The Impact of Property Rights Imperfections on Resource Allocation and Market Development: Co-Ownership of Land in Bulgaria

Land Economics/Use,

Commercialization and Subsistence in Transaction Agriculture: Empirical Evidence from Albania, Bulgaria, Hungary and Romania.

Present-day Central and Eastern European agriculture is characterized by a high incidence of small-scale farmers who are not producing for the market. This paper uses household level data from comparative farm surveys in Albania, Bulgaria, Hungary and Romania to analyze which farm household characteristics and endowments influence commercialization and subsistence farming.

Foreign investment, supermarkets, and the restructuring of supply chains: Evidence from Eastern European dairy sectors.

Investment; Investments; Working; Foreign investment; Supermarkets; Restructuring; Supply chains; Supply chain; Sector;

Property Rights Imperfections, Asset Allocation, and Welfare: Co-Ownership in Bulgaria

This paper analyzes how imperfections of property rights affect allocation of assets and welfare, using micro-survey data from Bulgaria. Co-ownership of assets is widespread in many countries due to inheritance. Central and Eastern Europe offers an interesting natural experiment to assess the effects of such rights imperfections because of the asset restitution process in the 1990s. Bulgaria is particularly interesting because of the prominence of the co-ownership problem (about half of all land plots are co-owned), because of the strong fragmentation of land, and because of legislation providing an instrument to separate out chosen (endogenous) versus forced (exogenous) forms of coownership. We find that land in co-ownership is much more likely to be used by less efficient farm organizations or to be left abandoned, and that it leads to significant welfare losses.Land Economics/Use, Resource /Energy Economics and Policy,

Property rights imperfections and asset allocation: co-ownership in Bulgaria.

This paper analyzes how imperfections of property rights affect households’ allocation of assets using micro-survey data from Bulgaria. Co-ownership of assets is widespread in many countries due to inheritance. Central and Eastern Europe offers an interesting natural experiment to assess the effects of this type of property rights imperfection because of the asset restitution process in the 1990s. In Bulgaria, where co-ownership is very prominent and land is strongly fragmented, the land reform and inheritance legislation allows identifying the impact of co-ownership by taking advantage of a discontinuity created by a minimum plot size law. We find that land in co-ownership is more likely to be used by less efficient farm organizations or to be left abandoned, and that it is related to significant welfare losses. The paper hence provides evidence of sub-optimal land allocation following a privatization that established formal but imperfect property rightsProperty rights; Asset allocation; Land markets;

The Impact of Property Rights Imperfections on Resource Allocation and Welfare: Co-ownership of Land in Bulgaria

This study used a unique 2003 survey dataset to analyse the developments in land use and exchange in Bulgaria. The survey analysis yields several results. Land is highly fragmented in Bulgaria which increases the need for an efficient exchange of land between owners and users of land. However, the land sales market is not well developed. In contrast, land rental agreements are very widespread. Land rental is widely used to exchange land between owners and users of the land. The users include a variety of farm types, including cooperatives, farming companies, and individual farms. While land titles are distributed and land plots clearly defined and delineated, an important property rights problem exists under the form of so-called "co-ownership". By law, certain plots are undividable among heirs because the plot size after division would fall under the imposed minimum plot size. Our estimation results show that co-ownership has a major impact on land use and allocation. Land under co-ownership and which is undividable by law, is more likely to be left abandoned or used by large enterprises - the default users of land given the history of land use in Bulgaria - compared to owner-cultivation or renting out to another household. Our analysis shows that solving co-ownership problems would not only stimulate efficient land allocation which in turn affects the household's welfare level. Land that is cultivated by the household or rented to an other household contributes more to its welfare than land that is rented to a cooperative or left abandoned.Land Economics/Use, Resource /Energy Economics and Policy,

Foreign Investment, Supermarkets, and the Restructuring of Supply Chains: Evidence from Eastern European Dairy Sectors

The combination of transition and globalization since the early 1990s has caused dramatic changes in supply chains globally. This paper uses survey evidence from several Eastern European countries (Albania, Bulgaria, Poland, Slovakia, Romania and Russia) on how these forces affect the dairy sector. In many countries dairy firms are small family firms. Investments by foreign companies in processing and retailing and the opening to international markets have introduced higher standards, leading, in turn, to extensive contracting and vertical coordination in the dairy chain. In countries close to the EU the restructuring of the dairy chain was mostly driven by investments in dairy processing, while in countries further from the EU, and less advanced in transition, retail investments are playing a more important role in driving change throughout the dairy chain. There have been significant efficiency gains, and the vertical coordination had positive effects on firm investments and productivity, especially since the late 1990s. Evidence suggests that small dairy firms have generally benefited from the vertical coordination processes

Property Rights Imperfections, Asset Allocation, and Welfare: Co-Ownership in Bulgaria

This paper analyzes how imperfections of property rights affect allocation of assets and welfare, using micro-survey data from Bulgaria. Co-ownership of assets is widespread in many countries due to inheritance. Central and Eastern Europe offers an interesting natural experiment to assess the effects of such rights imperfections because of the asset restitution process in the 1990s. Bulgaria is particularly interesting because of the prominence of the co-ownership problem (about half of all land plots are co-owned), because of the strong fragmentation of land, and because of legislation providing an instrument to separate out chosen (endogenous) versus forced (exogenous) firms of co-ownership. We find that land in co-ownership is much more likely to be used by less efficient firm organizations or to be left abandoned, and that it leads to significant welfare losses