Investment specificity, vertical integration and market foreclosure

In this paper we consider the impact of vertical integration on a retailer's choices of product variety and specific, brand-supporting investment. In an incomplete contract environment, vertical merger encourages investment in integrated supply, and foreclosure of non-integrated manufacturers. Anti-competitive as opposed to efficiency interpretations depend delicately on a trade-off between the benefits of supplier-specific rather than generally applicable retailer investment, and the value of multi-product rather than single product retailing. Where retailers compete, it is shown that vertical integration implements competition reducing, product differentiating investment strategies.incomplete contracts,vertical integration,monopolization

CURRENT ISSUES AFFECTING TRADE AND TRADE POLICY: AN ANNOTATED LITERATURE REVIEW

This review provides a base of literature describing current issues and research on the impacts of lobalization and the industrialization of agriculture and recent approaches to analyze and model agricultural trade and trade policies. Three key factors of the survey are differentiated goods, global economic integration and international supply chain linkages. The review covers 182 publications, which are presented alphabetically by author with a brief annotation describing how it relates to the above criteria. The articles are also indexed by keyword. A brief summary highlights the documented literature and includes a series of issues for future discussion and research.International Relations/Trade,

Empirical analysis of countervailing power in business-to-business bargaining

This paper provides a comprehensive econometric framework for the empirical analysis of countervailing power. It encompasses the two main features of pricing schemes in business-to-business relationships: nonlinear price schedules and bargaining over rents. Disentangling them is critical to the empirical identification of countervailing power. Testable predictions from the theoretical analysis for a pragmatic reduced form empirical pricing model are delineated. This model is readily implementable on the basis of transaction data, routinely collected by antitrust authorities and illustrated using data from the UK brick industry. The paper emphasizes the importance of controlling for endogeneity of volumes and established supply chains and for heterogeneity across buyers and sellers due to intrinsically unobservable outside options

Evolution of a supply chain management game for the trading agent competition

TAC SCM is a supply chain management game for the Trading Agent Competition (TAC). The purpose of TAC is to spur high quality research into realistic trading agent problems. We discuss TAC and TAC SCM: game and competition design, scientific impact, and lessons learnt

MARKET PERFORMANCE AND PRICE DISCOVERY ISSUES IN AN INDUSTRIALIZED AGRICULTURE

Demand and Price Analysis,

The impact of labels on the competitiveness of the European food label supply chain

The report studies the impact of private labels on the competitiveness of the European food processing industry and investigates whether a system of producer indication may improve the functioning of the food supply chain. The impact is studied using economic theory and empirical and legal analysis. The study is completed with an impact assessment

Channel Management and differentiation strategies: A case study from the market for fresh produce

The paper analyses the current differentiation strategies in the market for fresh produce. First a short review of the literature on channel structure and product differentiation is presented, in order to identify, on a theoretical grounding the incentives for differentiation strategies. Second, a case study is drawn of a UK channel intermediary organisation carrying out differentiation policies in the fresh produce category (on behalf of UK multiple retailer customers) supplied by a dedicated Italian grower. Results show that in the fresh produce industry there is room for product differentiation, but with contradictory welfare effects.fresh produce, product differentiation, channel structure and management, Agribusiness, Marketing,

Intra and Inter organisational determinants of electronic-based traceability adoption: evidences from the French agri-food industry

Traceability, the ability to trace the origin of products throughout the supply chain, has become an instrument to assure food quality and safety in agri-food chains. This process is organized within both institutional and market constraints, yet it integrates also a technological sphere marked by the unprecedented development of information and communication technologies. This paper analyses the factors influencing firms’ behaviour, with regards to adopting electronic-based traceability, in the French agri-food industry. These factors (microeconomic determinants) related to firms’ internal characteristics and the factors related to their environment. We use data from the ICT and Electronic Commerce survey from 2002, carried out by the French National Institute of Statistics (INSEE). A Probit type model is used, which allow us to take into account the firm’s determinants for its organisational choice, differentiating from those adopting (or not) an electronic-based traceability tool. Our main results show that the choices of electronic-based traceability depend on and interact with their own organizational characteristics and those of their competitive, industrial and local environment. Traceability technologies evidence the complementarities between organisational and technological practices. Large industrial firms known for their established identity and a brand image seem distant from standard traceability practices, contrarily to agribusinesses, which are subjected to regulations and look forward to use traceability for both complying with their downstream contracts and add value to their regional specificities.Traceability, Technology adoption, Agri-food industry, Agribusiness, Food Consumption/Nutrition/Food Safety,

Governance of Chains and Networks: A Research Agenda

Governance concerns the organisation of transactions. Four research themes regarding the governance of chains and networks are identified: decision rights, income rights, alignment, and cognition.chains;cognition;networks;incentives;coordination