The Effect of Ethanol Production on Coarse Grains: New Price Relationships

For years, the U.S. price of grain sorghum has been settled as 95% of the price of corn. Nevertheless, the increasing demand for corn and grain sorghum in ethanol production might have changed that price relationship. In this study, we use cointegration and the vector autoregressive model with independent variable (VARX) to assess the relationship between the spot price of sorghum in several U.S. markets and corn’s futures market price during the period 1996–2008. The results indicate a price relationship between the price of sorghum in the Gulf ports, Kansas City, and Texas, and corn prices of 1.01, 0.99, and 0.99, respectively. These new relationships are noteworthy for producers and other stakeholders.causality test, cointegration, futures markets, VARX model, Agribusiness, Marketing,

The Citizen Submission Process of the North American Commission for Environmental Cooperation

In order to address the environmental concerns raised by the existence of a continent-wide free trade zone, the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), Canada, United States and Mexico created an environmental side agreement, the North American Agreement for Environmental Cooperation (NAAEC). NAAEC established the Commission for Environmental Cooperation (CEC), a trilateral body created to help the NAFTA Parties achieve the goal of free trade while at the same time avoiding or lessening environmental industrial degradation. Although imperfect, the NAAEC embodies several processes that were innovative. The key innovation is the Citizen Submission Process that allows citizens and NGOs to make submissions asserting that a Party is failing to effectively enforce its environmental laws. This is a tremendous advance, which for the first time in the history of such agreements allows for public participation in the enforcement of environmental law. The main focus of this thesis is a discussion and critique of the Citizen Submission Process. In order to situate the discussion in the appropriate context, the thesis has six parts

Asymptotics for the heat kernel in multicone domains

A multi cone domain $\Omega \subseteq \mathbb{R}^n$ is an open, connected set that resembles a finite collection of cones far away from the origin. We study the rate of decay in time of the heat kernel $p(t,x,y)$ of a Brownian motion killed upon exiting $\Omega$, using both probabilistic and analytical techniques. We find that the decay is polynomial and we characterize $\lim_{t\to\infty} t^{1+\alpha}p(t,x,y)$ in terms of the Martin boundary of $\Omega$ at infinity, where $\alpha>0$ depends on the geometry of $\Omega$. We next derive an analogous result for $t^{\kappa/2}\mathbb{P}_x(T >t)$, with $\kappa = 1+\alpha - n/2$, where $T$ is the exit time form $\Omega$. Lastly, we deduce the renormalized Yaglom limit for the process conditioned on survival.Comment: 31 page

Developing Capacity, Skills, and Tobacco Control Networks to address Tobacco-related Disparities: Leadership and Advocacy Institute to Advance Minnesota’s Parity for Priority Populations (LAAMPP)

Priority populations disproportionately experience tobacco-related disparities, despite population level declines in tobacco use. The Leadership and Advocacy Institute to Advance Minnesota’s Parity for Priority Populations (LAAMPP) recruits and trains African immigrants/African Americans, Asian Americans/Pacific Islanders, American Indians, Chicano/Latinos, and LGBTQ community members to develop leaders to address tobacco harms in their communities. This paper describes and evaluates the LAAMPP Institute, and discusses lessons learned through the Institute and future directions for community-based tobacco-control efforts. The mixed-methods evaluation included qualitative key informant interviews with LAAMPP Fellows and community and project contacts, a Skills Assessment Tool, project case studies, and a social network analysis of the Fellows’ tobacco-control social networks at baseline and follow-up. At follow-up, Fellows’ tobacco control networks were larger, more extensive and diverse, and included more actors perceived to be influential in tobacco control. Fellows’ skills increased in core competencies (tobacco control, advocacy, facilitation, collaboration, cultural/community competence) and Fellows used tobacco, advocacy and cultural/community competencies more frequently. Four of five cohorts successfully passed policies. The results of LAAMPP suggest that a cross-cultural leadership institute contributes to the successful development of capacity and leadership skills among priority populations and may be a useful model for others working toward health equity

Governance of urban green spaces across Latin America - insights from semi-structured interviews to managers amid COVID-19

The COVID-19 pandemic has brought unprecedented challenges to managers of urban green spaces. As suggested by findings from 18 structured interviews from six Latin American countries reported in this paper, managers in Latin America have not been able to take the most advantage of available green space during the COVID-19 lockdown. At the core of this inability is a governance characterized by dependence on political will, lack of continuity due the nonexistence of civil service, limited autonomy, insufficient budgets, absence of formal paths to fund themselves, shortage of technical know-how, and insufficient citizens’ involvement. Thus, while a criticism to management of urban green spaces in developed cities is its focus on recreational services —with no attention to other ecosystem services—, management in Latin America is heavily constrained by funds that barely afford maintenance of basic infrastructure —with exceptions that we highlight in the manuscript. Consequently, managers of urban green spaces across Latin America have not successfully implemented adaptation measures that, for instance, European counterparts have —e.g. traffic management, information campaigns. In addition, these governance capabilities pose the risk of maladaptation. For instance, many managers in Latin America have formally resorted to a full closure of their premises during the COVID-19 lockdown but they have not successfully enforced such a closure, which likely has brought undesirable effects —e.g. more overcrowding than under a controlled no-closure scenario. We provide public policy recommendations, and a list of research questions specific to Latin America —an understudied region when it comes to both governance of urban green spaces, and the role of urban green spaces during the COVID-19 pandemic