Farmers’ constraints,governmental support and climate change adaptation: Evidence from Guangdong Province,China

While climate change is widely acknowledged, the role of government support in adaptation is less understood. We narrow this knowledge gap by modelling adaptation as a three‐stage process where a farmer sequentially decides: (i) whether there is a need for adaptation; (ii) whether there are constraints that prevent adaptation; and (iii) whether such constraints are removed through government support. We develop a triple‐hurdle model to describe this decision‐making process and empirically estimate the impact of government support using a rural household survey from Guangdong Province, China. It is found that government support is positively associated with raising the odds of adaptation by about one quarter. This magnitude is larger than the estimates in recent literature, suggesting government support is more effective for farmers bound by constraints. Therefore, for cost‐effective policy outcomes there is a need to identify the constraints and the farmers facing them.     

Tests of time: organizational time-reckoning and the making of accountants in two multi-national accounting firms

There has been remarkably little study of the recruitment, training and socialization of accountants in general, much less the specific case of trainee auditors, despite many calls to do so. In this paper, we seek to explore one key aspect of professional socialization in accounting firms: the discourses and practices of time-reckoning and time-management. By exploring time practices in accounting firms we argue that the organizational socialization of trainees into particular forms of time-consciousness and temporal visioning is a fundamental aspect of securing and developing professional identity. We pay particular attention to how actors consciousness of time is understood to develop, and how it reflects their organizational and professional environment, including how they envision the future and structure their strategic life-plan accordingly. Also of particular importance to the advancement of career in accounting firms is an active engagement with the politics of time: the capacity to manipulate and resist following the overt time-management routines of the firms. Rather than simply see trainees as passive subjects of organizational time-management devices, we noted how they are actively involved in ‘managing’ the organizational recording of time to further their career progression.     

Prospects for Canada's protected areas in an era of rapid climate change

Given the known and potential impacts of climate change on ecosystem composition, structure, and function, some recent studies question the efficacy and relevancy of current protected area policies and management objectives. For example, in a rapidly changing climate is it practical to continue to identify and protect ‘representative’ samples of the natural heritage estate? This paper examines a number of climate-related issues that now confront agencies and organizations responsible for the protection of natural heritage areas, including the roles of protected areas, representation targets, ecological integrity, protected area design, management techniques, research and monitoring needs, and agency capacity to respond. Potential avenues for adaptation are proposed in light of these issues. The development and implementation of a cross-jurisdictional landscape-scale strategic conservation framework focused on protecting, connecting, and restoring ecosystems will be fundamental to enhancing ecological resilience to climate change. We conclude that even though climate change presents unprecedented and significant challenges, the protected area contribution to ecosystem function and human health and well-being will remain an essential and worthwhile investment in the 21st century.     

Diversification, Vertical Integration, and the Regional Pattern of Dairy Farm Size

Dairy farm size differs considerably across the United States. We analyze patterns of dairy farm size to determine how differences in vertical integration and diversification relate to farm size. We find that diversification accounts for little size variation. For vertical integration, the partial correlation with dairy herd size is strongly negative. Dairy value-added size measures vary less across regions than herd size, indicating that an important part of herd size variation relates to vertical integration. Nonetheless, dairy farms in the Pacific and South regions remain much larger than farms in the traditional dairy regions, even when accounting for vertical integration.     

Predation,Protection, and Accumulation: Endogenous Property Rights in an Overlapping Generations Growth Model

We study a simple growth model with overlapping generations in which property rights are insecure. Insecurity of property rights leads to predation. Due to predation some of the resources are used for protection purposes. Both predation and protection remove resources from the accumulation process. In the model individuals allocate their labor between working for firms and appropriating output from them. Firms allocate their capital between production and protection. Without government, the model generates a unique but inefficient equilibrium. We show that in this equilibrium the level of output is increasing in the rate of effectiveness of protection, the relative utility of honesty, and the discount rate. Further, the equilibrium level of output is dynamically inefficient. We then extend the model to include a government as the sole provider of the public good “protection”. Protection is assumed to be financed by a capital tax imposed on firms. The model then yields multiple equilibria, with both a stable high-protection low-predation equilibrium, and a stable low-protection high-predation equilibrium. Which equilibrium a country is most likely to achieve, and how difficult it is for a country to move to the more desirable low-predation high-protection equilibrium, depend crucially on the parameters of the model describing the economy’s institutional structure. Hence, the results of the model support the emphasis placed by the World Bank on the importance for growth of strengthening institutional structures in developing countries.JEL Code: D23, D90, O41     

Accountants in organisational networks

Using four case studies carried out in the UK clothing and textiles industry, this paper explores how accounting might be differentially implicated in the co-ordination of activity as organisations face higher or lower degrees of uncertainty. It is argued that one of the difficulties faced by many of the contingency studies that have addressed this problem is their conceptualisation of accounting. The present study suggests that accounting, as a tool for organisational control, exists not as a collection of techniques, but as on-going processes. As such, the individuals involved with such processes might be expected to play a substantial role in shaping them. Social network analysis forms the basis of an attempt to understand these issues.     

Evidence of climate change impacts on crop comparative advantage and land use

Relative agricultural productivity shocks emerging from climate change will alter regional cropland use. Land allocations are sensitive to crop profits that in turn depend on yield effects induced by changes in climate and technology. We develop and apply an integrated framework to assess the impact of climate change on agricultural productivity and land use for the U.S. Northern Great Plains. Crop-specific yield–weather models reveal crop comparative advantage due to differential yield impacts of weather across the region's major crops, that is, alfalfa, wheat, soybeans, and maize. We define crop profits as a function of the weather-driven yields, which are then used to model land use allocation decisions. This ultimately allows us to simulate the impact of climate change under the RCP4.5 emissions scenario on land allocated to the region's major crops as well as to grass/pasture. Upon removing the trends effects in yields, climate change is projected to lower yields by 33–64% over 2031–2055 relative to 1981–2005, with soybean being the least and alfalfa the most affected crops. Yield projections applied to the land use model at present-day input costs and output prices reveals that Dakotas’ grass acreage will increase by up to 23%, displacing croplands. Wheat acreage is expected to increase by up to 54% in select southeastern counties of North Dakota and South Dakota, where maize/soy acreage had increased by up to 58% during 1995–2016.     

Market Structure and the Pricing of Electricity and Natural Gas

US Electricity and natural gas markets have traditionally been serviced by one of two market structures. In some markets, electricity and natural gas are sold by a regulated dual-product monopolist, while in other markets, electricity and natural gas are sold by separate regulated single-product monopolies. I analyze whether electricity and natural gas prices depend on the market structure and compare these results to the predictions of a number of theories. The results are most consistent with the political economy theories suggesting that regulators respond to interest group activity.