From peasant society to manufacturing society

Since the early 1990's when the first cases of HIV were found in Vietnam, the number of people infected with HIV has been increasing. Over half of the Vietnamese population is under the age of 25 and 78.9% of the reported cases of HIV are people between the ages of 20 and 39. This thesis work has been undertaken to evaluate whether there is a need to focus more on the youth in terms of prevention within HIV and AIDS related to the move from a peasant society to a more industrialised society. To investigate this, a literature desk study was carried out supported by key informant interviews and a small questionnaire. It was found that specifically the HIV and AIDS law, stigma, discrimination, gender roles, and risk-behaviour of migrants and the Vietnamese youth were important factors linked with vulnerability and livelihood change after doi moi. Although more research on a national level on the subject is needed, the findings indicate that changes have happened since doi moi which influences the linkages between livelihood change and HIV and AIDS vulnerability among the youth in Vietnam

The endogenous formation of sustanaible trade agreements

This paper addresses the endogenous formation of trade agreements in a three - country model of imperfect competition. While the requirement of sustainability of preferential trade areas has often been ignored in the literature, I construct a framework for predicting which trade agreements form when sustainability is explicitly included as a constraint on the formation of the cooperative agreements. It is found that the introduction of a self-enforcement requirement reduces the overall scope for a cooperative trade agreements, and that preferential trade areas can be stepping stones or stumbling blocks depending on the size of relative demand between countries.trade agreements, customs unions, FTAs

Exchange Rate Targeting in a Small Open Economy

The paper develops a New Keynesian Small Open Economy Model charac- terized by external habit formation and Calvo price setting with dynamic inflation updating. The model is used to analyze the e¤ect of nominal ex- change rate targeting on optimal policy and impulse responses. It is found that even moderate exchange rate concerns are capable of changing both sign and magnitude of the optimal instrument response to variables, and that whether the concern is with respect to the level or first di¤erence has much impact on monetary policy. Also, the cost of exchange rate stabilization in terms of output and inflation is evident in the model, and impulse responses under moderate exchange rate targeting are not simple combinations of those under a float and a regime that cares almost only for meeting the exchange rate target.Flexible inflation targeting, exchange rates, fear of floating

Denmark is Damaging Children by Leaving them on Lesbos

In this essay, Mette Nielsen zooms in on the Danish response to the fire in the Moira camp on Lesbos.&nbsp

innovative Public Organic food Procurement for Youth (iPOPY). Lessons learned from implementing organic into European school meals – policy implications.

The introduction of organic food offers new dimensions to school meals, and schools offer new dimensions to organic food – when tackled properly. In this paper we present findings from the iPOPY research project that is funded by the ERA-Net, CORE-Organic-I funding body network. It is based on studies of school food policies in Denmark, Finland, Italy and Norway. The embedded food traditions and cultures have had different attention in these countries, why also food related consumption, institutions and markets are quite heterogeneous and dynamic. Whereas school food services are relatively widely embedded in the school systems in Finland and Italy, the Danish and Norwegian school food is predominantly defined by the packed lunch brought from home when it comes to organic food the pattern is different. To analyse the strategies used in these countries we have selected a number of cases where in-depth studies have been conducted. The concept of embedding has been used in these studies and it has been informed by policy and actor network theories. The results of this analysis show a complexity in implementing organic food in existing school food aims, in embedding school food policies and in comprising also aims and policies for organic food purchasing in these. The variety amongst the analysed countries in strategies and success is identified, covering both structural and stakeholder related findings. A major finding is pointing at the challenge of “multi-embedding” processes when including organic food in school meal procurement

Does the Gap in Family-friendly Policies Drive the Family Gap?

A segregation of the labour market into a family-friendly and a non-family friendly sector has the effect that women self-select into the sectors depending on institutional constraints, preferences for family-friendly working conditions and expected wage differences. We find that neglecting the sector dimension tends to understate the effect of birth-related interruptions in both sectors. The combined effect of a large depreciation effect and no recovery means that females in the non-family friendly sector (e.g. private sector) are punished severely after childbirth. In the family friendly sector (e.g. public sector), we find complete catch up.Fertility; family gap; career interruptions; wages; public vs. private sector

Marriage Migration: Just another case of positive assortative matching?

It is a stylized fact that marriage formation generally involves positive assortative matching (PAM) on education. We test whether this is also the case for immigrants who tend to import their spouses and potentially use education as an exchange mechanism. We find that only women match positively on education. For Turks the results robustly confirm PAM, whereas for Pakistanis there is no evidence of PAM. For men there is local support to the exchange hypothesis, since cultural assimilation or conflicts with parents, through less spouse import, increase the likelihood of marrying a highly educated spouse.assortative matching; homogamy; exchange; marriage migration; spouse import