A theoretical perspective on agribusiness and ethics in a South African context

In my presidential address in 2002 I made the point that there is a growing need to make some adaptations to the neo-classical foundations of agricultural economics if we as agricultural economists want to become useful in making a contribution to the empowerment process in agriculture. I expressed the need for much more interaction and engagement with other disciplines in the social sciences if we want to play a significant role in addressing the real challenges facing agriculture in South Africa. Some new values and understanding of the principles of humanity and dignity is urgently needed. The theme of this conference provides an ideal opportunity to take this argument and the case I made for cross-disciplinarity a bit further. Last year I argued that agricultural economists need to utilise the strengths of sociology, anthropology and political analysis in order to be better equipped to tackle the challenge of black empowerment in South African agriculture. This year I will show how we need these disciplines and also philosophy if we want to address ‘ethics’ in business. The point that was made throughout my earlier paper is that economic theory sacrifices far too much relevance in its pursuit of ever-greater rigour. Given the challenges facing the agricultural sector in Africa, we need to see much stronger efforts to integrate the building of theory in economics with the study of reality.Agribusiness,

FORTY YEARS OF AGRICULTURAL ECONOMICS SCHOLARSHIP AND PRACTICE IN SOUTH AFRICA: A TIME TO CHALLENGE THE CONSENSUS AND REFOCUS OUR INTELLECTUAL WORK

Teaching/Communication/Extension/Profession,

A THEORETICAL PERSPECTIVE ON AGRIBUSINESS AND ETHICS IN A SOUTH AFRICAN CONTEXT

The theme of this conference provides an ideal opportunity to take this argument and the case I made for cross disciplinarity, a bit further. Last year I have argued that agricultural economists need to utilise the strengths of sociology, anthropology and political analysis in order to be better equipped to tackle the challenge of black empowerment in South African agriculture. This year I will show how we need these disciplines and also philosophy if we want to address 'ethics' in business. The point that was made throughout my earlier paper is that economic theory sacrifices far too much relevance in its pursuit of ever-greater rigour. Given the challenges in agricultural sector in Africa, we need to see much stronger efforts to integrate the building of theory in economics with the study of reality.Institutional and Behavioral Economics, Labor and Human Capital,

Expanding the Frontiers of Agricultural Economics to Meet the Future Challenges of Agricultural Development

In this paper I challenge the theoretical building blocks of agricultural economics and then provide some indication of how the discipline has rectified some of its shortcomings. The introduction of the New Institutional Economics into our discipline has been a major improvement. I have then argued that the challenges facing our profession are so huge that we need to think about further adaptation by making more use of other social sciences such as sociology and anthropology. This could help us understand the major complexities of dealing with the challenge of black economic empowerment in agriculture. This will however, also be necessary for us to adjust our research paradigm. This argument is well articulated by Doyer and Van Rooyen (2001) when they motivated a research method to study agribusiness supply chains. The challenges highlighted that for agricultural economic analysis to capture complex business reality and decisions to explain and predict the institutional and governance structures and optimal resource allocation behaviour of firms, approaches to research that combines positivist and constructivist are the most sensible. The combination of these approaches enables a holistic approach to the research problem. Positivism's strong explanatory and prediction capabilities are combined with the strong understanding and reconstructive capabilities of the constructivist approach. Throughout this process, qualitative and quantitative data can be used in combination. Since our research work also needs to focus more on structural and institutional issues it seems quite evident that we have to adopt a more eclectic research approach making much more use of case studies. The skills from the other social sciences will desperately be required here to advance our discipline into previously untreated terrain. This is necessary to make sure we make the important contribution to the task of building Africa's Agriculture.Community/Rural/Urban Development, International Development, Teaching/Communication/Extension/Profession,

Measurement and analysis of rural household income in a dualistic economy: The case of South Africa

