Measuring Price Effects of Concentration in Mixed Oligopoly: An Application to the Swedish Beef-slaughter Industry

Empirical studies of market power focus exclusively on industries with private firms. Yet, it is not uncommon to find private firms competing with public firms or cooperatives (coops) within the same market. We develop an empirical procedure for measuring market-power and cost-efficiency effects of concentration in mixed oligopoly consisting of coops and investment-owned firms (IOF) and apply the procedure to the Swedish beef-slaughter industry. We find that the cost-efficiency effect of coop concentration more than offset its market power effect, resulting lower beef prices. IOFs are found to be price-takers in both cattle procurement and beef sales.      

Customer Characteristics and Attitudes at Participatory and Supermarket Cooperatives

Rising food prices have contributed to an increase in the number of food cooperatives in the United States. The present study was undertaken to learn more about the characteristics and motives of food co-opshoppers at large supermarket cooperatives with paid staff and a full product range and small participatory co-ops with volunteer workers and selective merchandising policies. Customer counts and interviews were conducted at participatory and supermarket co-op stores and nearby commercial supermarkets in Northern California and in New York State. Shoppers at the participatory co-ops were found to be young, well-educated, ethnically homogeneous, non-affluent, and motivated primarily by low prices, food quality, natural food and co-op philosophy. Customers at supermarket co-ops tended to be more diverse in age and ethnicity, well-educated, with eclectic food tastes, and motivated primarily by convenience, low prices and co-op philosophy. Customers at near by commercial supermarkets were also heterogeneous in age and ethnicity and motivated primarily by price and convenience. The implications of the different customer populations and motives for the future of food co-ops are discussed.     

黑龙江省金融生态环境下农村金融合作社风险管理机制研究

当前,黑龙江省农村金融合作社金融生态环境存在的问题是,农村信用合作社产权制度改革进展较慢,农村社会征信体系还不完善,农村金融生态法律不健全,基层政府金融生态观念淡薄。构建金融生态环境下农村金融合作社风险管理机制,应加强地方政府的主导机制,完善农村信用合作社金融生态立法机制,加强同业合作,促成良性竞争机制,完善资本补足机制,健全内部治理机制,提升金融合作社抵御风险能力。     

基于物联网技术的农产品供应链运行相关问题

目前,我国农产品供应链层次较多,效率较低,流通消耗率高,极大地降低了农产品供应链上各个节点企业、尤其是农户的经济效益。采用物流网技术能够提高供应链的整体效率。我国应该对现有农产品供应链的结构和运行模式进行改造;农合组织也应借助物联网技术整合第三方运输商和销售终端(超市/社区店),从而满足用户对于农产品的需求,推动整条供应链上资源整合和协调运作,使农产品供应链运行模式更加合理和具有活力。     

The Value to Consumers of Health Labeling Statements on Breakfast Foods and Cereals

Food manufacturers have an incentive to include nutrient content claims, health claims, or other types of labeling statements on foods if they believe that consumers will be willing to pay more for products with specific attributes. We estimated semi-log hedonic price regressions for five breakfast bar and cereal product categories using Nielsen Scantrack scanner data for 2004 and found that labeling statements for these foods are often associated with substantially higher prices, reflecting higher implicit value to consumers. The largest effects were associated with “carb-conscious” carbohydrate labeling (reflecting the time period of the data), followed by fat and sugar content labeling statements.     

