Reconciliation of Forest Product Trade Data

The work reported here was done in close collaboration between the Forest Sector Project of the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis (IIASA) and the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO). The reasons for this joint effort were twofold. As far as IIASA is concerned, the incentive was our need for a consistent and full-scale historical data set on bilateral trade flows to be used in the global model. The FAO had several interests for participating in this analysis. First, to gain a fast computerized access to the very large UN data bank on trade in forest products. Then to carry out a series of comparisons between the UN and the FAO data, and, finally, to generate a set of standardized trade matrices. It is expected that the results will provide the basis for further validation of FAO data. Both the aims of IIASA and of FAO require an algorithm for "reconciling" the data of different origins with each other. This algorithm can then be used to calculate a set of trade matrices that may be closer to reality. The importance of such matrices is evident: past trade and other economic analyses having been based on any one of the various original trade matrices led to conclusions of a somewhat diverse and conflicting nature, reflecting sometimes the specific features - and errors - of the data set. The reconciliation method reported here produces historically consistent trade matrices. Even though some rules of the algorithm may be questioned, it is believed that the simplicity of our procedure makes it easier to use than many of the other known and more sophisticated data reconciliation techniques

Cost Functions for Controlling SO2 Emissions in Europe

This paper marks an important step in the development of the Regional Acidification INformation and Simulation (RAINS) model. One of the major goals of the project since its beginning four years ago, has been to get RAINS used in policy analysis. To that end the model should include variables that are very crucial in the eyes of the decision makers. The cost of reducing air pollutant emissions certainly is such an important policy relevant variable. The authors have successfully developed a uniform approach for establishing cost-of-control functions for emissions of sulfur dioxide in virtually all European countries. This uniformity is particularly important for comparing the cost-effectiveness of various scenarios for controlling acid deposition in Europe. Currently the assumptions and the numbers in this paper are under review by experts in many of the European countries. The cost-of-control functions allow the evaluation of targeted deposition levels at a variety of locations in Europe. This will be the topic of a subsequent paper. In the near future we will also develop similar control function for the emissions of nitrogen oxides and will eventually combine the functions into one cost-of-control function for acidifying emissions

The Demand for Forest Sector Products

In this paper the issue of demand analysis for the forest sector product is analyzed from a theoretical and an econometric points of view. An intermediary demand approach is advocated and applied. For the econometric estimates presented a database for Canada is used. The results indicate that the dual (cost) procedure to intermediate demand function estimation is preferable to the use of production functions to generate demand equations

New trajectories of the Hungarian regional development: balanced and rush growth of territorial capital

The basic assumption of the paper is that numerous similarities exist between the patterns of economic growth and territorial capital growth. The rush economic growth and rush growth of territorial capital are compared empirically at Hungarian micro-regional level from 2004 until 2010. After normalizing the dataset, a very novel spatial econometric method is applied, called a penalty for bottleneck. The results show that the constant rush growth of territorial capital is as harmful as economic recession. On the other hand, the decrease of infrastructural and social capital caused the rush growth of territorial capital in this period. Moreover, the key findings of two case studies suggest that the balanced growth of territorial capital will be created by the falling social inequalities and increasing infrastructural capita

Job Growth in Early Transition: Comparing Two Paths

Small start-up firms are the engine of job creation in early transition and yet little is known about the characteristics of this new sector. We seek to identify patterns of job growth in this sector in terms of niches left from central planning and ask about differences in job creation across two different transition economies: Estonia, which experienced rapid destruction of the pre-existing firms, and the Czech Republic, which reduced the old sector gradually. We find job growth within industries to be quantitatively more important than job growth due to across-industry reallocation. Furthermore, the industrial composition of startups is strikingly similar in the two countries. We offer convergence to "western" industry firm-size distributions as an explanation. We also find regularities in wage evolution across new and old firms, including small differences in job quality across the two transition paths.http://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/39888/3/wp503.pd

Acidification in Europe : A Simulation Model for Evaluating Control Strategies

RAINS (Regional Acidification Information and Simulation) is an integrated model of acidification in Europe designed as a tool for evaluating control strategies. It is currently sulfur-based, but is being expanded to include nitrogen species. Emphasis of the model is on the transboundary aspects of the acidification problem. Model computations are performed on a personal computer. Linked submodels are available for SO2 emissions, cost of control strategies, atmospheric transport of sulfur, forest soil and groundwater acidity, lake acidification, and the direct impact of SO2 on forests. The model can be used for scenario analysis, where the user prescribes a control strategy and then examines the cost and environmental consequences of this strategy, or for optimization analysis, in which the user sets cost and deposition goals, and identifies an "optimal" sulfur-reduction strategy. Preliminary use of the model has pointed to 1. the importance of examining long-term environmental consequences of control strategies, and 2. the cost advantages of a cooperative European sulfur-reduction program

On Hilberg's Law and Its Links with Guiraud's Law

Hilberg (1990) supposed that finite-order excess entropy of a random human text is proportional to the square root of the text length. Assuming that Hilberg's hypothesis is true, we derive Guiraud's law, which states that the number of word types in a text is greater than proportional to the square root of the text length. Our derivation is based on some mathematical conjecture in coding theory and on several experiments suggesting that words can be defined approximately as the nonterminals of the shortest context-free grammar for the text. Such operational definition of words can be applied even to texts deprived of spaces, which do not allow for Mandelbrot's ``intermittent silence'' explanation of Zipf's and Guiraud's laws. In contrast to Mandelbrot's, our model assumes some probabilistic long-memory effects in human narration and might be capable of explaining Menzerath's law.Comment: To appear in Journal of Quantitative Linguistic

Czech Social Reform/Non-reform: Routes, Actors and Problems

In this contribution, the author first considers the characteristics of the Czechoslovak communist welfare state and its theoretical alternatives. Throughout the reform process, dependency on both corporatist and socialist regimes won out, while residualist efforts were promoted in the beginning, but were later held back. The author then considers the possible actors involved in social reforms. In this respect, when proceeding from a general to a more concrete level, thought should first be devoted to the social classes and their ideologies, and second to political parties and their leaders. The author goes on to summarise the particular problems and traps in individual sections of the Czech social system. While no objection to decent standards of social protection and health care could be raised, the poor efficiency of their achievement should evoke concern. The author concludes by reflecting on the possible specificities of Czech social reform in comparison with the other countries undergoing reform and the EU. The current lethargy of the Czech welfare system corresponds to a “frozen edifice”, just as in most Western countries. However, such stagnation is apparently acceptable to both the politicians (who mask it in reformist rhetoric) and the population (which learned to master taking advantage of the generous welfare state) and thus is basically sustainable in the long run.http://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/40037/3/wp651.pd