Government Departments in South Africa utilise a number of different data sets on income of rural households. These include the Population Census, the October Household Survey of 1995 and 2000, the Rural Household Survey of 1997 and the various agricultural censuses (1996 and 2003). All of these use different approaches in obtaining household income. The agricultural census, for example, only reports on farm income – excluding the non-farm income. This paper reviews the different sources of household income data, their measurement techniques and the utilisation thereof. The difference in application of various surveys in the former homeland areas and the so-called commercial farming areas are also shown. In the case of the former homeland areas integrated rural household data are used for poverty measurement purposes. The context and methodologies of these surveys are discussed in detail.Consumer/Household Economics,

FARM-AGRIBUSINESS LINKAGES IN SOUTH AFRICA: EMPOWERING DISADVANTAGED COMMUNITIES THROUGH LINKS WITH AGRIBUSINESS

Agribusiness, Community/Rural/Urban Development,

Exploring the Economic Rationale for Protecting Geographical Indicators in Agriculture

The misappropriation of the names of geographical regions such as Parma, Roquefort and Champagne is protected in the European Union by a system of Geographical Indications, and is acknowledged by the World Trade Organization as an important intellectual property right. This article addresses whether there is a case for similar protection in South Africa. The article explores the economic rationale for implementing a system of Geographical Indications by addressing issues such as information asymmetry and the role of reputation; formation of niche markets; monopoly formation, value added and rural development. The economic rationale for protecting Geographical Indications derives mainly from the fact that place of origin may be used as a quality signal, or alternatively, that the resources of the region may be captured as quality attributes. In the first instance the meaning of the geographical name is emphasized in order to reduce information asymmetries. Where place of origin is used as an attribute, resources of the region are used to increase the value of the product. This includes specific resources such as production techniques, varieties and species, but also resources that are general to the region such as landscape, environment and culture. Economic arguments present a strong justification for the introduction of geographical indications in South Africa. At the same time it will afford greater protection to indigenous resources and geographical names which could, through the collective and inclusive nature of the system, directly contribute to rural development.International Development,

MODELLING THE IMPACTS OF MACROECONOMIC AND TRADE POLICIES ON THE SOUTH AFRICAN AGRICULTURAL SECTOR

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the importance of macroeconomic and trade policies on the agricultural sector in South Africa. Macroeconomic and trade policies are determined outside the agricultural sector and since the 1990s South Africa has been moving towards deregulation and trade liberalization. Structural econometric model was applied to determine the impacts of changes in macroeconomic and trade policies on the agricultural sector. Two Stage Least Squares (TSLS) was the technique used because of the simultaneous nature of the equations in the model. The results of the study shows that 10 percent reduction in import tariffs will lead to 11.44 percent increase in the degree of openness of the South African economy. Furthermore, the appreciation of the Rand will raise the domestic prices received by farmers.International Relations/Trade, Research Methods/ Statistical Methods,

Relation between quantum fluctuations and the performance enhancement of quantum annealing in a nonstoquastic Hamiltonian

We study the relation between quantum fluctuations and the significant enhancement of the performance of quantum annealing in a mean-field Hamiltonian. First-order quantum phase transitions were shown to be reduced to second order by antiferromagnetic transverse interactions in a mean-field-type many-body-interacting Ising spin system in a transverse field, which means an exponential speedup of quantum annealing by adiabatic quantum computation. We investigate if and how quantum effects manifest themselves around these first- and second-order phase transitions to understand if the antiferromagnetic transverse interactions appended to the conventional transverse-field Ising model induce notable quantum effects. By measuring the proximity of the semiclassical spin-coherent state to the true ground state as well as the magnitude of the concurrence representing entanglement, we conclude that significant quantum fluctuations exist around second-order transitions, whereas quantum effects are much less prominent at first-order transitions. Although the location of the transition point can be predicted by the classical picture, system properties near the transition need quantum-mechanical descriptions for a second-order transition but not necessarily for first order. It is also found that quantum fluctuations are large within the ferromagnetic phase after a second-order transition from the paramagnetic phase. These results suggest that the antiferromagnetic transverse interactions induce marked quantum effects, and this fact would be related to closely to the significant enhancement of the performance of quantum annealing.Comment: 9 pages, 8 figure