Older people and convenience in meal preparation: a European study on understanding their perception towards vegetable soup preparation

A sample of 768 seniors over 65 years, living in eight European countries, was interviewed to investigate perceptions, preferences and attitudes towards convenience in preparation of vegetable soups. In each country, a range of seven vegetables soups varying in preparation levels required before consumption was identified. The first part of the interview (in‐depth interview) was carried out by using the Repertory Grid Method, an effective method to describe perceptions of foods using consumers' own language. Overall, vegetable‐related foods with convenience in preparation were perceived in similar ways across the countries. Older adults tended to describe ready vegetable soups mainly making associations related to preparation, rather than on their own preferences and evaluations. Conversely, fresh vegetables requiring all preparation or considerable preparation (cut fresh vegetables) were mainly associated with attributes such as taste, freshness, health benefits and familiarity with the product. The second session of the interview was based in part on the Theory of Planned Behaviour. A component measuring the extent to which it is felt necessary to eat convenience foods (perceived need) was assessed as well. Generally speaking, older people did not seem to view positively the consumption of convenience foods. Additionally, they did not feel the need to consume these products nor do they have the intention to consume them in the forthcoming month. Pleasure associated with performance of the behaviour was the most important determinant of intention to eat convenience foods in Germany, Denmark and Sweden. Perceived need was the most important factor in determining the intention to eat convenience foods in the UK, Poland and Portugal. Perceived control and subjective norms were the most important factors influencing the intention to eat convenience foods in Italy. The encouragement of consuming ‘ready‐meals’ might represent an opportunity to have healthier food choices and to reduce the risk a monotonous diet for older people who cannot or do not know how to cook, combined with a low interest in food‐related activities such as cooking.     

Food expenditure patterns of working-wife families: Meals prepared away from home versus convenience foods

This paper investigates food expenditure patterns of working-wife families, focusing on the allocation of food dollars between two major time-saving options: meals prepared away from home and convenience foods. Data are drawn from the U.S. 1983 Consumer Expenditure Survey. Analysis of variance and regression techniques are used to compare expenditure patterns of families grouped by the wife's hours worked and her earnings. The findings suggest that working-wife families prefer the purchasing of meals prepared away from home to that of convenience foods. In particular, families with high-earning, full-time working wives buy the most meals prepared away from home, while the greatest expenditures on convenience foods are observed for families with moderate-earning working wives.     

Exploring convenience orientation as a food motivation for college students living in residence halls

The main objective of this paper is to study the concept of convenience orientation among young adults. A project was conducted among students living in residence halls, where information on their food motivation and behaviour was obtained. Data were collected using a self‐administered questionnaire filled out by 319 students. Convenience ap‐pears to be the most important food motivation followed by price, pleasure, health and concern about weight. Positive correlations were obtained between convenience and: deciding what to eat, having a varied diet and lack of time, all of which were considered to be difficulties associated with living in residence. Negative correlations were obtained between convenience and total time spent cooking per day and having learned to be autonomous in the kitchen. For male, the perception of eating well, having a varied diet, and maintaining weight were negatively correlated to convenience. For female, the correlation between convenience and the difficulty of eating enough was significant and positive. Negative correlations were obtained between convenience and fresh vegetables, potatoes, eggs, fresh meat, fresh fish and fresh poultry, herbal tea and alcohol. Positive correlations were obtained between convenience, frozen foods and foods brought from the parents’ home. Findings are discussed from both a health and a family perspective.     

Öffentliche Wohnraumförderung — auf dem richtigen Weg?

In Germany, in times of extreme low interest rates there is a boom in housing construction, housing demand and housing prices. In order to relieve the housing market, the Federal Government is planning to expand the funding for social housing considerably. Affordable housing has been decreasing in German metropolitan areas in recent years, the same applies to social housing. Meanwhile, the demand for dwellings in the lower and middle price segment is rising, partly due to an increased migration rate. This is why a strong social housing promotion needs to be combined with an effective direct subsidy, such as a dynamic housing allowance. However, the targeting of social housing is highly inaccurate. Thus, it would be better to strengthen housing allowances and to help lowincome households to purchase homes in order to reduce living costs. Nowadays, property credits stabilize the banking sector. However, just a small increase in interest rates could result in a new financial crash. Ever since their foundation, housing cooperatives have created affordable private dwellings and a safe living place for their members. They are able to produce not only tenants but owners of the dwellings. Thus public assistance schemes and subsidies should not exclude housing cooperatives.     

