An evaluation framework for earthquake-responsive land administration

In recent years earthquakes and their secondary hazards have claimed the largest number of lives of all large natural disasters. Some of the world’s most earthquake-prone zones are also areas of high population density. The impact is magnified by vulnerability factors including non-enforcement of building codes, knowledge gaps, urban poverty and poor governance capacity to manage and reduce earthquake risks. Poor security of land tenure and property rights increases the vulnerability of people and affects their ability to respond to natural disasters.Earthquake recovery and reconstruction provides very significant challenges for land agencies, with these challenges differing from one country to the next due to differences in the local context. Drawing on contrasting case studies in Haiti, Nepal and New Zealand this paper identifies the common post-earthquake land administration functions and challenges that may apply to many contexts. These lessons provide land agencies and other key stakeholders with a summary of the challenges an earthquake poses for land administration at different post-disaster stages. We also discuss the policy and regulatory, institutional, operational and preparedness lessons for land administration. From these lessons we propose a framework for evaluating the earthquake-responsiveness of a land administration system. This framework can be used by a land agency in an earthquake prone region, or where an earthquake has recently occurred, to assess what challenges to land administration might occur in the event of an earthquake, and the preparedness of their land administration system.     

U.S. Citrus Import Demand: Seasonality and Substitution

Citrus fruits make up 1/5 of all fresh fruit consumed in the United States. Given the increasing importance of imported citrus in the diet of American consumers, it is perhaps surprising that no import demand analysis of U.S. citrus has been conducted. Using quarterly U.S. import data for 6 citrus commodities, we employed a demand systems model and evaluated aspects of seasonality. The results suggest wide variations in price responses to different types of imported citrus. The average amplitude and phase shift suggest that all citrus fruits exhibit some seasonality in their imports, likely a result of peak harvesting schedules of exporters.     

Application of an ecosystem function framework to perceptions of community woodlands

Owners, local residents, government, and conservation organisations can express divergent preferences in the development and management of local woodlands. The perceptions of these four groups were examined, in the context of three community woodlands in Eastern England, using an ecosystem function framework. In a pilot study, residents were able to allocate a relative importance to woodland ecosystem services which were then related to “regulation”, “habitat”, and “production” or “information” functions. However residents also placed importance on negative services or “dis-services” associated with the woodland ecosystem. Therefore a fifth category of “dis-services” was included in the main survey which included 84 local residents, three woodland owners, three government institutions, and six representatives from conservation groups. Each of the four groups placed greatest importance on services associated with habitat (16–39% of the total importance) and information (30–50%) functions suggesting, in this example, mutual interest in the use of woodlands as a habitat or recreational resource. By contrast a potential area of difference was the particularly high importance placed by one owner on dis-services such as fly tipping. In addition the woodland owners placed higher importance (10–20%), than local residents and conservation groups (7–9%), on the productive services of the wood. This suggests a need for communication when production-related operations affect recreation. The ecosystem function framework appears to be a useful approach for highlighting potential tensions and areas of mutual interest in the management of semi-natural ecosystems.     

Price transmission between products at different stages of manufacturing in forest industries

The theory of demand and supply implies a positive relationship, or “price transmission” between the prices of products at different stages of manufacturing. This relationship was investigated with quarterly prices of softwood stumpage in the US South, and national prices of forest products, from 1977 to 2002. All prices, net of inflation, were found to be nonstationary and there was no evidence of co-integration between prices. Vector autogressive models, augmented by Granger causality tests and multiplier analysis showed that there was a one-to-one permanent positive response of the southern sawtimber stumpage price to a permanent change in the national lumber price. There was also a one-third permanent positive response of the national paper price to a permanent change in the national pulp price. There was no relation between regional pulpwood prices and national pulp or paper prices. When price transmission was significant, the full adjustment took about 2 years.     

On the Role of Risk Versus Economies of Scope in Farm Diversification With an Application to Ethiopian Farms

This article investigates the economics of farm diversification. The analysis assesses economies of diversification using a certainty equivalent measure. It identifies two components: one associated with expected income, and one associated with risk exposure. This integrates two lines of research explored in previous literature: economies of scope and risk management. We examine the roles played by complementarity, scale and concavity effects in economies of diversification. The approach is applied to diversification decisions made on Ethiopian farms, with a focus on production uncertainty. The econometric analysis finds large complementarity benefits, providing incentives to diversify. But this is tempered by (non)‐concavity effects that provide incentives to specialise. The analysis also documents how risk affects diversification, including both variance and skewness effects. It provides new insights on economic tradeoffs between farm diversification and specialisation.     

