TIME SERIES ANALYSIS OF A PRINCIPAL-AGENT MODEL TO ASSESS RISK SHIFTING AND BARGAINING POWER IN COMMODITY MARKETING CHANNELS

We apply the classic agency model to investigate risk shifting in an agricultural marketing channel, using time series analysis. We show that if the principal is risk-neutral and the agent is risk-averse instead of risk-neutral, then a linear contract can still be optimal if the fixed payment is negative. Empirical results for the Dutch potato marketing channel indicate that while fixed payments to farmers (agents) have decreased over time, even to negative levels, the incentive intensity has approximately doubled, and the risk premium the farmers ask for has remained considerable. These results imply that risk has shifted from wholesalers, processors, and retailers to farmers; we argue that this shift could be the consequence of chain reversal, i.e., the transformation of the traditional supply chain into a demand-oriented chain.Marketing, Risk and Uncertainty,

Local affordable housing dynamics in two global cities: patterns and possible lessons?

This paper compares how New York and London, two major global cities, have developed policies and programmes to help ensure affordable housing for their citizens. It clarifies how, starting from relatively limited local regulatory powers in the nineteenth century, each city has used local resources as well as centrally authorized programmes, to create unique mixes of rental housing support, mostly based on instruments that enable sub-market rents. It goes on to discuss how the legacies arising from these interventions, both positive and negative, have influenced affordability in these cities’ current, more internationally open and generally more privatized, housing systems. The relative success of both cities has depended on the management of this pastiche of programmes and financing. Even so, while large proportions of lower income households in both cities (although larger in London) are assisted, there remains significant, and, in current economic circumstances, potentially growing numbers of households, facing unaffordable market rents. In the foreseeable future it can only be an amalgam of these local and nationally supported policies together with local initiatives that can help limit, although not resolve, the continuing problems of ensuring adequate affordable homes for lower income households in both New York and London

Time of Decision

We are now witnessing developments which may result in a final act of decision permitting a system of transportation, the trans-Alaska pipeline, for the southward flow of oil from the North Slope of Alaska to Pacific ports. Concurrently the goods and facilities necessary for pipeline construction and operation will allow a counterflow of materials and people northward, the people drawn by opportunities to participate in new economic ventures or simply to view and enjoy environments at present of limited access. The last, great wilderness frontier of the United States - Alaska - has long since been breached. Now the government of the United States must resolve a conflict between the forces of economic growth and those of environmental protection and preservation as to whether that breach shall be widened. ... One way to understand better the complex situation created by the urge to develop oil as against the urge to protect and preserve the environment is to break down the complex into the major issues constituting the whole. These issues can then be considered individually and, taken all together, can give a better appreciation of what is going on and provide a basis for prediction of what is likely to happen in the future. A few of these issues are mentioned below in very summary fashion. Each has its proponents and detractors. There is no opportunity here to illuminate fully the arguments and no attempt is made to be comprehensive. ... [The issues discussed include: the need for energy, the environmental crisis, the economic picture, the interest of the state of Alaska, the place of the federal government, national security, and native claims.

Risk Management Using Futures Contracts: The Impact of Spot Market Contracts and Production Horizons on the Optimal Hedge Ratio

We specify a principal-agent marketing channel involving producers, wholesalers, retailers and a futures market. Our hedge ratio for producers appears to be much lower than the common price-risk minimising ones as we account for producers vertical contracts and, by using annual data, their production horizon. The Dutch ware potato marketing channel and its futures market in Amsterdam show that possibly through decreases in producers and wholesalers risk aversions, their optimal dynamic hedge ratios decreased from 38% and 12%, respectively, in 1982 to 18% and 10%, respectively, in 2003. These results comply with the decreased futures volume traded in Amsterdam over the years.Principal-Agent Model, Risk Management, Futures and Spot Market Contracts, Production Horizons, Food Marketing Channels, Marketing, Risk and Uncertainty,

Respectful Maternity Care and Midwives' Caring Behaviours During Childbirth in Two Hospitals In Calabar, Nigeria