Price recall: Brand and store type differences

Price is among the most important choice criteria for customers, whose price knowledge is often surprisingly inaccurate. This study aims at providing new insights into differences in price recall across brands and store types, and their potential effect on marketing efficiency and customers’ store choice. Towards this aim, we analyze the price recall of consumers for 51 food items by a random-effects panel estimation employing a survey with 715 participants. Our results show that customers recall national brand prices better than private labels, almost irrespectively of the store type; consumers overestimate store brand prices in both store types; the effect, however, is much higher for the convenience store. These outcomes have consequences for the marketing strategy: despite a price-matching guarantee for the store brands in the convenience store, the price image is still in favor of the discounter. This result raises doubts on the effectiveness of the price-matching guarantee, at least in this context. The everyday low price strategy of the discounter seems to pay off in terms of the price image. Though both stores charge the exact same prices for their store brands, prices at the discounter are on average perceived to be significantly lower.     

Family characteristics and convenience food expenditure in urban Korea

This study uses a sample of 39 025 urban families from the 1996 Korean Family Income and Expenditures Survey to examine the relationship between family characteristics and expenditure on convenience foods. Results indicate that age and education of the family's head, number of children, presence of children under the age of six, the wife's labour force participation, and area of residence were significant in predicting the level of expenditure on convenience foods. The present study points to and gives a rationale to differences in some of the effects as compared with those found in Western countries.     

小农户与现代销售渠道选择——来自中国梨园的经验数据

基于梨农入户调查数据,对选择传统销售渠道和现代销售渠道的农户进行的对比分析,以及通过构建Probit模型对销售渠道选择决定因素进行的实证研究表明,梨园面积较大、农业资产更加丰富的农户更容易选择现代销售渠道。也就是说,农产品现代销售渠道往往设置了种植规模和农业资产门槛,有可能将小规模贫穷农户排除在现代销售渠道之外。但小规模农户可通过加入农民专业合作社等方式来提高自己的组织化程度,进而提高自己加入现代销售渠道的可能性。因此,政府在制定农产品流通政策,推进农超对接等工程时,不可操之过急。政府应不断引导农民加入农民专业合作组织,规范农业合作组织,克服小农户分散经营的局限性,提高组织化程度和组织运行效率。政策制定部门要创造条件引导农民加入合作社或利用行业协会来提高农民的组织化程度,增加农民与现代销售渠道谈判的力量,同时规范农民专业合作组织运行机制,让合作组织真正成为分散小农户的利益代表。     

基于DEA和灰色关联模型的跨境物流通道竞争力研究

在构建跨境物流通道竞争力评价指标体系的基础上,采用DEA和灰色关联模型对中国西部地区与中南半岛之间的5条典型跨境物流通道进行了实证研究。结果表明:铁海联运通道具有较强的竞争力,而其余通道在便利性、经济性或及时性方面有待增强,其中便利性对通道竞争力影响最大。基于研究结论,提出了推进通关便利化、发挥运营枢纽带动作用、适当降低运输价格及减少环境污染等对策建议,以期为中国与周边国家物流通道建设提供参考。     

Supermarket access in the inner cities

One of the most pressing problems in urban America today is the serious shortage of supermarkets in many inner cities despite America’s abundant food supply and state-of-the-art food distribution system. Since the 1950s, numerous supermarket chains and independent grocers have departed low-income inner city neighborhoods. Consequently, inner cities have been left with smaller and less accessible stores that are generally unable to provide both the quality and variety of foods needed for a healthy population. In addition, these smaller stores are often unable to offer affordable prices to inner city households. Supermarket access in the inner cities is an important issue that has not been fully addressed by any sector. This paper attempts to reignite debate about the plight of inner city neighborhoods by discussing some of the critical issues, challenges and opportunities facing the development of supermarkets in poor urban neighborhoods.     

