Analysis of Trade and Environmental Policy Options on the Basis of a National Agricultural Sector Model with Multifunctional Outputs

Studies on liberalisation normally do not take into account the external benefits and costs of agriculture. Empirical studies on the valuation of externalities should be integrated into quantitative modelling. MULTSIM is a national supply model of agriculture. Besides commodity output the model depicts also external benefit linked to landscape preservation and external environmental costs of agriculture. Internalisation scenarios are defined showing that the reduction of commodity-linked support and the introduction of land subsidies and intermediate input taxes have differentiated impacts on the farm types’ competitiveness. A comprehensive policy approach to multifunctional agriculture requires market feedbacks to be taken into account. Internalising externalities may lead to a strong reduction of commodity output quantities. This gives rise to expectations that commodity prices would increase, which in turn would dampen the production impacts. As a consequence MULTSIM should be regarded as a bridge tool that may be linked to microeconomic based multi market models and agricultural trade models. A further strain of model development is an improved consideration of multiple policy objectives.environmental costs, multifunctional agriculture, policy analysis, agricultural sector modelling, Agricultural and Food Policy, Environmental Economics and Policy, International Relations/Trade,

The Global Spread of Stock Exchange, 1980-1998

Nations opened local stock exchanges at a rapid pace during the late 1980s and 1990s, creating a channel for investment capital from wealthy industrial nations to "emerging markets" as well as a mechanism for institutional change in local economies. This study examines the local and global processes by which exchanges spread, examining all nations "at risk" during the 1980s and 1990s. We find that local factors influencing the creation of stock exchanges included the size of the economy (overall and relative to population size); the legacy of colonialism; and a recent transition to multi-party democracy. Global factors associated with creating exchanges included levels of prior investment by multinationals; IMF "structural adjustment" aid; centrality in trade flows; and regional "contagion." In contrast to prior work in financial economics, we find no evidence for the influence of legal tradition, and contrary to the implications of dependency theory, we find no sign that foreign capital penetration affects the creation of exchanges. We also find no consistent evidence for the influence of stock exchanges on inequality or human development at the national level, above and beyond their effect on economic and population growth. The results indicate that globalization is usefully construed as a process analogous to institutional diffusion at the organization level.http://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/39725/3/wp341.pd

The Global Spread of Stock Exchange, 1980-1998

Nations opened local stock exchanges at a rapid pace during the late 1980s and 1990s, creating a channel for investment capital from wealthy industrial nations to "emerging markets" as well as a mechanism for institutional change in local economies. This study examines the local and global processes by which exchanges spread, examining all nations "at risk" during the 1980s and 1990s. We find that local factors influencing the creation of stock exchanges included the size of the economy (overall and relative to population size); the legacy of colonialism; and a recent transition to multi-party democracy. Global factors associated with creating exchanges included levels of prior investment by multinationals; IMF "structural adjustment" aid; centrality in trade flows; and regional "contagion." In contrast to prior work in financial economics, we find no evidence for the influence of legal tradition, and contrary to the implications of dependency theory, we find no sign that foreign capital penetration affects the creation of exchanges. We also find no consistent evidence for the influence of stock exchanges on inequality or human development at the national level, above and beyond their effect on economic and population growth. The results indicate that globalization is usefully construed as a process analogous to institutional diffusion at the organization level.globalization, contagion, financial markets

Documentation of the Central and Eastern European Countries Agricultural Simulation Model (CEEC-ASIM Version 1.0)

The Central and Eastern European Countries Agricultural Simulation Model (CEEC-ASIM) has been developed at IAMO. It is a partial equilibrium model for the agricultural sectors of 14 countries including demand of domestic consumers and is designed to analyse the impacts of agricultural policies on important target variables like producer and consumer prices, supply and input demand of agriculture, food demand, net trade and welfare. Particular efforts were undertaken to implement also the policy instruments of the Common Agricultural Policy of the European Union. These besides the market price support measures also include the different forms of domestic support as for example area payments and beef premiums. Also the set-aside obligations and production quotas can be taken into account. This discussion paper serves as a model documentation and describes the structure of the model along with the basic modelling assumptions. The model is essentially based on neoclassical theory. The main hypotheses are perfect markets, profit maximisation of producers and utility maximisation of consumers. -- G E R M A N V E R S I O N: Das Central and Eastern European Countries Agricultural Simulation Model (CEEC-ASIM) ist am IAMO entwickelt worden. Es ist ein partiales Gleichgewichtsmodell für die Agrarsektoren von 14 Ländern und umfasst auch die Nachfrage der Verbraucher. Insbesondere ist es für die Analyse der Auswirkungen von Agrarpolitiken auf wichtige Zielgrößen wie die Erzeuger- und Verbraucherpreise, Angebots- und Faktornachfragemengen der Landwirtschaft, Konsumentennachfrage, Nettohandel und Wohlfahrt erstellt worden. Besondere Anstrengungen sind unternommen worden, die Instrumente der Gemeinsamen Agrarpolitik der Europäischen Union in das Modell einzubeziehen. Diese umfassen neben den Maßnahmen der Marktpreisstützung auch verschiedene Formen der internen Stützung wie zum Beispiel die Flächenzahlungen und Prämien im Rindfleischbereich. Auch können Flächenstilllegungsverpflichtungen sowie Produktionsquoten berücksichtigt werden. Dieses Diskussionspapier dient als Dokumentation und beschreibt die Struktur des Modells sowie die grundlegenden Modellannahmen. Das Modell basiert im Wesentlichen auf der neoklassischen Theorie. Die zentralen Hypothesen sind vollständige Märkte, gewinnmaximierende Produzenten und nutzenmaximierende Konsumenten.Sector Modelling,Agricultural Sector,Partial Equilibrium Model,Policy Analyses,Sektormodellierung,Agrarsektor,partielles Gleichgewichtsmodell,Politik Analyse