In Vino ‘No’ Veritas: impacts of fraud on wine imports in China

China is one of the largest wine importing countries in the world and is poised for continued import growth in the future. Increased wine purchases throughout China have given rise to persistent fraud where fake wines are packaged and sold with counterfeit contents and labels. For exporting countries like France, counterfeit wines displace market share, damage foreign brand reputation, and cause distrust in consumers who are aware of counterfeiting problems throughout the country. We examine the impact of fraudulent wine events (as measured by negative media reports) on Chinese wine demand differentiated by supplying country. We employ the Rotterdam demand system and a switching regression procedure to estimate import demand and compare results across different media variable specifications. Results consistently show that negative reports disproportionately affect French wine regardless of how the media variable is specified. This is not surprising because most fraudulent events involve French wine counterfeits.     

重构乡村基层社会生活的实态--一个值得深入考察的徽州古村落宅坦

古村落宅坦位于绩溪西部的崇山峻岭之中 ,胡氏宗族在生存条件极为恶劣的情况下 ,组织族人改造环境 ,使之成为人与自然和谐相处的乡村社会。千百年来 ,在特定的时空条件下 ,经过一系列的社会变迁 ,古村落已形成宗族组织、文化科举和商业的良性互动 ,从而创造了古村落的文明。三者之间宗族居于核心地位。传统中国社会的动乱也会在这里引起反响 ,但是由于宗族聚居的格局使古村落乃至徽州社会具有特殊的应变力 ,直至近代仍保持自身的稳定。宅坦村有着丰富的资料遗存 ,为我们在宅坦从事田野考察、重构古村落的实态 ,提供了必要的前提。可以预见 ,宅坦必将以其丰富的人文内涵为世人所瞩目     

Patent Rights and Trade: Analysis of Biological Products, Medicinals and Botanicals, and Pharmaceuticals

This article analyzes the effects of foreign patent rights on U.S. bilateral exports. The empirical analysis covers three highly disaggregated drug industries over three decades. We estimate bilateral trade equations for each industry using cross-country data on the strength of national patent rights. The findings show that strong foreign patent rights enhance the market power of U.S. drug exporters across countries with weak imitative abilities. Alternatively, strong foreign patent rights stimulate the market expansion of U.S. drug exports across countries with strong imitative abilities. These effects are larger in magnitude during the 1980–90s relative to the 1970s.     

Sustainable urban agriculture: stocktake and opportunities

This paper reviews research on urban agriculture which relates to the three dimensions of sustainability: social, economic and environmental. We propose that urban agriculture has three elements: urban agriculture in isolation; its interface with the people and environment within which it is situated; and its contribution to the design of built form. Additionally, we consider its scale: micro, meso and macro. The analysis draws attention to legal, social and economic constraints and opportunities. It suggests that future priorities for research should be directed towards (i) strategically identifying principles of sustainable urban agriculture that help policy makers to design resilient cities, e.g. using flood-prone areas for food and employment, and (ii) operationally trialling innovative institutional mechanisms, e.g. differential land taxes to support sustainable urban agriculture or payments for environmental services provided by urban agriculture such as carbon sequestration.     

Geometrical data validation in 3D digital cadastre − A case study for Victoria,Australia

Data ambiguity and invalidity can cause significant expensive issues in the cadastral domain (e.g. legal disputes). An automated data validation can significantly help to reduce the potential issues. Quality assurance has been comprehensively investigated in various domains, however, the validation of 3D cadastral data is still in its early development. The availability of various regular and irregular shapes for 3D cadastral objects and modern building designs has resulted in a critical need for developing validation rules to ensure data validity and quality.The land registry in Victoria, Australia, is investigating the technical requirements for implementing a 3D digital cadastre. The study of 3D cadastral data validation requirements has been part of this ongoing investigation. This study is being undertaken in three main phases including 1) developing geometrical validation rules, 2) developing non-geometrical validation rules, 3) implementing an online service to validate 3D cadastral data.This paper aims to discuss the initial outcomes of the first phase of the aforementioned study which has focused on developing geometrical validation rules for 3D cadastral objects. The paper reviews the development of four geometrical validation rules which have been formalised using mathematical expressions to check the individual 3D parcels and their relationships with adjoining or neighbouring parcels. The first validation rule checks the compatibility of the cancelled parcel against the created parcels. The second rule deals with parcel collision detection which is required for flagging unacceptable intersection of 3D objects. The third rule ensures the faces forming a 3D parcel are flat. The fourth validation rule assures 3D objects are watertight. The paper concludes with a discussion around the impacts of the proposed validation checks on the subdivision process and future research for the Victorian 3D digital cadastre.