FACTORS INFLUENCING CONSUMER DECISIONS RELATED TO "NATURAL" BEEF IN THE SOUTHERN PLAINS

Consumer/Household Economics,

SUCCESS FACTORS FOR VALUE ADDED NEW GENERATION COOPERATIVES

Two surveys of New Generation Cooperative (NGC) managers were carried out to ascertain the factors most important to their success. Factors in the Planning and Development as well as the Financing and Cost categories were most important, and NGCs with more employees and more members' equity are most successful.Agribusiness,

Success Factors for New Generation Cooperatives

The goal of this research was to determine success factors for New Generation Cooperatives (NGCs). A self-explicated approach was used to assess the importance of various factors grouped in broad categories using data collected from a mailout survey of NGC managers. Results suggest that factors in the "Planning and Development" and "Financing and Costs" categories are considered to be critically important by NGC managers, though differences in factor rankings exist between managers of enterprises involved in the processing of different commodities.New Generation Cooperative, self-explication, Agribusiness,

Tracking intended nationally determined contributions: what are the implications for greenhouse gas emissions in 2030?

Headline issue: Countries agreed at the 20th session of the Conference of the Parties (COP20) in Lima, Peru, in December 2014 to set out their intended nationally determined contributions (INDCs) during the first quarter of 2015, ahead of COP21 in Paris, France, in December 2015. As of 20 July 2015, 46 countries, including the 28 Member States of the European Union, have submitted INDCs to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC). This policy paper considers whether the INDCs submitted so far are consistent with the 2°C limit. It finds that, whilst the INDCs represent progress compared with a ‘business as usual’ global emissions pathway, there is a gap between current ambitions and the actions that need to be taken to limit a rise in global average temperature to no more than 2°C above pre-industrial level. Key findings: The INDCs submitted as of 20 July 2015 would lead to annual global emissions in 2030 of 56.9 to 59.1 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent by 2030. This is much higher than the 36 billion tonnes that the United Nations Environment Programme has indicated would be consistent with having a 50 to 66 per cent chance of avoiding a rise in global average temperature of more than 2°C above its pre-industrial level. The INDCs also fall well short of the global emissions target of 42 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent by 2030, in the scenario that technologies – such as bioenergy with carbon capture and storage (BECCS) – can create significant ‘negative emissions’. The authors also reiterate the findings of a previous paper that countries should focus on four key ways to increase the ambitions of emissions cuts both before and after the Paris summit: Hard work is needed over the next few months by all countries to find credible ways of achieving bigger emissions reductions which can be included in pledges to be submitted before the Paris summit, or achieved through additional efforts by partnerships, for example, through specific decarbonisation initiatives among willing countries. An intensification of efforts to increase investment and innovation – particularly in relation to the development of cities, energy systems and land use – could help to close the gap between countries intentions and the emissions reduction goal before and after 2030. A mechanism should be included in the agreement emerging from the Paris summit in December so that countries can review their efforts and find ways of ramping up the ambition of their emissions reductions by 2030 and beyond. Concerted efforts are needed by all countries to build the strong and transparent domestic base necessary for the implementation of their pledges. This should set them on a path to decarbonisation and enable them to ramp up their ambitions

Intended nationally determined contributions: what are the implications for greenhouse gas emissions in 2030?

The analysis presented here considers whether the INDCs that were submitted by 23 October 2015 are consistent with a reasonable chance of not exceeding the 2°C warming limit. As of 23 October 2015, 154 countries (including the 28 Member States of the European Union) had submitted INDCs, including pledges to limit or reduce annual national emissions after 2020. These 154 countries were together responsible for over 85% of global annual emissions of greenhouse gases, and represented over 90% of global gross domestic product (GDP), in 2012. Based on our analysis we conclude that there has been progress compared with hypothetical ‘business as usual’ global emissions pathways. However there is a gap between the emissions pathway that would result from current ambitions and plans, including those goals outlined by the submitted INDCs, and a pathway that is consistent with a reasonable chance of limiting the rise in global average temperature to no more than 2°C above pre-industrial levels. The most optimistic estimate of global emissions in 2030 resulting from the INDCs is about halfway between hypothetical ‘business as usual’ and a pathway that is consistent with the 2°C limit. Consequently, countries should be considering opportunities to narrow the gap before and after the COP21 summit in Pa

What will global annual emissions of greenhouse gases be in 2030, and will they be consistent with avoiding global warming of more than 2°C?

Headline issue: Countries agreed at the 20th session of the Conference of the Parties (COP20) in Lima, Peru, in December 2014 to set out their “intended nationally determined contributions” (INDCs) during the first quarter of 2015, ahead of COP21 in Paris, France, in December 2015. As of 30 April 2015, 35 countries, including the 28 Member States of the European Union, have submitted INDCs. In addition, China has already provided some indication of what may be included in its INDC. This policy paper describes the preliminary calculation of what global annual emissions in 2030 could be, based on the INDCs and announcements by some of the largest emitters: the European Union, the United States and China. It finds that the current ambitions and plans of countries are not consistent with the international goal of avoiding global warming of more than 2°C. Key findings: Countries should focus on four key ways to increase the ambitions of emissions cuts both before and after the Paris summit: Hard work is needed over the next few months by all countries to find credible ways of achieving bigger emissions reductions which can be included in pledges to be submitted before the Paris summit, or achieved through additional efforts by partnerships, for example, through specific decarbonisation initiatives among willing countries. An intensification of efforts to increase investment and innovation – particularly in relation to the development of cities, energy systems and land use – could help to close the gap between countries intentions and the emissions reduction goal before and after 2030. A mechanism should be included in the agreement emerging from the Paris summit in December so that countries can review their efforts and find ways of ramping up the ambition of their emissions reductions by 2030 and beyond. Concerted efforts are needed by all countries to build the strong and transparent domestic base necessary for the implementation of their pledges. This should set them on a path to decarbonisation and enable them to ramp up their ambitions

Practising the Space Between: Embodying Belief as an Evangelical Anglican Student

This article explores the formation of British evangelical university students as believers. Drawing on ethnographic fieldwork conducted with a conservative evangelical Anglican congregation in London, I describe how students in this church come to embody a highly cognitive, word-based mode of belief through particular material practices. As they learn to identify themselves as believers, practices of reflexivity and accountability enable them to develop a sense of narrative coherence in their lives that allows them to negotiate tensions that arise from their participation in church and broader social structures. I demonstrate that propositional belief – in contexts where it becomes an identity marker – is bound up with relational practices of belief, such that distinctions between “belief in” and “belief that” are necessarily blurred in the lives of young evangelicals

Success factors for new generation cooperatives

The Oklahoma Cooperative Extension Service periodically issues revisions to its publications. The most current edition is made available. For access to an earlier edition, if available for this title, please contact the Oklahoma State University Library Archives by email at [email protected] or by phone at 405-744-6311

Extracting a Representation from Text for Semantic Analysis

This paper presents a novel fine-grained semantic representation of text and an approach to constructing it