6,305 research outputs found
The state of agricultural credit in New Zealand
In this paper the subject of agricultural credit has been subdivided into three sections covering background, borrowing, and lending. The background covers some of the changes in the New Zealand economy and government policies which have affected both borrowers and lenders in the agricultural sector, and consequently the amount and form of credit used.
The section on borrowing (Section 3) examines the present credit
needs of farmers, in particular the apparent trends towards increased
equity and greater difficulty in servicing debt.
The lending section (Section 4) examines the roles of government
and private lending institutions in the field of agricultural credit
and changes in the amount and form of credit available
A review of agricultural credit in New Zealand
The following discussion of the agricultural credit market
encompasses agriculture in its wider sense. Because most of the
available information and data on agricultural credit is concerned with
traditional forms of pastoral farming (sheep, beef and dairy) the
discussion relates primarily to those sectors. However, the growing
importance of other sectors such as horticulture, grain cropping and
deer farming is recognised and where possible their credit situation is
also considered.
The purpose of the paper is to update previous research by the
Agricultural Economics Research Unit into the financing of the
agriculture industry. In the past the agricultural credit situation has been
relatively stable. Because of its large contribution to exports, agriculture (pastoral agriculture in particular) received considerable support from Government in the form of policies aimed at maintaining a steady flow of investment. Credit assistance was one of the cornerstones of these policies. In 1982 the Government began to change its stance. In the Budget of that year interest payments and certain development
ceased to be tax deductible where the farm property was sold within 10 years of purchase.
Although this steadied inflation in land prices, long term
investors particularly pastoral farm investors still enjoyed
considerable advantages over investors wishing to borrow capital for
diversification into or expansion of enterprises which were capable of
better returns on investment. It was not until late 1984 that a wide
range of policies were introduced to remove these advantages and
promote greater equity between enterprises and industries requiring
capital for restructuring or expansion. As a result some of the
conclusions reached in Discussion Papers on agricultural and
horticultural credit published by the Unit as recently as April and
October 1984 have been quickly overtaken by economic events and
need updating. This paper begins with a background of trends in the New
Zealand economy and then in chronological order details recent changes
in Government Policy. This is followed by a discussion of the
implications of these changes for the financing of agriculture.
Finally the present state of the agricultural credit market is
discussed and some conclusions are drawn.
The discussion is based on a variety of sources including MAF,
Reserve Bank, Treasury, AERU and private economic reports and data. A
considerable part of the material was also obtained from personal
correspondence and interviews with people directly involved in the
finance industry. The views expressed are, of course those of the
authors
An asymptotic theory for the re-equilibration of a micellar surfactant solution
Micellar surfactant solutions are characterized by a distribution of aggregates comprised predominantly of pre-micellar aggregates (monomers, dimers, trimers, etc.) and a region of proper micelles close to the peak aggregation number, connected by an intermediate region containing a very low concentration of aggregates. Such a distribution gives rise to a distinct two-timescale re-equilibration following a system dilution, known as the 1 and 2 processes, whose dynamics may be described by the Becker–Döring equations. We use a continuum version of these equations to develop a reduced asymptotic description that elucidates the behavior during each of these processes
On the predictions and limitations of the BeckerDoring model for reaction kinetics in micellar surfactant solutions
We investigate the breakdown of a system of micellar aggregates in a surfactant solution following an order-one dilution. We derive a mathematical model based on the Becker–Döring system of equations, using realistic expressions for the reaction constants fit to Molecular Dynamics simulations. We exploit the largeness of typical aggregation numbers to derive a continuum model, substituting a large system of ordinary differential equations for a partial differential equation in two independent variables: time and aggregate size. Numerical solutions demonstrate that re-equilibration occurs in two distinct stages over well-separated time-scales, in agreement with experiment and with previous theories. We conclude by exposing a limitation in the Becker–Döring theory for re-equilibration and discuss potential resolutions
The structure of causal sets
More often than not, recently popular structuralist interpretations of
physical theories leave the central concept of a structure insufficiently
precisified. The incipient causal sets approach to quantum gravity offers a
paradigmatic case of a physical theory predestined to be interpreted in
structuralist terms. It is shown how employing structuralism lends itself to a
natural interpretation of the physical meaning of causal sets theory.
Conversely, the conceptually exceptionally clear case of causal sets is used as
a foil to illustrate how a mathematically informed rigorous conceptualization
of structure serves to identify structures in physical theories. Furthermore, a
number of technical issues infesting structuralist interpretations of physical
theories such as difficulties with grounding the identity of the places of
highly symmetrical physical structures in their relational profile and what may
resolve these difficulties can be vividly illustrated with causal sets.Comment: 19 pages, 4 figure
Tapping Environmental History to Recreate America’s Colonial Hydrology
To properly remediate, improve, or predict how hydrological systems behave, it is vital to establish their histories. However, modern-style records, assembled from instrumental data and remote sensing platforms, hardly exist back more than a few decades. As centuries of data is preferable given multidecadal fluxes of both meteorology/climatology and demographics, building such a history requires resources traditionally considered only useful in the social sciences and humanities. In this Feature, Pastore et al. discuss how they have undertaken the synthesis of historical records and modern techniques to understand the hydrology of the Northeastern U.S. from Colonial times to modern day. Such approaches could aid studies in other regions that may require heavier reliance on qualitative narratives. Further, a better insight as to how historical changes unfolded could provide a “past is prologue” methodology to increase the accuracy of predictive environmental models
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