EU-MIGRATION IN THE CONTEXT OF LIBERALIZING AGRICULTURAL MARKETS

The paper discusses the relevance of migration in the course of the forthcoming eastern enlargement of the EU focusing on the liberalization of the agricultural markets. The technical basis of this research is represented by the general equilibrium model GTAP comprising a survey of existing applications and own calculations including migration.Labor and Human Capital,

AutoTopography: what can physical mementos tell us about digital memories?

Current technology makes it possible to capture huge amounts of information related to everyday experiences. Despite this, we know little about the processes by which people identify and manage mementos - objects which are directly meaningful to their memories. Among the millions of objects people encounter in a lifetime, few become such reminders of people, places or events. We report fieldwork where participants gave us a tour of their homes describing how and why particular objects become mementos. Our findings extend the existing digital memory literature; first our participants didn't view their activities as experiential 'capture', nor were mementos limited to pictorial representations of people and events; instead they included everyday objects. Furthermore, mementos were not only displayed and shared, but also integrated into everyday activities. Finally there were complex relations between house location and memento type. We discuss the theoretical and technical implications of our work

Effects of Aggregation and Model Structure on Model Linkages

Agribusiness, Agricultural Finance, Environmental Economics and Policy,

The challenges of model based policy advice

In policy consultation, communicating model results to administration and policy makers has always proven to be a challenge for scientists. Many of the relevant preconditions for effective and successful policy advice are aggravated when results are based on the simultaneous use of a multitude of different models. This paper identifies key issues – e.g., relations to administration; correct identification of prevailing objectives of all agents involved; ability to run scenarios ‘in time’ - and discusses strategies for successful communication based on the experiences of the vTI model network. Specific attention is paid to the issue of communicating ‘conflicting’ results of different models: while often seen as a source for scientific insight, such ‘inconsistencies’ have proven to be a major obstacle for acceptance in a non-academic institutional setting. The experiences, as well as the literature, point specifically to the importance of tight linkages between modellers and policy makers, and the need to abandon decisionist or technocratic approaches of policy advice in favour of pragmatic approaches stressing the bilateral nature of communication.model network, policy advice, Agricultural and Food Policy, Teaching/Communication/Extension/Profession,

Implications of Domestic Support Disciplines for Further Agricultural Trade Liberalization

This paper employs the GTAP computable general equilibrium model and dataset to analyse the implications of domestic support reductions in the context of agricultural trade liberalisation. Three specific issues are addressed: overhang in domestic support, the accurate distinction of the boxes in the GTAP dataset and the treatment of market price support in the amber box. An extensive domestic support database is used to calculate the change in applied domestic support rates from a specified cut in bound rates, and to identify the impact on the different domestic support boxes and the required reductions in each support category. The GTAP model is extended to incorporate an explicit representation of the market price support element of the AMS. The results from these extensions of the standard database and model support the view that the impact of an agreement to reduce domestic support will be limited and lower than conventionally estimated. Results of simulations combining domestic support cuts with market access and export competition disciplines show that the effect of import tariff reductions dominate the gains from domestic support cuts once full account is taken of the issues addressed in this paper.WTO agricultural negotiations, domestic support, agricultural protection, Aggregate Measure of Support

Narrating a Life

The point of departure of this study is the temporal multilayeredness of our narrative constructions of life and identity, both in fictional and factual genres of life writing. The question of “historical sequence” and “morphology” – the central issue of the 2019 Turin conference – is reformulated as a question of life and narrative. I argue that narrative plays a crucial role in juggling the many balls of identity, at least in Western traditions of identity formation. Put differently, narrative combines diachronic and synchronic perspectives, orders of sequentiality and orders of simultaneity. This combination or, perhaps better, synthesis is not only at the heart of our narrative identity projects, it is inherent to the very narrative process. I explain and illustrate this view by examining an extract from an autobiographical narrative.The point of departure of this study is the temporal multilayeredness of our narrative constructions of life and identity, both in fictional and factual genres of life writing. The question of “historical sequence” and “morphology” – the central issue of the 2019 Turin conference – is reformulated as a question of life and narrative. I argue that narrative plays a crucial role in juggling the many balls of identity, at least in Western traditions of identity formation. Put differently, narrative combines diachronic and synchronic perspectives, orders of sequentiality and orders of simultaneity. This combination or, perhaps better, synthesis is not only at the heart of our narrative identity projects, it is inherent to the very narrative process. I explain and illustrate this view by examining an extract from an autobiographical narrative

The logic of the CAP: Politics or Economics?

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

EUROPEAN UNION ENLARGEMENT: WHAT ARE THE AGRICULTURAL TRADE MODELS MISSING?

This paper quantifies the potential impact of European Union enlargement and the consequences of ignoring the non-agricultural component of this integration. We find that agriculture-focused studies offer sound estimates of agriculture-specific production and trade changes, but the estimates of trade volume changes, and welfare gains are far too low.International Relations/Trade,