Resource flows through the multilateral system for food and agriculture : Trends of the decade

The tenth session of the World Food Council in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, held on 11–15 June 1984, undertook an assessment of international activities in the decade since 1974 for meeting the World Food Conference objectives of improving the global food system and overcoming the blight of world hunger. One document prepared for the session looks specifically at the activities of the multilateral institutions since the 1974 conference, in terms of both resource and programme commitments. This article provides a summary of that WFC document.     

North-South and South-South trade-related technology diffusion: an industry-level analysis of direct and indirect effects

Abstract .  This paper examines one direct and three indirect channels of North-South trade-related technology diffusion. We find that i) the largest impact on TFP in the South is from direct North-South technology diffusion; ii) there are also significant effects from indirect North-South technology diffusion, though their magnitude is smaller than that of the direct one; and iii) the impact of direct North-South technology diffusion on TFP in the South occurs faster than the impact of indirect technology diffusion.     

Test validation from a conceptual and legal perspective: Issues and trends

A little-explored issue in the psychological and legal literature involves test validation. This article discusses issues of test validation from both psychological and legal perspectives. Areas of inconsistency are noted and probable future directions are high-lighted.     

Regional Integration as Diplomacy

Regional integration agreements are examples of second-bestpolicies and have an ambiguous impact on welfare. This articlebuilds a model in which regional integration agreements unambiguouslyraise welfare by correcting for externalities. It assumes thattrade between neighboring countries raises trust between themand reduces the likelihood of conflict. The optimum interventionin that case is a subsidy on imports from the neighbor. Thearticle shows that an equivalent solution is for the neighboringcountries to tax imports from the rest of the world—thatis, to form a regional integration agreement—togetherwith some domestic taxes. The article shows that (1) the optimum tariffs on imports fromthe rest of the world are likely to decline over time; (2) deepintegration implies lower optimum external tariffs if it isexogenous; (3) optimum external tariffs are higher before deepintegration and lower thereafter if deep integration is endogenous;and (4) enlargement of bloc size (in terms of symmetric countries)has an ambiguous impact on external tariffs but raises welfare,and some form of domino effect exists.     

The impact of auctions on residential property prices

This study assesses whether the sale method in residential real estate markets – auction versus private treaty – is a determinant of sale price. Utilising a larger and richer dataset than previous research, we test for a price effect in auction sales in Sydney and Christchurch. When self‐selection biases are corrected for, using two‐stage hedonic regression analysis and a matched sampling procedure, we find no significant difference between prices of properties sold at auction to those sold by private treaty. This conflicts with the conclusions of previous research in the Australian and New Zealand housing markets, which have documented a price premium associated with auction sales.