DISCUSSION OF STRUCTURAL CHANGES IN THE FOOD AND FIBER SYSTEM

Industrial Organization,

Economics of Change in Market Structure, Conduct, and Performance The Baking Industry 1947-1958

Baking is one of the largest industries in the United States. Its sales, which exceed $4 billion annually, rank it third among the food processing industries, and thirteenth among all manufacturing industries. Bakery products account for nearly$1 out of every $10 spent by American consumers for food. Almost half of the domestic consumption of wheat flour is in the form of bread, rolls, cake, pie, doughnuts, sweet goods, and other perishable bakery products. While this study encompasses the perishable bakery products industry as defined by the U.S. Census Bureau, it focuses primarily on wholesale markets for white bread. Since World War II, important changes have occurred in the bread baking industry. A decline in the per capita demand for bread products coupled with changes in technology and costs has affected the relationships between baking companies, their market behavior, and the resulting level of efficiency and price performance. In an industrial economy, the farming, milling, baking, retailing, and consuming functions are integrally related. Changes in the organization and practices in one may induce changes in others. The baking industry occupies a strategic position in this process, and as a result, consumers, farmers, millers, and retailers, as well as bakers themselves, have a vital interest in the way the baking industry performs. Changes in market structure and firm behavior in the baking industry have been the subject of study and concern by several interested individuals and groups. The U.S. Department of Agriculture has followed with increased concern the widening of the market margin and the declining farmer share of consumer bread prices. The Senate Agricultural Committee has completed a study of average cost and returns of bakery operations.The Federal Trade Commission has followed the pricing practices of many baking companies with frequent cease and desist orders. I\u3e The Justice Department, through periodic prosecutions, has kept baking firms aware of the limitation imposed by the antitrust laws. The Senate Subcommittee on Antitrust and Monopoly has studied the impact of discriminatory pricing by large baking companies on small independent bakers.7 The industry has encouraged economic study of the historic development of baking and changes in market organization and practices.s Most recently, the F.T.C. studied buyer concentration and the integration of retail grocery organizations into baking and other food processing industries

NONMARKET VALUE OF WESTERN VALLEY RANCHLAND USING CONTINGENT VALUATION

With the irreversible loss of agricultural land to develop uses in certain areas, there is increased concern that land be preserved for posterity'Â’s sake. We estimate the nonmarket value of a ranchland protection program in the Yampa River Valley in Routt County, Colorado, including the Steamboat Springs resort. The case study builds on previous land preservation studies by adding several preferences indicators. We find that local residentsÂ’' willingness to pay is substantial, but insufficient, to justify protecting the existing quantity of valley ranchland in the study area.Land Economics/Use,

ENHANCING RURAL PUBLIC TRANSPORT ACCESSIBILITY THROUGH IMPLEMENTING A SMART SCAN-ON M-TICKETING SOLUTION: : A UNITED KINGDOM CASE STUDY APPROACH WITHIN RURAL DEREGULATED ENVIRONMENTS

Scott Copsey, Sue Walsh, Liam Fassam, Richard Southern, ‘Enhancing Rural Public Transport Accessibility Through Implementing a Smart Scan-on M Ticketing Solution: A United Kingdom Case Study Approach Within Rural Deregulated Environments’, paper presented at the European Transport Conference, Barcelona, Spain, 5-7 October, 2016.The aim of this paper is to demonstrate how two UK Local Authorities (Hertfordshire and Northamptonshire), the two Universities of Hertfordshire and Northampton and public transport providers have worked in partnership to develop a smart scan-on m-ticketing solution, that integrates into a wider ‘smart city’ solution delivering social good through connected value propositions. Based on the initial success of a Hertfordshire pilot, a specific objective of this work is to establish smart integrated multi-operator/modal solutions. This pilot is subsequently being collaboratively expanded upon, through the UK Department for Transport funded ‘Network Northamptonshire Total Transport’ initiative, a transformative project to improve connectivity, integration and accessibility for rural transport networks. This forms part of the recently signed ‘Heart of England’ economic tri-county alliance agreement, which aims to work collaboratively across three local authority regions (Buckinghamshire, Oxfordshire and Northamptonshire), consolidating £3bn of spending. This provides a further future platform for innovative transport solutions being rolled out across wider geographical areas. The initial Hertfordshire demonstrator pilot project explored how a ‘smart’ m-ticketing platform could provide a sustainable financial business model for implementing ticketing solutions for small and medium bus operators within rural Shires, outside of large urban settings. This unique project was the first scan-on bus mobile ticket product used in the UK (outside of London). It offers a partnership model and governance structure for local authorities, commercial operators and other stakeholders with an interest in integrated sustainable transport to take forward, and leads to the possibility of new, socially innovative models for procuring and delivering transport solutions. Initial user reactions have been positive, generating large digital data sets, analysis of which indicates rapid user uptake in comparison to other schemes. This data enables detailed analysis such as precise user geo-spatial distribution, supporting targeted marketing and route-specific promotions to encourage further service uptake. A critical success factor of the project was to target a reduction of on-bus cash handling by five per cent within the first 12 months. This would aid in reducing bus loading times, improve reliability and operator efficiencies. After an initial 16 month operational use, uptake growth in excess of 7 per cent of total revenue has been achieved, on specific routes the transfer to m-ticket has exceeded 12 per cent, with targets of 10 per cent of total cash to mobile conversion predicted by the middle of 2017, likely to be realised. The effectiveness of marketing campaigns, technical development aspects and implementation issues will be reported. These projects have a wider context. Public transport services in rural areas in England are deregulated, and have at present no effective statutory backing or ring-fenced funding. As a result, with reductions in funding to local authorities, funding for non-commercial bus services is being sharply reduced and many authorities are proposing to cease all funding for local bus services (Campaign for Better Transport, 2016). These projects may offer alternative cost-effective ways of providing local transport services in non-metropolitan areas, and thus provide the potential for unique future research opportunities. These include understanding the uptake of smart multi-modal solutions in rural areas to improve accessibility and connectivity through enhanced services for new users and for those with restricted or reduced mobility networks, whilst also offering efficiencies for operators. This research has added importance, because the UK Government is proposing legislation on bus services in England, which would confer significant extra powers on local authorities to intervene in the bus market in various ways. These projects may act as pathfinders for the use of these powers in non-metropolitan areas. Structures supporting a partnership approach involving all those with an interest in public transport are a critical part of improving rural connectivity and accessibility. Through the experience of establishing quality partnership models in Hertfordshire, this paper will go on to detail the subsequent work now underway developing a Social Enterprise model involving local government, universities, operators, health and education services in Northamptonshire, which will form the basis of the transformation of rural integrated sustainable transport delivery.Non peer reviewedSubmitted Versio

Periodic Orbits for a Discontinuous Vector Field Arising from a Conceptual Model of Glacial Cycles

Conceptual climate models provide an approach to understanding climate processes through a mathematical analysis of an approximation to reality. Recently, these models have also provided interesting examples of nonsmooth dynamical systems. Here we discuss a conceptual model of glacial cycles consisting of a system of three ordinary differential equations defining a discontinuous vector field. We show that this system has a large periodic orbit crossing the discontinuity boundary. This orbit can be interpreted as an intrinsic cycling of the Earth's climate giving rise to alternating glaciations and deglaciations