IMPACT OF LOCALIZED CUTBACKS IN AGRICULTURAL PRODUCTION ON A STATE ECONOMY

This study examines the effects that a cutback in production by Texas agricultural producers would have on the economic well-being of all producers and consumers in the stateÂ’s economy. To do this, a quadratic input-output model incorporating econometric estimates of final demand was developed for the Texas economy. The output of the agricultural production sectors was constrained to reflect the cutback in production. The results show that agricultural producers would be economically worse off than before only if the producers of raw agricultural products in Texas imported their input needs from other geographical areas.Community/Rural/Urban Development, Production Economics,

The cryptic summit graben of Mt. Etna volcano

Previous studies have inferred the likelihood of a summit graben at Mt. Etna, but until now there has been no direct observation or evidence of such a feature. Here, the results of 43 years of deformation measurements at the summit are reported, in which the presence of an actively forming north-south graben 1.5 km wide is evident, with a maximum subsidence of nearly 4 m in 43 years. Its bounding faults have in most places been hidden by the eruptive deposits of 190 summit eruptions, but horizontal measurements across these faults show a maximum value of nearly 9 m of east-west extension. Most of the subsidence and extension has taken place during the injection of eruption feeder dykes, with extreme values for single events of −1.7 m subsidence during the injection of the 2002–2003 dyke, and 4.4 m extension across the 1989 feeder dyke, but subsidence and extension continues to take place slowly during inter-eruptive periods. Analogue modelling indicates that its origin is probably a consequence of the gravitational spreading and downslope sliding of the Etna edifice on its clay-rich substrate, aided by magmatic pressure from feeder dykes intruded into individual faults, and by downward pressure from surface loading of erupted lava. This study clarifies the way in which the mechanism of gravitational spreading is maintained throughout the lifetime of this and other spreading volcanoes and rifts on Earth and Mars

Chemistry in Bioinformatics

A preprint of an invited submission to BioMedCentral Bioinformatics. This short manuscript is an overview or the current problems and opportunities in publishing chemical information. Full details of technology are given in the sibling manuscript http://www.dspace.cam.ac.uk/handle/1810/34579 The manuscript is the authors' preprint although it has been automatically transformed into this archived PDF by the submission system. The authors are not responsible for the formattingChemical information is now seen as critical for most areas of life sciences. But unlike Bioinformatics, where data is Openly available and freely re−usable, most chemical information is closed and cannot be re−distributed without permission. This has led to a failure to adopt modern informatics and software techniques and therefore paucity of chemistry in bioinformatics. New technology, however, offers the hope of making chemical data (compounds and properties) Free during the authoring process. We argue that the technology is already available; we require a collective agreement to enhance publication protocols

Farm Management - Bugger the roots, where is the future?

The Farm Management discipline has long been closely aligned with agricultural economics. The question we raise is not where either discipline came from but where is Farm Management going. The impact of globalisation, the rising tide of deregulation and chain reversal mean that farm management professionals who have traditionally focused on optimisation of activities at a farm level are now commonly expected to use sociology and management science to explain economic organisation and performance on farms. They also are required to look at relationships in the value chain(s) in which the farm sits. This paper will analyse the implications of such change for Farm Management professionals.Farm Management, value chains, Farm Management,