Technical Efficiency and Heterogeneity of Argentina Pension Funds

This paper examines the technical efficiency of Argentinean pension funds management companies using a random stochastic frontier model to rank the pension funds management companies, taking into account heterogeneity in the data. The empirical findings reveal that efficiency measures have a significant effect on pension funds efficiency. The implications for managers and policy makers are discussed.Argentina; pension funds; efficiency; stochastic frontier models.

Cartilha: saúde mental e direitos humanos

Universidade Federal de São Paulo (UNIFESP) Departamento de PsiquiatriaUNIFESP, Depto. de PsiquiatriaSciEL

Labor market regulations and the demand for labor in Brazil

The main objective of this study is to evaluate the impact of the 1988 changes in labor market regulations prescribed by the new Constitution on the level of employment and on the speed of employment adjustment in Brazil. From the many aspects of labor market regulations, this study concentrates on those that directly influence variable labor and dismissal costs. Evaluating the impact of changes in these costs on the level of employment and speed of adjustment is based on estimates of structural dynamic models for labor demand at different points in time before and after the 1988 constitutional change. The empirical strategy is to estimate such models from micro-longitudinal monthly data for a sample of 5,000 manufacturing establishments, which cover the period from January 1985 to December 1997. To try to isolate the effect of the constitutional change on the parameters of the labor demand function from the effects of the trade liberalization process and from the several stabilization plans that also occurred by the end of the 1980s, we regress our monthly estimates of these parameters on a temporal indicator of the 1988 constitutional change, controlling for a variety of other macroeconomic indicators.

PROJECT ÉVORA 3D: RESEARCH, METHODOLOGY, RECONSTRUCTION AND VISUALIZATION

The Évora 3D project was born from the collaboration between the Municipality and the University of Évora, through the two research centres of CIDEHUS1 and CHAIA2, with the objective of completing a virtual reconstruction of the city in a longtime frame. In the national and international context, the use of new technologies has led to the diversification of this type of proposal, both at the urban level and in the reconstruction of concrete spaces. The application of this same model to Évora, contemplating several chronological layers, seems to impose itself in a city that, in the medieval and modern periods, was one of the most important of the kingdom, as Court city, and that today is classified as World Heritage Site

Diversidad genética y patogenicidad a nivel de raíz en plántulas de soja de tres cultivares de cepas de Fusarium graminearum aisladas de rastrojos de maíz

Crops residues are an important source of maintenance of Fusarium graminearum inoculum in the soybean agroecosystem. Given that these populations can interact in the substrate through mechanisms of mycelial recognition and that they can come into direct contact with the implanted seed and cause disease, the following objectives were set: (1) to evaluate the genetic diversity through of the mycelial compatibility of F. graminearum strains isolated from maize crop residues; (2) to analyze the pathogenicity of F. graminearum strains isolated from crop residues towards soybean seedlings from different cultivars treated and untreated with fungicide. Mycelial compatibility studies showed a unique pattern of mycelial compatibility for each strain, indicating a great heterogeneity in the population evaluated. Pathogenicity tests in all strains tested were capable of causing symptoms of root rot with varying degrees of severity and reduc- tions in the height of seedlings. In the factorial statistical analysis, the greatest effect was marked by the soybean cultivar effect. A clear decline in the severity index was also observed with the fungicide application, so this would be a useful prevention tool to reduce the intensity in soybean seedling diseasesLos rastrojos de cultivos antecesores son una fuente importante de mantenimiento del inóculo de Fusarium graminearum en el agroecosistema de la soja. Teniendo en cuenta que estas poblaciones pueden interactuar en el sustrato a través de mecanismos de reconocimiento micelial y que las mismas pueden entrar en contacto directo con la semilla implantada y causar enfermedad, se plantearon los siguientes objetivos: (1) Evaluar la diversidad genética a través de la compatibilidad micelial en cepas de F. graminearum aisladas de rastrojos de maíz; (2) Analizar la patogenicidad de cepas de F. graminearum aisladas de rastrojos respecto de la podredumbre de raíz en plántulas de distintos cultivares de soja tratadas y no tratadas con fungicida curasemillas. Los estudios de compatibilidad micelial mostraron un único patrón de compatibilidad micelial para cada cepa, indicando una gran heterogeneidad en la población evaluada. En los ensayos de patogenicidad todas las cepas evaluadas fueron capaces de provocar síntomas de podredumbre de la raíz con distintos grados de severidad y reducciones en la altura de plántulas. El análisis estadístico factorial demostró que el mayor efecto observado en las variables independientes estuvo marcado por el efecto del cultivar de soja evaluado. También se observó una clara disminución en el índice de severidad con la aplicación de un fungicida curasemilla, por lo que esta sería una herramienta útil de prevención para disminuir la intensidad en las enfermedades de plántulas de soja.Fil: Bonacci, Martin Miguel. Universidad Nacional de Río Cuarto. Facultad de Ciencias Exactas, Fisicoquímicas y Naturales. Departamento de Microbiología e Inmunología; Argentina. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas; ArgentinaFil: Barros, Germán Gustavo. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas; Argentina. Universidad Nacional de Río Cuarto. Facultad de Ciencias Exactas, Fisicoquímicas y Naturales. Departamento de Microbiología e Inmunología; Argentin

