Measuring Farm and Market Level Economic Impacts of Improved Maize Production Technologies in Ethiopia: Evidence from Panel Data

While it is often recognised that agricultural technology adoption decisions are intertwined and best characterised by multivariate models, typical approaches to examining adoption and impacts of agricultural technology have focused on single technology adoption choice and ignored interdependence among technologies. We examine farm‐ and market‐level impacts of multiple technology adoption choices using comprehensive household survey data collected in 2010/11 and 2012/13 in Ethiopia. Economic surplus analysis combined with panel data switching endogenous regression models are used to compute the supply shift parameter (K‐shift parameter), while at the same time controlling for the endogeneity inherent in agricultural technology adoption among farmers. We find that our improved technology set choices have significant impacts on farm‐level maize yield and maize production costs, where the greatest effect appears to be generated when various technologies are combined. The change in maize yield and production costs results in an average 26.4% cost reduction per kilogram of maize output (the K‐shift parameter). This increases the producer and consumer surpluses by US$ 140 and US$ 105 million per annum, respectively. These changes in economic surplus help to reduce the number of poor people by an estimated 788 thousand per year. We conclude that deliberate extension efforts and other policies that encourage integration of technologies are important for maize technologies to yield their full potential at both farm and market levels.     

Past price ‘memory’ in the housing market: testing the performance of different spatio-temporal specifications

Recent methodological developments provide a way to incorporate the temporal dimension when accounting for spatial effects in hedonic pricing. Weight matrices should decompose the spatial effects into two distinct components: bidirectional contemporaneous spatial connections; and unidirectional spatio-temporal effects from past transactions. Our iterative estimation approach explicitly analyses the role of time in price determination. The results show that both spatio-temporal components should be included in model specification; past transaction information stops contributing to price determination after eight months; and limited temporal friction is exhibited within this period. These findings highlight the decidedly non-linear temporal patterns of such information effects.     

刺芪参胶囊的制备工艺研究

目的:探索刺芪参胶囊的制备工艺。方法:采用正交实验,以总皂苷质量为指标,优化提取工艺;采用单因素实验优化制剂工艺。结果:在最佳提取工艺条件下,刺芪参胶囊提取物中的总皂苷含量为12.19 mg·g-1;以糊精作为填充剂、硬脂酸镁为助流剂、95%乙醇为黏合剂制备胶囊剂。结论:刺芪参胶囊的制备工艺稳定可行。     

债务违约、社会责任与政府支持

转型期中国，地方国有企业作为地区经济发展的一股中坚力量，当其发生债务违约时，作为实际控制人的地方政府究竟是否愿意提供支持，会优先选择哪些企业提供支持，政府的支持行为是否会影响到信贷资源的配置效率呢?为得到验证，文章选取2007-2016年沪深A股地方国有上市企业作为研究样本，实证分析了地方国企发生债务违约后，地方政府的支持行为及其对信贷资源配置效率的影响。研究结论表明：第一，地方国企发生债务违约后，地方政府会提供更多的"支持"，且支持额度与债务违约额呈显著正相关关系；第二，债务违约前，承担了更多社会责任（环保投资、捐赠以及就业等）的地方国企，在债务违约后可相应地获得更多的地方政府支持；第三，违约企业，尤其是得到更多政府支持的违约企业可获得更多的信贷资源，而其经营业绩却往往更差。由此表明政府干预一定程度上降低了信贷资源配置效率。     

Mobile learning adoption for tourism education in a developing country

Since developing countries are gradually introducing mobile-based tourism education, it is a growing demand to understand the students’ intention to adopt mobile learning. The study used partial least squares-based structural equation modelling to analyse survey data from 176 questionnaires at three tourism education institutes in Bangladesh. The study contributes to the theory of planned behaviour by examining the antecedent impact of innovativeness and moderating effect of self-efficacy. Results confirmed innovativeness as a significant antecedent on the attitude–intention relationship; however, the moderating effect of self-efficacy has not been supported. The study has marketing implications for tourism education institutes and government bodies.     

基于双kinect数据融合技术的工人作业疲劳智能化检测研究

本文针对制造型企业工人的作业疲劳检测问题,首先采用双kinect数据融合技术,提出了骨骼数据融合算法模型并应用于人体姿势识别,实现对工人作业疲劳姿势的智能化检测;然后将该算法与单kinect、Lin等算法比较,验证该算法的可靠性及识别精度;最后通过企业案例进行工人作业疲劳检测,结合人因工程学对工人动作进行分析并改善,对比验证结果表明,基于姿态角的双kinect人体姿势识别算法识别时间明显缩短,识别率显著增强,精准度较高,工人姿势识别数据具有较高可靠性.     

The many shades of ‘openness’: an application of item response theory to open innovation research

This study addresses one of the most basic research questions investigated in the Open Innovation (OI) literature: how open are firms? This question has remained partially unanswered given the challenges encountered by empirical research in assessing the relevance of specific OI practices within the OI model, as well as the types of activities perceived by managers as OI benefits or concerns. To provide an answer to this question, we suggest a framework using Item Response Theory to improve over current measures of firms' openness and test it on a sample of 383 technology‐based SMEs. Our theoretical model conceives openness as an instance of how firms make decisions regarding the adoption of different OI practices based on their evaluation of OI benefits and concerns. Focusing on the relationship between firm‐level differences in terms of openness and the types of OI practices adopted by these firms, we show that significantly different levels of ‘OI maturity’ are required to broaden the scope of external partnerships and to shift from non‐pecuniary OI modes (relation‐based approaches) toward pecuniary (transaction‐based) practices. Our results have relevant implications for the OI literature and provide new managerial insight into OI adoption.     

Moving beyond the tensions in open environmental innovation towards a holistic perspective

This paper analyses factors determining open environmental innovation (EI) and explores the possibility of embracing their tensions to achieve integrated environmental strategic goals. Building on recent literature linking open innovation and EI, the study assumes open EI strategic goals as a multidimensional construct based on the “synergistic and interwoven nature” of four identified enabling factors, that is, partners, knowledge, benefits, and motivations. A fuzzy‐set qualitative comparative analysis (fsQCA) based on Boolean algebra is conducted to analyse a set of 186 European companies operating in the telecommunication and information and communication technology (ICT) service industries. Making important theoretical, managerial, and policy contributions, this paper offers insights into the key factors enabling open EI and the tensional relationships within and between them. In doing so, it captures the non‐linear effects among these factors and the strategic goals related to an open EI strategy. It also suggests how the paradox theory might help in addressing the tensional dilemma of open EI strategy.     

A tale of two Italies: ‘access-orders’ and the Italian regional divide

ABSTRACT

This paper uses the ‘access orders’ paradigm developed by North, Wallis, and Weingast [(2009). Violence and social order: A conceptual framework for interpreting recorded human history. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press] to analyse the case of the Italian North–South economic divide. In line with their framework, we collect and discuss several social and political indicators over the long-run, at the regional level. Firstly we looked at data on the pre-conditions for the establishment of an open-access order, such as murders per capita (a proxy for control over violence), voting turnout and referendums participation (proxies for political legitimacy), and the impersonality of exchange. We then showed evidence of different access orders in the North and in the South, using the information on human capital formation, women participation in the labour market, and referendum results. On the basis of this evidence, we argue that, despite being part of the same State and subject to the same formal institutions, the North of the country progressively developed into an open-access order, while the South remained a form of limited access order.

Institutional differences are linked to specific aspects of the economic performance of the two areas, thus the ‘access order’ paradigm appears to be an effective conceptual scheme to explain the North–South economic divide.