THE EU AGRICULTURAL POLICY: A CONSUMER VIEWPOINT

The final objective of government intervention is the attainment of the 'common good' for society as a whole. Government are supposed to intervene in market economies mainly in order to offset market failures. However governments themselves often fail to maximise the common good, especially when private interests prevail. In the decision-making process of the CAP agricultural lobbies play a predominant role, without any substantial counterpart lobbying to defend the interest of society as a whole. Although, according to common sense, food surpluses and related budgetary costs (export subsidies, food storage, etc.) would disappear if public price support were dismantled, this elementary solution to the most important problems raised by the CAP was never fully accepted. The cost of the CAP, mainly due to the agricultural price and farm revenue support, amounts to almost 50% of the EU budget, paid by taxpayers. Moreover, according to OECD estimates, an almost similar invisible transfer of income to agricultural producers is borne by consumers paying higher market prices. Consequently, although agriculture accounts only for 1.7% of the Community GDP, the cost of the CAP as big as the total EU budget. The performance of sectoral economic policies is usually appraised on the grounds of three sub-objectives better specifying the broad dimensions of social well-being: economic efficiency, social equity and environmental sustainability. The effects on economic efficiency are manifestly negative. Domestic market prices are distorted among farm products, capital and labour resources are retained in agriculture while their productivity for society as a whole would be much larger in other industries. If at least the CAP were consistent with structural adjustment in the long term then, sooner or later, the problem would be solved and the present waste of economic resources terminated. Unfortunately this is not the case as present distortions in market prices generate distorted investments. In terms of social equity, higher food prices act as a regressive tax on food burdening proportionally more worse-off households who spend a much larger share of their family budget on food than better-off households. On the other hand better-off farmers producing larger amounts of commodities whose price is supported get a much larger share of the benefits. As a result income disparities among citizens are increased. In terms of environmental sustainability the impact of farm price support is mixed. On the one hand higher farm prices stimulate the use of polluting inputs such as fertilisers and pesticides. On the other hand price support is likely to prevent serious problems in terms of depopulation or reduced environmental standards in some marginal regions. However these positive effects are circumscribed to specific areas and could be attained in a much more effective way by specific agri-environmental and agri-regional policy measures. According to the recent document of the Commission Agenda 2000, the very nature of the CAP will not be substantially changed before 20006. The worse aspects of the CAP in EU-15 will be reduced to a certain extent, but this positive impact on European social well-being is likely to be largely offset by the negative impact on new Member Countries which will have to accept the acquis communautaire in agricultural policy. In the Amsterdam Treaty a strong 'horizontal clause' is instituted by which Community Consumer Policy should also monitor the other EU policies both at Community and national level in order to protect consumer interests. Up to now the noxious effects of the agricultural price support policy could be cast to farm lobbies and to ill-informed policy makers, however in the future the Consumer Policy will be co-responsible for the reduction of social welfare generated by the CAP as well as by other sectoral policies.Agricultural and Food Policy,

THE ROLE OF THE INDUSTRIAL POLICY IN ITALY

The aim of this paper is to match the Italian small-medium firms’ (SMEs) need for technological innovation and the state and regional aid programs aimed at supporting innovation and technology. The purpose is to highlight existing capabilities and new opportunities in support of Italian SMEs requirements in innovation. The paper reports the results of two empirical research projects recently carried out at Ceris-Cnr (Institute of Economic Research on Firms and Growth – Italian National Research Council). After a framework of the most important innovation policies the Italian aid programmes for innovation and technology are described. In particular the role of the Italian Regions is analysed in depth. The empirical research confirmed that the approach to innovation of Italian SMEs tends to satisfy the demand of existing market in the best possible way ompared with competitors. Product improvement follows incremental processes. The most common way of introducing new technology is the purchase of new machines and equipment to reduce costs and improve quality. All the industrialised countries tend to favour the linking of the SMEs with external sources of knowledge. The research shows that such a policy clashes with the SMEs’ capacity for absorbing innovation. Most of them lack the technical structures (technical office, design department, R&D laboratory, prototype department, etc.) and graduate staff capable of interfacing with the research world.

Instability of some unsteady viscous flows

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Linear and Nonlinear Optical Effects in High Carrier Concentration Oxides and Nitrides at Epsilon-Near-Zero

Nonlinear optics has been an important method for achieving ultrafast light manipulation. Recently, ENZ material have gained interest due to inherent advantages such as slow light, improved confinement, and ideal relaxation times, the nonlinear response of these materials, such as the intensity-dependent-refractive-index, are ultra-large yet remain ultra-fast. This experimental discovery of epsilon-near-zero enhancement has thus opened new avenues in nonlinear optics research in recent years, and while experiments have continued to progress a theoretical understanding of the processes and origins of nonlinear optical enhancement at epsilon-near-zero has lagged. To fill this gap, the work herein focuses on uncovering the mechanisms that drive the nonlinear interactions of Drude-based epsilon-near-zero materials. This framework utilizes knowledge of a given material’s electronic band structure in energy-momentum space to understand the kinetic motion of free electrons under intense optical irradiation, realizing a fully feed-predictive simulator without fitting parameters. From this, two types of nonlinearities are elucidated, intra- and inter-band, whose overall effect on the optical properties are rooted in the non-parabolic dispersion of energy bands. Moreover, these effects are shown to induce opposing changes on the optical permittivity leading to distinctively different outcomes that can be used individually or together to sculpt the material’s optical properties in time and space. Experimentally, both intraband and interband nonlinearities are interrogated through these methods with the first known multi- beam deflection studies in epsilon-near-zero materials. Through this holistic study, improved prediction power is available for finding the ideal nonlinear films, and effects can be explored to optimize them

THE CAP REFORM AND EC-US RELATIONS: THE GATT AS A "CAP" ON THE CAP

Reform of the Common Agricultural Policy has entailed the substitution of new income support instruments for the former price based instruments, mainly in the cash crop sector. Our first point is that the domestic political balance was unable to generate such a large change in policy design, in spite of inefficiencies and inbalances. The pressure of the US has been a major factor in the design of the reform. We argue that trade interests have been crucial to catalyze international collective action in order to countervail domestic pressure groups. The pursuit of an agreement in the GATT is therefore a means to place a cap on the CAP and foster some reform and control over sectors such as sugar and dairy in other countries. We do not foresee the disappearance of sources of tensions between the two countries, as EC animal products become more competitive and as the working of the CAP in the vicinity of world prices will make trade flows sensitive to world macro-economic and agricultural shocks. The Uruguay Round, should not be considered as fully satisfactory, and the long-run objective of further decoupling of payments from production incentives should be pursued.Agricultural and Food Policy,

Resistance to treatment in eating disorders: a critical challenge

The Special Issue “Treatment resistance in Eating Disorders” gathers together the contributions provided by several experienced groups of researchers in the field of Eating Disorders (EDs). The main topic is addressed from multiple perspectives ranging from pathogenesis (including developmental and maintaining factors) to treatment. An explicative model of resistance in EDs is also proposed