Matters of food and farming in Asia

Leaving aside the plantation enclaves, the problems of food and farming in Asia are centred on subsistence farming. This, in spite of recent improvements in farming techniques, remains subject to natural hazards, population pressure and risks which only those with ready access to land, labour, capital and know-how are able to face. By comparison, small cultivators, tenants and landless labourers suffer serious disadvantages. These can be reduced only as a result of reforms which bring security of tenure, transfers of land and a just system of land tax combined with public works programmes. Thus economic growth, coupled with social equilibrium and political stability, could be achieved.     

The roles of land tenure reforms and land markets in the context of population growth and land use intensification in Africa

This article reviews the past and potential future roles of land tenure reforms and land markets in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) as responses to population growth in the process of land use intensification and livelihood transformation. The farm size distribution and the existence of an inverse relationship (IR) between farm size and land productivity in SSA and the implications of this relationship for efficiency and equity are investigated. More secure property rights and removal of restrictions on land markets have the potential to create both efficiency and equity benefits, but there are high risks of elite capture of large land areas with inefficient and inequitable outcomes. This situation is the case not only in land-abundant areas but also in urban and peri-urban areas where increasingly larger proportions of people will make their living. Increasing population pressure in densely populated rural areas contributes to more rapid rural–urban migration, and creating alternative livelihood opportunities for the migrating youth population is essential to achieving economic development with social stability.     

Land rights,agricultural productivity,and deforestation

This paper studies the relationship between land tenure for smallholder agriculture and deforestation. We combine high resolution satellite data on deforestation with rich household and commune-level, biannual panel data from Vietnam. We study two margins of tenure security, whether a household has any land title (extensive) and the share of a household’s land held in title (intensive). Using a household-fixed effects model, we find the increases in crop production and land investment associated with holding land title are driven by the intensive margin. We then aggregate the survey data to the commune-level and find evidence that marginal increases in extensive tenure (share of households with any land title) increase deforestation holding constant the average intensive tenure (average share of land held in tenure among those with land title). We find some evidence that increasing the intensive margin of tenure (holding constant the extensive tenure) decreases deforestation. These results present a more nuanced view of the tenure-deforestation relationship than is prevalent in the existing literature.     

Toward Flexible Industrial Relations? Neo-Liberalism,Democracy, and Labor Reform in Latin America

Neo-liberal economic reforms have placed significant pressure on traditional industrial relations systems throughout Latin American. In this context, most countries have revised their basic labor legislation. Yet, despite similar economic pressures, countries have moved in varying directions in revising their labor laws, and industrial relations systems remain highly diverse. This paper focuses on democratization, institutional legacies, the role of organized labor, and the political negotiations surrounding labor law changes to help explain this diversity.     

Land use in Nigeria

Prior to the Land Use Decree of 1978, the Nigerian land tenure system had become the object of intense attack and defence by vested interests promoting their views on changes in the tenure system which would best increase food and fibre production. The many points of view could be classified into two opposing camps: those who regarded the tenure system as inimical to agricultural development with emphasis on food production; and, those who argued that the tenure system was not a hindrance at that time. This article provides background information on issues leading to the land tenure reform in Nigeria; points out some of the shortcomings of past direct government control and management of land, and the Land Use Decree; suggests needed modifications to the Land Use Decree's implementation; and, derives some food production policy implications.     

Beyond the water cooler: using socialization to understand use and impact of networking services on collaboration in a business incubator

Scholars and policymakers claim that Business Incubators (BIs) add value by facilitating internal cooperation between tenant firms. Taking a tenant perspective, this research investigates the impact of a tenant's length of BI tenure on the use of formal internal networking services the BI management provides, and then on the tenant's level of intra-BI cooperation. The premise is that BI tenants use and benefit more from formal internal networking services when their socialization through participation in BI informal networking activities is low. When socialization is high they will enjoy a stronger direct effect of tenant tenure on cooperation with other tenants. Findings from data collected from a Dutch BI confirm the premise of our moderated-mediation model. Results also show that both mechanisms complement each other and that each contributes significantly to tenants' sales growth. It lends support to the effectiveness of BI formal internal networking services, but also stresses the importance of socialization through informal networking activities.     

财政激励、晋升激励与地方官员的土地出让行为

近年来,地方政府官员热衷于出让土地,现有文献主要强调土地财政。地方政府官员不仅面临财政激励而且还面临政治激励:在地方政府官员晋升以GDP为主要考核指标的激励下,地方政府官员有土地招商引资的动机。本文在理论上证明了,在一个政治集权经济分权的经济体,地方政府官员出让土地的土地财政和土地引资动机同时存在;在实证上,我们采用省级面板数据发现,地方政府官员热衷于出让土地是源于土地引资,而非土地财政。本文的工作意味着,中国的土地问题是与土地市场之外的因素联动的,解决中国的土地问题需要土地市场之外的联动改革。     

