Proceedings of the OECD/PACIOLI Workshop on Information Needs for the Analysis of Farm Household Income Issues

The assessment of agricultural policies depends more and more on micro-economic data sets. This is especially true for policies with an income objective in a situation where farm households have different income sources. Among others the OECD has stressed this point in recent years with analytical reports. The PACIOLI network yearly brings together data managers and researchers interested in the innovation of data collection in this area. In April 2004 a joint workshop was organised at the OECD in Paris to bring experts together to exchange best practices. This report contains the proceedings of that workshop.Farm Management,

Support for farmers' cooperatives: EU synthesis and comparative analysis report: policy measures

In order to foster the competitiveness of the food supply chain, the European Commission is committed to promote and facilitate the restructuring and consolidation of the agricultural sector by encouraging the creation of voluntary agricultural producer organisations. To support the policy making process DG Agriculture and Rural Development has launched a large study, “Support for Farmers’ Cooperatives (SFC)”, that will provide insights on successful cooperatives and producer organisations as well as on effective support measures for these organisations. These insights can be used by farmers themselves, in setting up and strengthening their collective organisation, and by the European Commission in its effort to encourage the creation of agricultural producer organisations in the EU. Within the framework of the SFC project this EU synthesis and comparative analysis report - Policy Measures has been written. Data collection for this report has been done in the summer of 2011. In addition to this report, the SFC-project has delivered 27 country reports, a report on policies for cooperatives in non-EU OECD countries, 8 sector reports, 5 other EU synthesis and comparative analysis reports, 33 case studies, a report on cluster analysis, and a final report

On the mechanism of irradiation enhanced exchange bias

By means of layer resolved ion irradiation the mechanisms involved in the irradiation driven modifications of the exchange bias effect in NiFe/FeMn bilayers have been investigated. It is shown that not only the locations of the defects but also the magnetic coupling between both layers during the irradiation process is of crucial importance. This requires an extension of current models accounting for defects in exchange bias systems.Comment: 3 pages, 3 figures, revised version, added results from further structural characterization by TEM, submitted to Europhysics Letter

Adjustment and differences in farm performance; A farm management perspective from the Netherlands

There are differences in performance between farmers. In the Netherlands this has been a major topic of research for at least 30 years. Research has shown that the managerial capacities of farmers play a major role in differences in economic and environmental performance. Management can be measured and the optimal level is not the maximum level. Farmers differ in their objectives, competences and local external situation and there-fore their strategies. These strategies can be identified. In recent years strategic management has become more important and this can be supported with consultancy. Farmers also differ in their adoption and innovation behaviour. These micro-economic results, which correlate with large differences in income and high prices of fixed assets with a limited supply, can be explained as being consistent with economic theory on perfect markets. Although these findings suggest that some farm households have attractive strategies that can cope with policy adjustments, the research supports the hypothesis but does not (yet) prove that a severe adjustment of agricultural policy e.g. towards a more market oriented policy, induces more innovation, and that due to this innovation the effects of adjusting the agricultural policy are less severe than estimated ex ante with current dynamic policy models.Farm Management,

Thruster Allocation for Dynamical Positioning

Positioning a vessel at a fixed position in deep water is of great importance when working offshore. In recent years a Dynamical Positioning (DP) system was developed at Marin [2]. After the measurement of the current position and external forces (like waves, wind etc.), each thruster of the vessel is actively controlled to hold the desired location. In this paper we focus on the allocation process to determine the settings for each thruster that results in the minimal total power and thus fuel consumption. The mathematical formulation of this situation leads to a nonlinear optimization problem with equality and inequality constraints, which can be solved by applying Lagrange multipliers. We give three approaches: first of all, the full problem was solved using the MATLAB fmincon routine with the solution from the linearised problem as a starting point. This implementation, with robust handling of the situations where the thrusters are overloaded, lead to promising results: an average reduction in fuel consumption of approximately two percent. However, further analysis proved useful. A second approach changes the set of variables and so reduces the number of equations. The third and last approach solves the Lagrange equations with an iterative method on the linearized Lagrange problem

Thermal measurement and modeling of multi-die packages

Thermal measurement and modeling of multi-die packages became a hot topic recently in different fields like RAM chip packaging or LEDs / LED assemblies, resulting in vertical (stacked) and lateral arrangement. In our present study we show results for a mixed arrangement: an opto-coupler device has been investigated with 4 chips in lateral as well as vertical arrangement. In this paper we give an overview of measurement and modeling techniques and results for stacked and MCM structures, describe our present measurement results together with our structure function based methodology of validating the detailed model of the package being studied. Also, we show how to derive junction-to-pin thermal resistances with a technique using structure functions.Comment: Submitted on behalf of TIMA Editions (http://irevues.inist.fr/tima-editions

Hacking the CAP – Options to redesign the European Agricultural Policy

In 2020 the Common Agricultural Policy of the European Union has to be renewed. This raises the question which policy would be optimal for the 3rd decade of the century, seen the changes in agriculture (decline in the number of farmers, effect of ict and other new technologies, concentration in the food chain etc.) and public issues that ask for solutions (climate change, sustainability, need for jobs and growth in rural development, food policy etc.)The history of the CAP has shown that policy changes are often incremental. Some argue that especially in 2020 changes will be small as the term of the policy is out of sync with the budget cycle (important decisions on the CAP are not taken without a decision on the EU’s financial framework) and as the CAP decision will be at the moment that the current commissioners hand over their mandate to their successors. However this should not prevent scholars from coming up with fresh ideas on how the policy could be made more effective and efficient for a resilient agriculture and food and nutrition security in a sustainable environment.To do so, this paper takes the view that the CAP is a bundle of policy instruments to reach several policy objectives, that not necessarily are consistent or have synergies but where trade-offs exist. That means that Tinbergen’s rule applies: achieving the desired values of a certain number of policy targets requires the policy maker to control an equal number of instruments.In our analysis we re-interpret Article 33 of the Treaty of the European Union (that defines the CAP) in current policy objectives and specific targets. We then look for the most effective policy instruments for each of these targets. We discuss synergies between instruments in the execution of the policy. To test the robustness of these policy targets and instruments we stress-test them against three scenario’s for the future of agriculture and the food system: High Tech, Self-Organisation and Collapse. These three scenarios have been published by the EU’s Standing Committee on Agricultural Research’s strategic working group AKIS (Agricultural Knowledge and Innovation Systems).This leads to a redesigned CAP, fit for the 3rd decade of this century, as robust as possible for external scenario’s on agriculture. Finally we discuss the discrepancy between the current CAP and our suggestions for the redesigned CAP

Business Dynamics with Scenarios on Dutch Agriculture and its Institutional Arrangements

This paper investigates the development in the Durch Agri-Food innovation system.  Main components of the system are agriculture and agribusiness, the promotion of interests in the lobby system and the knowledge system. Each has its own dynamics but they are until now tied together by institutional arrangements. Based on a historical description we formulate a simple business dynamics model. The robustness of the system is investigated by a scenario analysis. Results have been checked by interviews with experts

Struggle for Leadership: the Competitiveness of the EU and US Food Industry

Globalization is an important issue in the food industry, although most food is still locally produced and consumed. Many small and medium enterprises characterize the industry. Results of WTO negotiations intensify the international competition, in which the EU and USA are the largest players. Countries like Brazil, India and China are gaining market share. This raises the following research questions: 1. How competitive are the EU and US food industry and their sub-sectors? 2. Which role plays innovation and legislation in the competitiveness of the industry? 3. How will the competitiveness develop under future globalization and trade liberalization? The goal of this study is to fill these knowledge gaps.Agribusiness, International Relations/Trade,