Distortions to Agricultural Incentives in Latin America

Distorted incentives, agricultural and trade policy reforms, national agricultural development, Agricultural and Food Policy, International Relations/Trade, F13, F14, Q17, Q18,

The link between poverty and malnutrition : a household theoretic approach

Past studies have identified nutrition exclusively with nutrient intake. A better definition of nutrition would critically affect the link between poverty and malnutrition and would affect the implications for policies designed to improve the nutritional status of the poor. This paper focuses on the relationship between household income and their nutritional and health status. It presents new evidence on these interactions and suggests a framework for the analysis ofthe interactions between income transfers, the publicly provided inputs, and the household's response, as reflected in the effect on nutrition and health. Such framework can be applied in the evaluation of public policies designed to reduce malnutrition and improve the health status among the poor in urban and rural areas.Poverty Assessment,Agricultural Knowledge&Information Systems,Environmental Economics&Policies,Health Economics&Finance,Health Monitoring&Evaluation

A profile of border protection in Egypt : an effective rate of protection approach adjusting for energy subsidies

This study examines recent effective rates of protection across the Egyptian economy, using an ad valorem price wedge introduced by nontariff barriers and energy subsidies, and compares today's effective rates of protection with those of a decade ago. The study uses 23 aggregated sectors from input-output matrix information. Although trade liberalization since the late-1990s has had a considerable impact in reducing protection of some industries, some sectors, such as the food and tobacco sector, remain relatively highly protected, due to tariff escalation and nontariff barriers, and due to energy subsidies. Energy subsidies are not formally sector specific but do favor sectors that are energy intensive (of particular note is the electricity sector). It appears that energy pricing is part of a strategy to subsidize and promote certain industries and in effect offset the dis-protection or taxation that results from tariffs on intermediate inputs. The case of the cement sector is notable because energy subsidies appear to almost exactly offset the negative impacts of tariffs and indirect taxes. The fertilizer sector has zero nominal tariffs, benefiting agriculture, and so a negative effective rate of protection due simply to tariffs on intermediate inputs. However, the fertilizer sector ends up with a very high a positive total effective rate of protection due to energy subsidies.Transport Economics Policy&Planning,Energy Production and Transportation,Economic Theory&Research,Taxation&Subsidies,International Trade and Trade Rules

Determinants of Farm Revenue in Pakistan

Will small farm viability decline with the reduction of average farm size in Pakistan? This paper addresses the determinants of rural household and farm-related income. Using the 2001 PIDE Household Survey, the approach developed captures the potential interactions between farm returns and household, farm, and factor market characteristics (schooling, family size, land tenure and operational size, access to water, credit, and capital). Econometric results show: (a) returns to additional schooling and the revenue elasticity of operated acres increase with farm size; (b) medium and large farm renters would be willing to pay more than observed rents, implying an incentive to increase farm size at the prevailing rental values; (c) owner-operated farms, landowners who also leases in, and fixed rental tenants earn higher revenues than sharecropping tenants. The difference, however, between landowner/fix-renter income and sharecropper income varies with family and farm size, as well as water use. While these results favour farm size increase, the results also show that off-farm and non-farm income sources are relatively more important for small farmers, contributing to their viability.Pakistan, Land Markets, Rural Factor Markets, Revenue Function

Agriculture and the macroeconomy

Based on an economy-wide perspective, this paper begins with a discussion of the bias against exports and agriculture that characterized the economic literature and the development strategies in many developing countries after World War II. This is followed by an analysis of how the macroeconomic environment affects agricultural structural price incentives. Specifically, the paper discusses how early policies concerning industrial protection, exchange rates, and interest rates and other fiscal policies can strongly influence the economic incentives for agriculture compared with other sectors, identifying the most relevant literature and alternative approaches used on this issue. It then proceeds to examine how the real exchange rate can be affected by exogenous shocks, such as the foreign terms of trade, with emphases on the Dutch Disease phenomenon and agriculture. The paper next examines the influence of interest rates on incentives in agriculture, arguing that, surprisingly, this has been a neglected area in the literature. The paper explores the effects on agriculture of structural adjustment programs implemented since the early 1980s in developing countries. The final section surveys the literature on agriculture and the macro-economy in industrial countries, focusing on the impact of the exchange rate on export competitiveness in the United States, the cost of agricultural protection for the overall economy in Europe and Japan, and the increased importance of fluctuations in money markets for the farm sector and the additional instability they generateEnvironmental Economics&Policies,Markets and Market Access,Labor Policies,Agricultural Knowledge&Information Systems,Economic Theory&Research,Economic Theory&Research,Environmental Economics&Policies,Economic Stabilization,Access to Markets,Markets and Market Access

Distortions to Agricultural Incentives in Latin America and the Caribbean

Distorted incentives, agricultural and trade policy reforms, national agricultural development, Agricultural and Food Policy, International Relations/Trade, F13, F14, Q17, Q18,