The political economy of the Korean telecommunications reform

South Korea proclaimed a gradual economic liberalization ever since the early 1980s. Regardless of her vow to do so, however, most of liberalization efforts turned out to be a sheer rhetoric. In sharp contrast, genuine market liberalization and regulatory reforms are being introduced in the telecommunication sector, which is unprecedented in the Korean economic history. Why and how could Korea pursue such a full scale market liberalization and regulatory reforms in the telecommunications sector? Though it is argued that a regulatory convergence in economic management is found in everywhere in the world, the particular speed, scope, and/or processes of a country’s telecommunication reform cannot be understood correctly without examining the structures and institutions of the Korean political economy and of the telecommunications industry. This paper examines the causes and consequences of the Korean telecommunication reform by analyzing the relevant institutional changes both in domestic and international, which largely affect the interaction among those involved in the process of market liberalization and regulatory reforms.     

Food policy reforms for sustainable agricultural development in Uzbekistan, the Kyrgyz Republic, and Tajikistan

Given the present conditions of demographic growth and the complicated transition toward market economies in Central Asia, the problems of food security and designing policies to achieve it without compromising economic growth are at the forefront of policy agendas in these countries. This paper reviews food policy reforms in Uzbekistan, the Kyrgyz Republic, and Tajikistan in the context of sustainable agricultural development. Analyzing the trends in the agricultural sector during the transition period, it identifies the major impacts of policy reforms on food security and enumerates future challenges for improving food security in these countries. It finds that despite the progress made in reforming their economies toward market-oriented ones, the three countries continue to face food insecurity to varying degrees. It concludes that there is an urgent need to further expand and deepen the reform process by enabling functioning land, labor, and financial markets.     

Red,blue, and purple firms: Organizational political ideology and corporate social responsibility

Research summary : Why do firms vary so much in their stances toward corporate social responsibility (CSR )? Prior research has emphasized the role of external pressures, as well as CEO preferences, while little attention has been paid to the possibility that CSR may also stem from prevailing beliefs among the body politic of the firm. We introduce the concept of organizational political ideology to explain how political beliefs of organizational members shape corporate advances in CSR . Using a novel measure based on the political contributions by employees of Fortune 500 firms, we find that ideology predicts advances in CSR . This effect appears stronger when CSR is rare in the firm's industry, when firms are high in human capital intensity, and when the CEO has had long organizational tenure . Managerial summary : Why do firms vary in their stances toward corporate social responsibility (CSR )? Prior research suggests that companies engage in CSR when under pressure to do so, or when their CEOs have liberal values. We introduce the concept of organizational political ideology, and argue that CSR may also result from the values of the larger employee population. Introducing a novel measure of organizational political ideology, based on employees' donations to the two major political parties in the United States, we find that liberal‐leaning companies engage in more CSR than conservative‐leaning companies, and even more so when other firms in the industry have weaker CSR records, when the company relies heavily on human resources and when the company's CEO has a long organizational tenure . Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Rental markets,gender, and land certificates: Evidence from Vietnam

In developing countries, a significant share of land transactions occurs among closely related parties and often does not entail any specific compensation (in-kind or monetary). Despite the prevalence of these non-market or informal transactions, the literature has paid little attention to the determinants and consequences of these exchanges. In this paper we shed light on the role land use certificates play on the agreed compensation of rental agreements when landlords, particularly those with weaker ex-ante tenure security (i.e. women), rent out land to their relatives in Viet Nam. We find that female-headed households who lease their plots to relatives are less likely to receive any type of payment, unless they possess a title for the plot they leased. A regional decomposition of our results shows that this effect is more predominant in the Northern regions.     

土地制度与中国发展模式

土地在中国经济奇迹创造中扮演的重要角色越来越引起高度关注,但是,现有基于政府特殊性的研究忽视了土地的重要性,影响了对中国发展模式的理解和解释力。本文刻画了政府通过独特土地制度安排主导发展权的"以地谋发展"模式的特征和典型化事实,构建了土地作用于结构转变和经济增长的机制,通过建立一个纳入土地要素的经济增长计量模型,利用全国地级市样本数据检验了土地经由工业化和城市化的结构转变和通过资本形成对经济增长的影响,分析了结构转变不同阶段的土地制度安排及其变迁影响工业化和城市化的程度和方式。需要说明的是,本文研究旨在描述和解释中国改革时期形成的推动快速结构转变和高增长的"以地谋发展"的事实和逻辑,随着经济发展阶段转换和内外环境变化,土地的功能和"以地谋发展"模式的风险和问题凸显,需要进行进一步的变革。     

Strengthening intellectual property rights: Experience from the 1986 Taiwanese patent reforms

Do stronger intellectual property rights spur inventive activity and foreign direct investment (FDI) in developing countries? What are the characteristics of industries where strengthening patent rights has the most favorable impact? In an attempt to answer these questions, this paper uses the 1986 Taiwanese patent reforms to examine the effects of strengthening patent rights in a developing economy. I find that the reforms encouraged R&D effort across industries. In addition, industries that were highly R&D intensive witnessed a marked increase in their patenting in the United States. The reforms also induced additional FDI.     