Speeding up SOR Solvers for Constraint-based GUIs with a Warm-Start Strategy

Many computer programs have graphical user interfaces (GUIs), which need good layout to make efficient use of the available screen real estate. Most GUIs do not have a fixed layout, but are resizable and able to adapt themselves. Constraints are a powerful tool for specifying adaptable GUI layouts: they are used to specify a layout in a general form, and a constraint solver is used to find a satisfying concrete layout, e.g.\ for a specific GUI size. The constraint solver has to calculate a new layout every time a GUI is resized or changed, so it needs to be efficient to ensure a good user experience. One approach for constraint solvers is based on the Gauss-Seidel algorithm and successive over-relaxation (SOR). Our observation is that a solution after resizing or changing is similar in structure to a previous solution. Thus, our hypothesis is that we can increase the computational performance of an SOR-based constraint solver if we reuse the solution of a previous layout to warm-start the solving of a new layout. In this paper we report on experiments to test this hypothesis experimentally for three common use cases: big-step resizing, small-step resizing and constraint change. In our experiments, we measured the solving time for randomly generated GUI layout specifications of various sizes. For all three cases we found that the performance is improved if an existing solution is used as a starting solution for a new layout

Auswirkungen der EU-Osterweiterung im Agrarbereich

Die EU-Osterweiterung wirft hinsichtlich der Belastung des EU-Haushaltes erhebliche Fragen auf. Das trifft für beide große Politikbereiche, die aus dem EU-Budget finanziert werden, zu; die Agrarpolitik und die Strukturpolitik. In diesem Beitrag werden nur die Auswirkungen der Übertragung der Gemeinsamen Agrarpolitik (GAP), wie sie in der Agenda 2000 festgeschrieben ist, auf die 10 Beitrittskandidaten Mittel- und Osteuropas analysiert. Die Untersuchung zeigt, dass mit zusätzlichen Ausgaben in Höhe von 8 Mrd. Euro für die wichtigsten Ausgabenbereiche zu rechnen ist. Der Großteil dieser finanziellen Transfer-leistungen fließt als Direktzahlungen den Landwirten zu. Dabei zeigt sich, dass die Verteilung der Mittel zwischen den Ländern sehr ungleich ist, wenn man sie auf die Fläche oder die Arbeitskraft bezieht. Auf dieser Basis sind sie aber auch erheblich niedriger als in der EU-15. Schwer zu beantworten ist die Frage, wie viel von den Direktzahlungen bei den die Fläche bewirtschaftenden Landwirten verbleiben und welcher Teil an die Verpächter von Land weitergereicht wird. Auf Grund des in einigen Beitrittsländern hohen Pachtanteils ist diese Frage von erheblicher Bedeutung für die Transfereffizienz. Die gesamten im Zusammenhang mit der GAP zu leistenden Ausgaben aus dem EU-Haushalt sind höher als die hier ausgewiesenen, da nicht alle Bereiche in die Analyse einbezogen worden. Dazu zählen die Verwaltungsausgaben sowie die Erstattungen für einige Produkte wie Wein, Olivenöl, Obst Gemüse, Tabak und Schaffleisch. -- E N G L I S H V E R S I O N: The East-Enlargement of the EU raises several questions regarding the EU-budget. This holds for both policy areas for which financial transfers are made out of the EU-budget; the structural policies and the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP). This paper focuses on the impact of implementing the CAP as specified in the Agenda 2000 in the 10 Central and Eastern European candidate countries. The analysis shows that about 8 Bill. Euro will have to be transferred for the main types of payments out of the EU budget to the new members. The larger part of these financial transfers will be direct payments and not measures for market support. It also becomes evident that these expenditures are quite unequally distributed among the candidate countries if one calculates them per hectare or per person working in agriculture. In addition, in comparison to the EU-15 they are substantially lower. It is rather difficult to say how of the direct payments will remain with the farmer and what share is going to be transferred to the land lessors. Since in some of the candidate countries, leased land holds a large share of total cultivated land this question is important for transfer efficiency. The overall expenditures to be paid from the EU-budget in relation to the CAP are higher than what is shown here since not all types of payments considered in the analysis. This holds for outlays for administrative purposes as well for commodities such as wine, olive oil, fruits, vegetable, tobacco and mutton.EU-Osterweiterung,EU-Haushalt,Sektormodellierung,Agrarsector,partielles Gleichgewichtsmodell,Politikanalyse,EU-Eastenlargement,EU-Budget,Sector Modelling,Agricultural Sector,Partial Equilibrium Model,Policy Analyses

EU-Agrarpolitik: Entwicklung, Stand, Perspektiven

Agricultural and Food Policy,

Method to Control Multiple Segmented LLSM without Position Encoder

In recent years long stator linear synchronous motors (LLSM) started to replace the typical rotating to linear converters like belts, chains, screw systems, pulleys, disks and so on. With LLSM a lot of drawbacks in the machine concepts and design can be prevented. For long tracks, reducing reactive power and individual control of numerous moveable units, the track is segmented in several fed stator units. Because of the LLSM construction an operation with a physical position encoder is not desirable. For that reason position observers should be used instead. In this paper a method to control the multiple segmented LLSM without position encoder is proposed. The special behaviour during entrance and exit of one moveable unit in an active stator segment is described and the control concept via a master slave relationship is proposed. Experimental results are presented to demonstrate the performance and feasibility of the proposed method