Distortions to Agricultural Incentives in Chile

Distorted incentives, agricultural and trade policy reforms, national agricultural development, Agricultural and Food Policy, International Relations/Trade, F13, F14, Q17, Q18,

FIGHTING RURAL POVERTY IN LATIN AMERICA: NEW EVIDENCE AND POLICY

We synthesize recent case studies on rural poverty in six Latin American countries, plus two thematic studies. We find that the return to education in farming is surprisingly small; land redistribution increases total farm output, but has mixed effects on income; and urban economic growth significantly reduces rural poverty.Community/Rural/Urban Development, Food Security and Poverty,

Latin America's "New Open Regionalism" and WTO Negotiations: the case of agriculture

This article analyses past trade trends and agricultural protectionism in Latin American agriculture, by examining observed changes in Latin American agriculture and trade policies over the last 20 years that have led to what the authors call the "New Open Regionalism". It also discussed the conflicting interests and various trading positions taken up by Latin American countries in multilateral trade talks, as a result of the strong heterogeneity between net agricultural exporters and importers. The authors show that the repeated failure of the Doha round of trade talks opens the door for bilateral or sub-regional free trade agreements, concluding with the prediction that regional integration in Latin America will come about as a result of agreements between various sub-regional trade blocs. The weakness of internal demand makes the development of the region's agri-food sector highly dependent on exports, the growth of which is one of the main economic drivers in these countries, particularly net exporters. In addressing the issue of the distribution of profits from trade liberalization, the authors propose a variety of schemes that have already proved their effectiveness in countries such as Mexico, Turkey, Brazil, Colombia, Nicaragua and Honduras Nuevos acuerdos regionales de comercio en Latinoamérica y disposición a negociar: el caso de la agricultura Resumen Este artículo analiza las tendencias del comercio agrario y el proteccionismo de la agricultura en Latinoamérica, examinando los cambios observados en la agricultura y la política comercial en los últimos 20 años, denominados por los autores como "nuevos acuerdos regionales de comercio". También se discuten el conflicto de intereses y las variadas posiciones comerciales desarrolladas por los distintos países de América Latina, como resultado de una fuerte heterogeneidad entre los exportadores y los importadores agrarios netos. Los autores muestran que los reiterados fallos de las negociaciones comerciales de la ronda Doha abrieron las puertas para acuerdos comerciales libres bilaterales o sub-regionales, concluyendo con la predicción de que la integración regional traerá como resultado un acuerdo entre varios bloques de comercio sub-regionales. La debilidad de la demanda interna hace que el desarrollo del sector agroalimentario dependa fuertemente de las exportaciones, especialmente de los exportadores netos. En la dirección de los resultados de la distribución de beneficios de los acuerdos de liberalización, los autores proponen una variedad de esquemas que han tenido su efectividad en países como México, Turquía, Brasil, Colombia, Nicaragua y Honduras. Palabras clave: acuerdos libre de comercio, nuevos acuerdos regionales de comercio y agricultura.Free Trade Agreements, New Open Regionalism and Agriculture, International Relations/Trade, Q17,

System-level design and RF front-end implementation for a 3-10ghz multiband-ofdm ultrawideband receiver and built-in testing techniques for analog and rf integrated circuits

This work consists of two main parts: a) Design of a 3-10GHz UltraWideBand (UWB) Receiver and b) Built-In Testing Techniques (BIT) for Analog and RF circuits. The MultiBand OFDM (MB-OFDM) proposal for UWB communications has received significant attention for the implementation of very high data rate (up to 480Mb/s) wireless devices. A wideband LNA with a tunable notch filter, a downconversion quadrature mixer, and the overall radio system-level design are proposed for an 11-band 3.4-10.3GHz direct conversion receiver for MB-OFDM UWB implemented in a 0.25mm BiCMOS process. The packaged IC includes an RF front-end with interference rejection at 5.25GHz, a frequency synthesizer generating 11 carrier tones in quadrature with fast hopping, and a linear phase baseband section with 42dB of gain programmability. The receiver IC mounted on a FR-4 substrate provides a maximum gain of 67-78dB and NF of 5-10dB across all bands while consuming 114mA from a 2.5V supply. Two BIT techniques for analog and RF circuits are developed. The goal is to reduce the test cost by reducing the use of analog instrumentation. An integrated frequency response characterization system with a digital interface is proposed to test the magnitude and phase responses at different nodes of an analog circuit. A complete prototype in CMOS 0.35mm technology employs only 0.3mm2 of area. Its operation is demonstrated by performing frequency response measurements in a range of 1 to 130MHz on 2 analog filters integrated on the same chip. A very compact CMOS RF RMS Detector and a methodology for its use in the built-in measurement of the gain and 1dB compression point of RF circuits are proposed to address the problem of on-chip testing at RF frequencies. The proposed device generates a DC voltage proportional to the RMS voltage amplitude of an RF signal. A design in CMOS 0.35mm technology presents and input capacitance <15fF and occupies and area of 0.03mm2. The application of these two techniques in combination with a loop-back test architecture significantly enhances the testability of a wireless transceiver system