Agricultural policy reforms and food security in Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan

This paper provides an overview of agricultural policy reforms and their impact on food security in Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan. Owing to increasing hostility in regional trade among the countries of Central Asia, Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan, like their neighbors, have chosen to follow a path of food self-sufficiency, which has biased their agricultural systems towards grain production. The paper finds that the land reforms in these two countries, which have dismantled the state farms, have resulted in reduced productivity of crops and declining food availability at the household level. It argues that reversing this trend will require increased investment in rural infrastructure and agricultural research to improve crop yields, and in the short-term, food security interventions to protect the poor and vulnerable.     

Multisectoral nutrition planning: a post-mortem

Multisectoral nutrition planning emerged in the early 1970's as a bold new approach to combating malnutrition in low-income countries. Conceptually elegant and operationally ambitious, it blossomed on paper but collapsed in practice notwithstanding vigorous promotion by international assistance agencies. This essay reviews the meteoric rise and fall of the multisectoral approach and then proceeds to examine its theoretical underpinnings. The essay concludes by identifying 12 lessons learned that, if heeded, can help the current generation of intersectoral initiatives against malnutrition to realize their potential. In retrospect, it was a mistake to assign responsibility for nutrition to economic planners and scientists who possessed little political influence or operational authority. Nutrition requires high-level political sponsorship if it is to command resources, be integrated with established ministerial responsibilities and have staying power. Nutrition planning bcame attractive to basically conservative governments anxious to accommodate international benefactors without having to accept more fundamental reforms; the analysis of malnutrition causality focused primarily on attributes of the malnourished and their families, not on the social, economic, and political order around them.     

Market-based reforms,synchronization and product innovation

This paper focuses on the multiple dimensions of market-based reforms and their impacts on firms’ product innovation performance in China, the largest emerging country in the world. By analyzing a data set with more than one-half-million observations on firms during China's economic transition during the period 2005–2007, we find that the progress of market-based reforms and the degree to which different dimensions of market-based reforms are conducted simultaneously, referred to as synchronization, have a positive effect on firms’ product innovation. We also find that firms with higher absorptive capacity benefit more from market-based reforms and the synchronization of different dimensions of market-based reforms.     

Food production policies in Nigeria

This review of Nigerian food production deals with the economic background to and the problems in food production, processing and marketing. The author examines the attempts to improve food supply and the government's approach. He discusses the problems of implementing the plans, prominent amongst which is the land tenure system.     

Food policy research for improving the reform of agricultural input and output markets in Central Asia

Agriculture is a significant component of the Central Asian economies. Since independence, the republics have implemented agricultural reforms in varying measure, yet production has fallen sharply across the region. The more ambitious agricultural reform programs have included measures aimed at liberalizing agricultural marketing, trade and prices. However, so far the expected supply response has yet to emerge. The objective of this paper is to highlight key policy and research issues surrounding reform of agricultural markets. It summarizes the main features of agricultural performance since the reforms, highlighting trends in grain and cotton, livestock, input use, and trade and analyzes key constraints to improvement of the sector, emphasizing price policy, sequencing problems, and institutional weakness. It presents a research agenda by identifying the main research needs for better agricultural policy design. It calls for more research on input and output market efficiency, private sector development, the effects of reform on farmers, sequencing issues, comparative advantage, water management, land tenure and farm size.     

对有关国家油气矿权管理制度的思考

美国对于进入油气工业的主体没有身份限制,但从实际运行情况看,仍以实力雄厚的大公司拥有矿权为主,在开放油气资源开发的同时,管理部门职责明确、分工合作、从严监管.加拿大矿业管理部门分为联邦和省两级,在资源开发的不同阶段对矿权采取不同的管理方式,拥有油气勘探开发权的公司在一定时期后必须将未进行勘探开发的油气勘探开发权返还给政府.俄罗斯的资源管理从分散逐渐趋向统一,强化国家对自然资源的所有权,以更好地适应经济可持续发展对自然资源合理开发利用、环境保护和生态安全的诉求.委内瑞拉通过一系列强制性的国有化运动和管理机构改革,使政府的石油管理权限几乎涵盖了石油产业链的全过程.上述国家矿权管理制度及其演变对我国的启示是:油气矿权管理制度是实现国家战略意图的手段之一;油气资源矿业市场的建立和有效运作需要完备的制度保障;面对国内外不同的矿权管理变化趋势,需要结合本国实际,创新管理,积极应对挑战.     

政治资源、经济资源与收入差距

在制衡机制缺位的前提下,政治资源和经济资源的扭曲结合恶化了资源分配的不平等,它是居民收入差距和地区收入差距扩大的重要原因。文章认为,解决政治资源分配不均以及由其导致的经济资源分配不均,即实现政治资源和经济资源的合理结合,对缩小收入差距有积极作用,也是进一步值得研究的重要课题。