Procedure for the Implementation of the Precautionary Principle in Biosafety Commissions

In order to fulfil their responsibilities under the precautionary principle, biosafety commissions should lay down guidelines concerning the understanding and application of this principle and work towards an operational procedure. With this contribution, we propose a step‐wise procedure that aims to establish the understanding of the precautionary principle within biosafety commissions and to provide a methodological approach for the application of this principle to specific cases in the course of risk assessment. This approach is based on systematically investigating the consensus view within a group of 15 biosafety experts with the help of sets of checklists. For step 1, we propose a checklist of 13 criteria aimed at defining the understanding of the precautionary principle. For step 2, we propose 4 criteria for the decision on whether or not to use the precautionary principle. For step 3, 11 criteria for the use of the precautionary principle are presented. In step 4, additional criteria for specific applications could be included. In step 5, possible recommendations to decision‐making authorities are proposed.     

法团主义视野下政府与非政府组织的互动关系研究——以社会福利服务领域中的个案研究为例

法团主义,是研究国家与社会关系的一种西方理论模式,于20世纪90年代在对多元主义质疑中出现。本文以法团主义理论为基础,以依赖、回馈等概念为分析工具,运用个案研究方法对社会福利服务领域中非政府组织与政府的互动关系进行比较深入研究,发现个案与政府所形成的合作关系,建立在非政府组织依赖、回馈政府,政府支持、控制非政府组织的基础之上,并具有人治化色彩。从实证分析入手,提出二者关系由人治化向制度化发展是必要的。     

美国国际贸易法院判定美国商务部对河北兴茂轮胎有限公司非公路用轮胎“双反”措施不当案评述

美国进口商和中国出口商不满美国商务部对来自中国的某些非公路用轮胎实施反倾销和反补贴税的裁定,向美国国际贸易法院提出起诉。美国国际贸易法院裁定,美国法律没有明确规定反倾销税法是否可适用于非市场经济国家;本案中美国商务部做的"双反"裁定,在方法上不合理。本文在介绍该案的基本案情、归纳法院推理和判决的基础上,对该案涉及的法律问题做了简要评论。     

Determinants of Health Costs due to Farmers’ Exposure to Pesticides: An Empirical Analysis

Pesticide spraying by farmers has an adverse impact on their health. However, in studies to date examining farmers’ exposure to pesticides, the costs of ill health and their determinants have been based on information provided by farmers themselves. Some doubt has therefore been cast on the reliability of these estimates. In this study, we address this by conducting surveys among two groups of farmers who use pesticides on a regular basis. The first group is made up of farmers who perceive that their ill health is due to exposure to pesticides and have obtained at least some form of treatment (described in this article as the ‘general farmer group’). The second group is composed of farmers whose ill health has been diagnosed by doctors and who have been treated in hospital for exposure to pesticides (described here as the ‘hospitalised farmer group’). Cost comparisons are made between the two groups of farmers. Regression analysis of the determinants of health costs show that the most important determinants of medical costs for both samples are the defensive expenditure, the quantity of pesticides used per acre per month, frequency of pesticide use and number of pesticides used per hour per day. The results have important policy implications.     

Livelihood diversification strategies in the Himalayas*

This article examines livelihood diversification strategies of rural households using survey data from the Himalayas. We present and explore an analytical framework that yields different activity choices as optimal solutions to a simple utility maximization problem. By classifying the range of activities of rural households into a few distinct categories based on their profitability and by considering portfolios of farm and non‐farm activities, we provide novel insights into diversification behaviour of rural households. The evidence shows that while the poor are mainly agricultural labourers and work in the low‐return non‐farm sector, the better‐off diversify in high‐return non‐farm activities. As expected, we find strong evidence that education plays a major role in accessing more remunerative non‐farm employment. A somewhat less intuitive finding is that larger household size is associated with higher probability of diversification into the high‐return non‐farm sector. The finding that the farm size is not a constraint to diversification in lucrative non‐farm employment is also surprising. Geographical location plays a role in diversification behaviour of rural households indicating the importance of local context.     

科技期刊转企改制的对策研究

从2011年以来我国非时政类报刊转企改制的改革背景入手,立足科技期刊,提出科技期刊坚持＂为人民出版,替科研服务＂的职责与出版精品期刊的质量目标、强化经营意识与服务意识、打造学习型期刊社等对策。以科学发展观为指导,把握方向,分析路径,提供思路,加强非时政类期刊转企改制的应对探讨,从而推进我国科研事业的发展有着极其重要的意义。     

Trade liberalization in the presence of domestic regulations: public policies applied to EU and U.S. wine markets

Wine is the highest valued product in the agricultural, food, and beverage sector traded between the United States and the European Union (EU) and wine faces a range of tariffs that are differentiated by country and product category. In addition, the production of wine grapes is heavily regulated within the EU and there are complicated state-level policies in the United States designed to limit the retail availability of wine. There continues to be economic and political pressure for reform to the tariffs between the United States and the EU, and to the domestic regulations in each region. We carefully develop parameters to characterize the effects of tariffs and domestic regulations that affect production and consumption of wine in the two regions. Simulation results show that reductions in tariffs would have relatively small effects in EU and U.S. wine markets, whereas reductions in EU domestic policies that affect wine grape production would have much larger trade and welfare implications.     

Thresholds in finance–growth nexus: Evidence from G‐7 economies

This study explores the finance and economic growth nexus in G‐7 economies as these countries experience significantly higher levels of financial development. Using a balanced panel of 31 years from 1983 to 2013, we provide new evidence on the finance–growth relationship. We show the presence of nonlinearity as there is an inverted U‐shaped relationship between finance and growth in the long run. Estimating the thresholds in the finance–growth nexus, we notice that there exists a threshold effect of finance at 109% of Gross Domestic Product (GDP). We observe that exceeding the threshold would hinder the countries instead of furthering economic growth as too much finance is harmful. Based on the panel Granger causality test results, we claim that financial development should be associated with optimal growth performance. Our findings for the G‐7 economies offer some useful policy inferences to the emerging and developing economies in designing their financial development strategies.     

关于我国宏观税负与经济增长的思考

宏观税负是反映政府经济规模及政府干预市场能力大小的一个重要的宏观经济指标.本文从理论与实证两个角度对宏观税负之于经济增长的影响进行了分析,认为过高的宏观税负不利于经济增长,并针对我国目前预算内的宏观税负水平不高但实际宏观税负却比较沉重的情况提出了一系列建议.