"Spice", "Kryptonite", "Black Mamba": An overview of brand names and marketing stragtegies of Novel Psychoactive Substances on the Web

Novel Psychoactive Substances (NPSs) are often sold online as “legal” and “safer” alternatives to International Controlled Drugs (ICDs) with captivating marketing strategies. Our aim was to review and summarize such strategies in terms of the appearance of the products, the brand names, and the latest trends in the illicit online marketplaces. Methods: Scientific data were searched in PsychInfo and Pubmed databases; results were integrated with an extensive monitoring of Internet (websites, online shops, chat rooms, fora, social networks) and media sources in nine languages (English, French, Farsi, Portuguese, Arabic, Russian, Spanish, and Chinese simplified/traditional) available from secure databases of the Global Public Health Intelligence Network. Results: Evolving strategies for the online diffusion and the retail of NPSs have been identified, including discounts and periodic offers on chosen products. Advertisements and new brand names have been designed to attract customers, especially young people. An increased number of retailers have been recorded as well as new Web platforms and privacy systems. Discussion: NPSs represent an unprecedented challenge in the field of public health with social, cultural, legal, and political implications.Web monitoring activities are essential for mapping the diffusion of NPSs and for supporting innovative Web-based prevention programmes.Peer reviewedSubmitted Versio

A review of bioanalytical techniques for evaluation of cannabis (Marijuana, weed, Hashish) in human hair

Cannabis products (marijuana, weed, hashish) are among the most widely abused psychoactive drugs in the world, due to their euphorigenic and anxiolytic properties. Recently, hair analysis is of great interest in analytical, clinical, and forensic sciences due to its non-invasiveness, negligible risk of infection and tampering, facile storage, and a wider window of detection. Hair analysis is now widely accepted as evidence in courts around the world. Hair analysis is very feasible to complement saliva, blood tests, and urinalysis. In this review, we have focused on state of the art in hair analysis of cannabis with particular attention to hair sample preparation for cannabis analysis involving pulverization, extraction and screening techniques followed by confirmatory tests (e.g., GC–MS and LC–MS/MS). We have reviewed the literature for the past 10 years’ period with special emphasis on cannabis quantification using mass spectrometry. The pros and cons of all the published methods have also been discussed along with the prospective future of cannabis analysis

Are public preferences for pasture landscapes heterogeneous? Results of a discrete choice experiment in Germany

The development of the extent and the usage of pasture land has become a topic of increasing interest from several perspectives. In comparison to the pasture extent, where political actions seek to protect and preserve pasture land, the usage form faces a broader public discussion. Here, many stakeholders express a preference of the usage of pastures by using grazing techniques. Despite the relevance, grazing livestock is rarely considered in research on public landscape preferences. By using the methods of discrete choice experiments (DCE), this study deepens the understanding of the German public preferences for pasture land. Based on a representative sample, the main results indicate that there is a general preference and WTP for livestock presence in the landscape in Germany. The mean WTP does not depend on the livestock density. Still it is found that scale heterogeneity is present in the sample. The paper discusses the relevant implications which follow from this result. Further, the paper discusses the possible differences in the study outcomes when using different econometric models. Here, the results indicate that future DCE applications on landscape preferences should consider econometrics models which account for scale heterogeneity. This could improve the understanding of the preference structures. Acknowledgement : The study was supported by the Ministry for Science and Culture of Lower Saxony (MWK) within the collaborative research project SAM, Analysis of Dairy Production: Grazing versus Indoor Housing of Dairy Cows, Support Code: ZN 286

