case Study in Intellectual Property Management and International Capacity Building

In order for agricultural biotechnology (agri-biotech) to play a larger role in the development of sustainable agricultural systems, intellectual property (IP) rights management must be addressed. These issues are not limited to developing countries. With increased globalization, the management of agri-biotech IP rights affects both developing and industrialized countries. In industrialized countries, for example, IP rights risk management entails protection of inventions via strong patent portfolios. For developing countries, IP rights risk management includes the acquisition of rights requisite for the use of inventions essential to the basic welfare of the population. Strategies are needed to bridge these disparate IP management paradigms to facilitate the successful transfer of the agri-biotech from an industrialized country source to a developing country recipient. This paper examines IP management linked to agri-biotech products. Further, this paper examines Golden Rice, a genetically engineered rice strain that accumulates beta-carotene (i.e., pro-vitamin A) in the endosperm tissue of grain, as a case study for IP management, with emphasis on the international movement of agri-biotech from industrialized to developing countries. Topics discussed include: the application of agri-biotech to international development; the challenge of transferring this technology from industrialized to developing countries; a method for evaluating the IP constraints impinging on the deployment of Golden Rice; industrialized/developing country perspectives vis-a-vis IP rights management; six shorter-term options for the management of IP connected to Golden Rice; and a longer-term proposed path to sustainable transfers of agri-biotech products

The Role of Tradable Permits in Water Pollution Control

This paper was prepared as a conceptual framework to stimulate discussions on the role and applicability of tradable permits in water pollution control among participants of the Technical Seminar on the Feasibility of the Application of Tradable Water Permits for Water Management in Chile (13-14 November 2003 in Santiago de Chile). In Chile, water pollution is a major problem. Until recently, existing regulations to control water pollution consisted mainly of non-market based instruments. Innovative instruments are now being explored via a recent national law for tradable emission/discharge permits. The instrument of tradable discharge permits is one of several market-based instruments used in water management and pollution control. Tradable discharge permits are actually among the most challenging market-based instruments in terms of both their design and implementation. Experience to date with tradable discharge permits for water pollution control has been limited and mainly comes from several regions of the US and Australia. The paper at first introduces tradable permits as part of an overall taxonomy of economic instruments in the field of water management. In this context, three fundamentally different fields of application of tradable permits systems relating to water are presented: tradable water abstraction rights, tradable rights to water-based resources and tradable water pollution rights. The remaining of the paper deals exclusively with the latter category, i.e. tradable water pollution rights, their role and applicability in water pollution control

Property rights and collective action in watersheds

According to the authors, "watersheds define a terrain united by the flow of water, nutrients, pollutants, and sediment. Watersheds also link foresters, farmers, fishers, and urban dwellers in intricate social relationships. Both factors—the biophysical attributes and the policy and institutional environments—shape peoples' livelihoods and interactions within the watershed." In this brief the authors show that "watersheds have such broad impacts at so many levels, they raise special issues for the management of resources through collective action." They explore the relationships between property rights, collective action, watershed management, and stakehold participation and conclude that empowering local communities to take a leading role in watershed management is essential. from Text.Collective behavior ,Poverty alleviation ,Property rights ,Collective action ,Empowerment ,stakeholders ,

Economics of Copyright Collecting Societies and Digital Rights: Is There a Case for a Centralised Digital Copyright Exchange?

Copyright collecting societies have attracted economists’ attention for over 30 years and the attention of government regulators for even longer. They have typically been accepted by economists and by courts of law as necessary for reducing transaction costs and enabling copyright to work. The advent of digitization has led to renewed interest in the topic and to the view that though new technologies offer the possibility of improved rights management, collecting societies are not responding sufficiently to these opportunities. That view was evident in recent enquiries into the role of copyright in the digital age in the UK, which proposed the formation of a Digital Copyright Exchange (DCE) that would promote online digital trade. This paper evaluates the case for the DCE in the light of what economists know about collective rights management

Explaining the Changing Institutional Organisation of Dutch Farms: The Role of Farmer's Attitude, Advisory Network and Structural Factors

Although the family farm remains the dominant organisational form for farms there are changes in the legal mode of organisation. Applying the new institutional economics and economic organisation theory the different organisation modes are explained, mainly in terms of control and income rights. Important factors are (limited) liability, risk-bearing costs, transaction costs, and residual control and income rights. In an empirical follow-up, based on a sample among 3100 farmers in the Netherlands, the impact of farmers' attitudes, farm advisory network, and structural variables on organisation choice are analysed. Especially the financial advisors appear to play a significant role in the choice of organisation mode. Other factors are age, branche (horticulture, factory farming), and farm size.farm organisation, ownership and management, liability, risk, residual control and income rights, attitudes, advisory network, Farm Management, Industrial Organization, Q12,

Knowledge Management What Can Organizational Economics Contribute?

Knowledge management has emerged as a very successful organization practice and has been extensively treated in a large body of academic work. Surprisingly, however, organizational economics (i.e., transaction cost economics, agency theory, team theory and property rights theory) has played no role in the development of knowledge management. We argue that organizational economics insights can further the theory and practice of knowledge management in several ways. Specifically, we apply notions of contracting, team production, complementaries, hold-up, etc. to knowledge management issues (i.e., creating and integration knowledge, rewarding knowledge workers, etc.) , and derive refutable implications that are novel to the knowledge management field from our discussion.Transaction costs, organizational economics

Uncertainty and Risk:From Entitlement Theory of Justice to Inalienable Rights

The following paper presents a set of philosophical arguments that extend the standard set of property rights under the classical libertarian perspective to include the individual rights to ownership, management and transfer of risk and uncertainty. The paper shows that an extension of property rights, proposed below, strengthens the libertarian arguments concerning the sufficiency of the minimal state for achievement of liberty and justice. However, as argued in the paper, property rights extension alone does not support the argument in favour of the minimal state as a necessary condition for justice. To achieve such argument, we extend the argument concerning the inalienable rights to include the rights to risk and uncertainty. We show that in presence of such rights, the infamous Nozickian assertion concerning the potential implications of continuity of the space of rationality with regards to its role in separation of the human domain from that of the other biological species, no longer holds. In addition we establish that incorporation of individual rights over risk and uncertainty into the set inalienable rights allows for resolution of the Hansson’s causal dilution problem.