All women deserve humane, considerate, sensitive and respectful care in childbirth. Respectful maternity care (RMC) is human right and standard midwifery practice. However there have been general public complaints about lack of respectful behaviour by midwives. To determine clients' experience of respectful maternity care and midwives' caring behaviour, two hospitals in Calabar, Nigeria were selected for this study. This descriptive study collected data from 83 purposively selected postnatal women who had spontaneous vaginal delivery, and 51 midwives caring for them. Ethical clearance was obtained from the HREC of Cross River State Ministry of Health and informed consent from participants. Clients and midwives identified respectful maternity care received/practiced from the RMC checklist. Data were analyzed using SPSS version18.0. RMC was reported by 58 (69.9%) clients while 25 (30.1%) reported lack of it in different categories. Non-respectful care reported included lack of privacy, lack of information about progress of labour, denying preference and choice of childbirth position, lack of sensitivity towards clients' pain and culture, verbal abuse, detention in facility for non-payment of bill. Attending midwives confirmed not adequately screening or draping women (because of lack of screens and drapes); restricting women to deliver in the dorsal position and detaining women if they cannot pay the bill (because of hospital policy). Common acts of disrespectful care experienced by women in this study fit into some of the categories identified in literature. Appropriate maternity care must be respectful and rights-based in order to enhance utilization of maternity services and access to skilled care

Making Cornish–Fisher Distributions Fit

Preprin

The Vascular Flora of the Potomac River Watershed of King George County, Virginia

The results of two floristic studies of King George County, Virginia, are combined into an annotated checklist. Field work was initiated in 1983-84 with a study of Caledon Natural Area, a 2,500-acre tract with 3.5 miles of frontage on the Potomac River. Collecting resumed in 1991 and 1992 to include other portions of the county drained by the Potomac River. The study area contains a wide variety of habitats including dry upland woods, mesic ravines, low elevation river flats, beaches, swamps, marshes, and creeks; creeks and marshes include both brackish and freshwater environments. The Potomac River watershed of King George County harbors a diverse assemblage of plants; the checklist includes documentation for 918 species of vascular plants classified in 466 genera and 130 families. This total includes 418 species that at the time of collection were the first records of occurrence in King George County

Monospecific helminth and arthropod infections in an urban population of brown rats from Doha, Qatar

Parasitic infections were studied for the first time in an urban population of brown rats (Rattus norvegicus) from Doha. Only one species of helminth was found, the cestode Hymenolepis diminuta, and one ectoparasite, the flea Xenopsylla astia, from a sample size of 136 rats (52 males and 84 females). The prevalence of H. diminuta was 17.6%, increasing with host age but not in relation to host sex nor season of capture. Host age was a key factor in influencing abundance of infection, although there was a significant three-way interaction with season and host sex arising through heavy infections in juvenile male rats in the summer. The prevalence of X. astia was 45.6%, although both prevalence and abundance of infestations were season and host age dependent. In the winter prevalence and abundance were similar in both host age and sex groups, but in the summer both parameters of infestation were markedly higher among juveniles compared with adults. We found evidence for some association between these two species: H. diminuta was more prevalent among rats with fleas than among those without, although this association was season-, and independently sex- and age-dependent. There were no quantitative interactions and reasons for this are discussed in relation to the foraging and breeding behaviour of the brown rat in Qatar

Note on a sigma model connection with instanton dynamics

It is well known that the instanton approach to QCD generates an effective term which looks like a three flavor determinant of quark bilinears. This has the right behavior to explain the unusual mass and mixing of the $\eta(958)$ meson, as is often simply illustrated with the aid of a linear SU(3) sigma model. It is less well known that the instanton analysis generates another term which has the same transformation property but does not have a simple interpretation in terms of this usual linear sigma model. Here we point out that this term has an interpretation in a generalized linear sigma model containing two chiral nonets. The second chiral nonet is taken to correspond to mesons having two quarks and two antiquarks in their makeup. The generalized model seems to be useful for learning about the spectrum of low lying scalar mesons which have been emerging in the last few years. The physics of the new term is shown to be related to the properties of an "excited" $\eta'$ state present in the generalized model and for which there are some experimental candidates.Comment: reference added, minor typos correcte