Profile of Furniture Manufacturers in the U.S. South: Structure and Industry Growth Factors

Economic growth and development strategies typically center on either retention and expansion of existing companies or attracting new industrial investment. In addition, wood products industry development efforts generally focus on value-added secondary processing or remanufacturing. The furniture industry is one value-added sector that has been promoted with great success, particularly in the U.S. South. This paper gives an overview of the furniture industry structure in the South and discusses elements of success and impediments to industry growth and development

Social sector participatory development in Honduras: a process across institutions, culturesval and continents

This research was conducted to determine whether our participatory process of curriculum development for vocational technical schools in Honduras was successful. This study analyzed program documents and correspondence to answer two questions: a) How did individual stakeholders perceive and negotiate the participatory process? and b) What factors --individual and environmental-- promoted and impeded the participatory process of development in this project? Participatory development concepts applied to Human Ecology Theory guided this research. Qualitative methodologies were utilized to develop the curriculum—Phenomenology-- and to evaluate the process of development—Grounded Theory and Matrix Analysis. An analysis of individual counterpart contacts revealed that stakeholder organizations moved through 3 phases from project inception to completion. First, the team established an egalitarian and participatory philosophy of development. Second, they moved through a sequence of learning and teaching exercises prior to forming partnerships and developing projects. Third, the team focused on counterpart “fit” and relationship development as essential factors in successful partnering and participatory development. The process was a success in the following respects: 1) Our team valued, respected and facilitated the needs and desires of local agencies working in the field; 2) Our participatory process was informed, iterative and voluntary, and 3) Overall participation by our primary stakeholders were consistent and significant. Our process could have been improved by involving primary beneficiaries earlier in the project cycle. Although this analysis was qualitative and is therefore limited in its generalizeability, several lessons learned may be transferred to others interested in planning for a participatory development process. Individual development workers, the group dynamic and philosophy, and the process of development are equally important in successfully facilitating a participatory project. Supporting factors were a decentralized decision-making structure, key host-country based employees and recognition that socialization and play cement relationships that are an essential base for participatory processes. Impeding factors were a lack of time and funds dedicated to support relationship development and counterpart input

A Model of Employee Satisfaction: Gender Differences in Cooperative Extension

Employee satisfaction is an important issue for management and employees in any organizational setting. We developed a generalized model of employee satisfaction and tested it for both female and male U.S Extension employees. Results indicate that there are no differences in the antecedents of employee satisfaction between genders

A Facilitated Prioritization Process: An Application in the Forest Sector in Honduras

This article describes an application of an Extension-oriented facilitated goal prioritization process conduced for national forest sector development in Honduras. The process can be employed in many settings that require stakeholder input. This article describes the consensus ranking of priority actions and generation of most doable actions. The results of this project will be used as an input in national forest-sector strategic planning in Honduras

Forest Products Certification: The Business Customer Perspective

While only a handful of wood products suppliers and business customers are currently involved in manufacturing or purchasing certified wood products, the potential exists for increased industry participation. Previous empirical work on environmental certification has examined the perceptions and a titudes of consumers, with few studies examining the perceptions of corporate customers. This research examines perceptions and activities associated with environmentally certified wood products for architects, building contractors, and home center retailers. Study results indicate that industrial forest product customers are not supportive of wood products certification efforts. Even when management environmental concern exists, there is a breakdown in elevating this concern to a corporate commitment or philosophy. Additionally, the federal government was consistently found to be the organization least trusted to certify forest management practices, while independent third-party certifiers were most trusted. A willingness to pay for certification was mixed, and few respondents felt that their customers would pay a premium for certified products