What do Families and Teams Have in Common?

They both have built-in support groups, and they’re both subjects of interest to Brad Donohue. The UNLV psychology professor takes the principles of Family Behavior Therapy and applies them in a variety of contexts, including athletic performance

Grant Helps Broaden Perspectives

Fulbright winner Alexis Lien ’05 is spending the 2005-2006 academic year teaching, studying and conducting research in Austria

Organic dairy farming in Norway under the 100% organically produced feed requirement

The EU regulation governing organic production will require 100% organic feed in organic dairy systems from August 2005 compared with 85% currently in Norway. This study aimed to assess adjustments in resource use and financial impacts on organic dairy herds using a discrete stochastic programming model. Farm management effects of the regulatory change varied between farm types. For the two organic dairy systems examined, both having a milk quota of 100 000 litres but with varying farmland availability, the introduction of the 100% organic feed regulation resulted in an economic loss of approximately 6-8% of the net income compared to the current regime. The economic loss was mainly due to the considerable higher price of organic compared to conventional concentrates

Electricity Restructuring: What Has Worked, What Has Not, and What is Next

In the 1990s and early 2000s, a series of state and federal initiatives restructured electric markets. In many areas of the country generation was unbundled from transmission and distribution and competitive markets for energy generation were established. A decade has now passed since many of these market reforms were implemented, and increasing energy prices have re-focused attention on these reforms. In particular, commentators are blaming the reforms for the rising energy prices and, in several states, legislators are now considering re-imposing regulation. In this paper I discuss some successful features of industry restructuring, and consider areas where further reform may be warranted. It appears that market restructuring is now producing significant tangible benefits in the areas of the country where it has been most fully implemented. Calls for the reimposition of heavy-handed regulation should be resisted.

When job ads turn you down : how requirements in job ads may stop instead of attract highly qualified women

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Organic dairy farming in Norway in relation to the ‘conventionalisation’ debate

The new organic farmers may differ from their more established colleagues, which may have implications for the development of the organic farming sector and its distinctiveness vis-à-vis conventional production practices. The aim of this study was to explore organic farmers’ characteristics, farming goals and conversion motives, grouped by year of conversion (three groups). A survey was undertaken among organic dairy farmers in Norway. The newcomers (converted in 2000 or later) were younger and less educated than the early entrants who converted in 1995 or earlier. The newcomer herds were fed more concentrates and had higher milk production intensity than the herds of the two earlier converting groups. Newcomers more often mentioned goals related to profit and leisure time. The early entrants were more strongly motivated by food quality and soil fertility/pollution issues than the others, whereas financial reasons were relatively more important among the newcomers. Even though trends towards more pragmatic and business oriented farming were found, the majority of the newcomers were fairly committed

Stochastic utility-efficient programming of organic dairy farms

Opportunities to make sequential decisions and adjust activities as a season progresses and more information becomes available characterise the farm management process. In this paper, we present a discrete stochastic two-stage utility efficient programming model of organic dairy farms, which includes risk aversion in the decision maker’s objective function as well as both embedded risk (stochastic programming with recourse) and non-embedded risk (stochastic programming without recourse). Historical farm accountancy data and subjective judgements were combined to assess the nature of the uncertainty that affects the possible consequences of the decisions. The programming model was used within a stochastic dominance framework to examine optimal strategies in organic dairy systems in Norway