Personality, epilepsy, homicide

The authors describe the case of a woman with epilepsy who murdered her husband and discusses the connections between the facts.Os autores descrevem o caso de uma mulher com antecedente de epilepsia que assassinou seu marido tentando estabelecer um nexo causal entre os fatos.Universidade Federal de São Paulo (UNIFESP) Departamento de PsiquiatriaUNIFESP, Depto. de PsiquiatriaSciEL

Geopolítica do minério de ferro brasileiro no entreguerras

This work explores the conflict in the international sphere in the interwar period regarding the exploitation of the large iron ore reserves in the central region of the state of Minas Gerais, Brazil, along with some of their implications. The literature that covers the debate about the steel-making problem and iron ore export, which occurred in Brazil from the 1910s to the early 1940s, largely neglected the differentiation of interests and antagonism between the world powers regarding the exploitation of these mineral resources. I argue here that this exploitation had significant strategic potential implications to the balance of power among European powers within the configuration established after the Treaty of Versailles. This circumstance unfolded into relevant events in Brazil, and allows us to understand both that ARBED came to the country to create the Companhia Siderúrgica Belgo-Mineira and the emergence of an openly antiexport discourse from some prominent politicians from Minas Gerais

O problema siderúrgico nacional na Primeira República

The debate over the Brazilian national steel-making problem took shape in the end of the 1900 decade and lasted until 1941, with the creation, by the Brazilian federal government, of the Companhia Siderúrgica Nacional (CSN – National Steel Company) to build and exploit the Volta Redonda steel mill, which was hailed as the solution to the problem, thus closing a debate more than three decades long. Due to this and due to the symbolic importance to the Estado Novo with which the CSN was impregnated, the historiography was significantly marked by this particular outcome, which in light of the own debate was by no means necessary. Bearing this in mind, this dissertation aims at reconstructing and analyzing the efforts, debates and conflicts surrounding the steel-making question along the Brazilian First Republic. We attempt to identify the main agents which intervened and weighted in directing government policy relative to the steel sector and try to present the main proposals done and initiatives attempted by these agents, as well as to map the implications of these initiatives and proposals to the development of the sector. Three of the main axes around which the debates turned were the following: i) the counterpoint between “small-scale steel-making” and “large-scale steel-making” and the correlate choice between imported coal, national coal and charcoal; ii) the question of the link between iron ore export and national steel-making; and, at last, iii) the question of the location of the steel mill. We attempt to understand how these three dimensions interacted along the debate, as well as to identify the origin of the defenses of each of these positions at each moment. The dissertation is divided into four main chapters. In a first one, we describe the evolution of the Brazilian steel-making sector between 1900 and 1940, attempting to evaluate the quantitative and qualitative dimensions of this development. In a second one, we deal with the emergence, in the end of the decade of 1900 and beginning of the following one, of a series of proposals for the export of iron ore from the iron region in Minas Gerais, which were linked, or rather subordinated, to the steel production in the country. Thus the steel-making problem took shape entwined to the question of iron ore export. In a third chapter, we handle the important 1920 Itabira Iron Ore Co. contract and the more immediate reaction, internal and external, which it gave rise to. Finally, in a last chapter, we identify the configuration of a model alternative to the Itabira Iron’s to the solution of the steel-making problem, based on strictly national inputs, detached from the iron ore export and led by the mineiro government, as well as the resulting polarization of the debate over the steel-making problem