A review of horticultural export performance of Asian developing countries: aspects of quality, competitiveness and sustainability.

Many developing countries in Asia have a comparative advantage in the production of horticultural commodities. Drawing from the widely diverging experiences of six countries, it is concluded that government policies significantly influence horticultural export performance. In order to meet strict consumers' specifications in importing countries, maximum cooperation is needed between the private export sector, the government, the research community and growers. Increased horticultural production in temperate highlands has led to serious land degradation and production of negative externalities. However, the trade-off between profitability and sustainability as well as the desirability and from of government intervention remain controversial issues

Quantification of aggregation bias in regional agricultural land use models: application to Guácimo County, Costa Rica

Different specifications of a land use model for Guacimo county in Costa Rica were used to quantify various sources of aggregation bias, including variation in farm resource endowments within and between representative farm classes; spatially variable prices; and labor market inter-dependencies between farm classes. The results indicate that adequate treatment of the farm level in regional land use analysis requires proper classification of individual farms in representative farm classes, as well as explicit modelling of inter-dependencies between such classes. Aggregation bias introduced by the assumption of spatially fixed farm-gate prices is insignificant for regions with reasonable infrastructure quality and relatively small distances between farms and markets. Aggregation bias caused by variation in resource endowments within farm classes cannot be eliminated, but should be minimized, underscoring the importance of a proper farm classification