A maximal affine stochastic volatility model of oil prices

This study develops and estimates a stochastic volatility model of commodity prices that nests many of the previous models in the literature. The model is an affine three‐factor model with one state variable driving the volatility and is maximal among all such models that are also identifiable. The model leads to quasi‐analytical formulas for futures and options prices. It allows for time‐varying correlation structures between the spot price and convenience yield, the spot price and its volatility, and the volatility and convenience yield. It allows for expected mean‐reversion in the short term and for an increasing expected long‐term price, and for time‐varying risk premia. Furthermore, the model allows for the situation in which options' prices depend on risk not fully spanned by futures prices. These properties are desirable and empirically important for modeling many commodities, especially crude oil. © 2009 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Jrl Fut Mark 30:101–133, 2010     

Modeling seasonality in agricultural commodity futures

The stochastic behavior of agricultural commodity prices is investigated using observations of the term structures of futures prices over time. The continuous time dynamics of (log‐) commodity prices are modeled as a sum of a deterministic seasonal component, a non‐stationary state‐variable, and a stationary state‐variable. Futures prices are established by standard no‐arbitrage arguments and the Kalman filter methodology is used to estimate the model parameters for corn futures, soybean futures, and wheat futures based on weekly data from the Chicago Board of Trade for the period 1972–1997. Furthermore, in a discussion of the estimated seasonal patterns in agricultural commodity prices, the paper provides empirical evidence on the theory of storage that predicts a negative relationship between stocks of inventory and convenience yields; in particular, convenience yields used in this analysis are extracted using the Kalman filter. © 2002 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Jrl Fut Mark 22:393–426, 2002     

An empirical analysis of commodity pricing

Commodity pricing models generally explain the link between commodity prices and stock levels in terms of a stock‐out constraint or a convenience yield. Analysis of this link is provided using monthly London Metals Exchange copper, lead, and zinc prices obtained for the period November 1964 to December 2003. A Markov model, fitted to these data, supports the existence of two distinct pricing regimes while the impact of convenience yields is also identified. © 2006 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Jrl Fut Mark 26:391–415, 2006     

Challenges of Existing in a Market as a Small,Low-quality Producer

This paper explores the strategy of a small firm entering a monopolist's market thereby creating a duopoly market. The small firm avoids competing with the larger, incumbent firm by producing a lower-quality product at a lower price. The model here establishes an equilibrium under a specific set of assumptions and examines how exogenous factors affect prices, qualities and profits. Although the strategy might allow the firm to enter and earn a profit, the market conditions may make this position much less desirable to that of the large firm for several reasons. In the case explored here where tastes for the product are uniformly distributed, the small firm's profit is about six percent of that of the larger firm. The smaller firm is more severely threatened by the entrance of a third firm. Furthermore, even if the smaller firm can cut costs, its position is not well suited for exploiting such increases in efficiencies.     

Risk premiums on inventory assets: the case of crude oil and natural gas

This study tested for the presence of risk premiums on crude oil and natural gas. The econometric analysis followed from a stochastic model in which the equilibrium value of inventories depends on a convenience yield and an option value related to price uncertainty. The empirical findings provide rather strong support for the presence of risk premiums and also evidence for the existence of convenience yields. The risk premiums rose sharply with greater price volatility and help to explain why prices for immediate sales often exceed prices for future delivery. © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. Jrl Fut Mark 21:109–126, 2001     

Approximation for convenience yield in commodity futures pricing

The pricing of commodity futures contracts is important both for professionals and academics. It is often argued that futures prices include a convenience yield, and this article uses a simple trading strategy to approximate the impact of convenience yields. The approximation requires only three variables—underlying asset price volatility, futures contract price volatility, and the futures contract time to maturity. The approximation is tested using spot and futures prices from the London Metals Exchange contracts for copper, lead, and zinc with quarterly observations drawn from a 25‐year period from 1975 to 2000. Matching Euro‐Market interest rates are used to estimate the risk‐free rate. The convenience yield approximation is both statistically and economically important in explaining variation between the futures price and the spot price after adjustment for interest rates. © 2002 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Jrl Fut Mark 22:1005–1017, 2002