Hedging effectiveness of weather index-based insurance in China

Purpose - Maize production in China is exposed to pronounced yield risks, in particular weather risk, which is one of the most important and least controllable sources of risk in agriculture. The purpose of this paper is to analyze the extent to which weather index-based insurance can contribute to reducing the revenue risk in maize production caused by yield variations. An average farm producing maize is analyzed for each of eight Chinese provinces, six of which are part of the Northern Plains of China. Design/ methodology/ approach - Data are based on the Statistical Yearbook of China and the Chinese Meteorological Administration. The used method of insurance pricing is burn analysis. Hedging effectiveness of precipitation index-based insurance is measured by the relative reduction of the standard deviation (SD) and the Value at Risk of maize revenues. Findings - Results reveal that precipitation index-based insurance can cause a reduction of up to 15.2 percent of the SD and 38.7 percent of the Value at Risk with a 90 percent confidence level of maize revenues in the study area. However, there are big differences in the hedging efficiencies of precipitation index-based insurance measured at different weather stations in the various provinces. Therefore, it is recommended for insurance providers to analyze the hedging effectiveness of weather index-based insurance with regard to the geographical location of their reference weather station if they would like to offer weather index-based insurance products. Research limitations/ implications - The absence of individual, long-term yield data in the study area prevents the evaluation of risk on individual farms. Thus, the hedging effectiveness can only be analyzed on an aggregated level of yield data and can rather be modeled for an average farm of a particular province. Originality/ value - To the author's knowledge, this paper is the first that investigates the hedging effectiveness of precipitation index-based insurance designed for reducing revenue risk of maize production in eight Chinese provinces

Considering milk price volatility for investment decisions on the farm level after European milk quota abolition

After the abolition of the milk quota in the European Union, milk price volatility is expected to increase because of the liberalized market conditions. At the same time, investment appraisal methods have not been updated to capture the increased uncertainty. Therefore, the objective of this paper is to assess the effect of changing price volatility due to quota abolition on investment decisions at the dairy farm level. To contribute to the objective and to approximate milk price volatility after the European milk quota abolition, the risk-adjusted discount rate for risk-averse dairy farmers is derived based on the milk price volatility of a milk price series from New Zealand. New Zealand dairy farmers have faced liberalized market conditions for more than 3 decades. Afterward, the risk-adjusted discount rate is applied to appraise milking technology investments for an average German dairy farmer. The results show that it is still more reasonable to invest in a parlor system than an automated milking system, although the net present value of the parlor system investment varies between €191,723 for risk-neutral dairy farmers and €100,094 for modestly risk-averse dairy farmers. For the automated milking system investment, the same calculations lead to €132,702 for risk-neutral dairy farmers and €31,635 for risk-averse dairy farmers. According to higher levels of milk price volatility after milk quota abolition, the reduction of the expected utility of the underlying investment decision for modest risk-averse dairy farmers is almost similar to a milk price decrease of 5% for risk-neutral dairy farmers. Therefore, the findings urge finance providers and extension services to consider the change of increasing milk price volatility after dairy quota abolition when giving dairy farmers financial advice. The risk-adjusted discount rate is a flexible tool to do so.</p

Hedging weather risk on aggregated and individual farm-level - Pitfalls of aggregation biases on the evaluation of weather index-based insurance

Purpose – Since the 1990s, there has been a discussion about the use of weather index-based insurance, also called weather derivatives, as a new instrument to hedge against volumetric risks in agriculture. It particularly differs from other insurance schemes by pay-offs being related to objectively measurable weather variables. Due to the absence of individual farm yield time series, the hedging effectiveness of weather index-based insurance is often estimated on the basis of aggregated farmdata.The authors expect that there are differences in the hedging effectiveness of insurance on the aggregated level and on the individual farm-level. The purpose of this paper is to estimate the magnitude of bias which occurs if the hedging effectiveness of weather index-based insurance is estimated on aggregated yield data. Design/methodology/approach – The study is based on yield time series from individual farms in central Germany and weather data provided by the German Meteorological Service. Insurance is structured as put-option on a cumulated precipitation index. The analysis includes the estimation of the hedging effectiveness of insurance on aggregated level and on individual farm-level. The hedging effectiveness is measured non-parametrically regarding the relative reduction of the standard deviation and the value at risk of wheat revenues. Findings – Findings indicate that the hedging effectiveness of a weather index-based insurance estimated on aggregated level is considerably higher than the realizable hedging effectiveness on the individual farm-level. This refers to: hedging effectiveness estimated on the aggregated level is higher than the mean of realized hedging effectiveness on the individual farm-level and almost every evaluated individual farm in the analysis realizes a lower hedging effectiveness than estimated on the aggregated level of the study area. Nevertheless, weather index-based insurance designed on the aggregated level can lead to a notable risk reduction for individual farms. Originality/value – To the authors’ knowledge, this paper is the first that analyzes the influence of crop yield aggregation with regard to the hedging effectiveness of weather index-based insurance