国内城乡结合部土地利用研究综述

研究目的：综述国内有关城乡结合部土地利用研究文献。研究方法：文献法。研究结果：国内学者在有关城乡结合部土地利用的特点、土地利用存在的问题及城乡结合部的土地产权、土地市场、土地规划、土地利用的模式和预警等方面研究已取得不少成果,但还存在研究深度不够、部分问题认识不清的缺陷。研究结论：城乡结合部为土地问题研究提供了极好的素材,对城乡结合部土地问题的调查和研究则是认识和解决该区域土地利用问题的不二路径。     

国内外健康旅游研究述评

基于叙述性文献综述法梳理国内外健康旅游的研究脉络,研究发现国内外对于健康旅游的研究内容和方法具有较大差异。国内健康旅游的研究仍处于起步阶段,研究内容集中于资源开发、产业现状及发展对策等方面,研究中多采用定性研究的方法。国外对于健康旅游的研究范围则从单一类型的水疗旅游逐渐向医疗旅游、保健旅游、旅游动机等细分领域拓展,研究方法的选择更加多元,定性、定量以及定性和定量相结合的方法均具有相当的比例。希望通过对国内外健康旅游研究差异的分析,找到国内在该领域研究的不足,为国内未来在健康旅游领域的研究和健康旅游产业的发展提供思路和指导。     

On the rebound: estimating direct rebound effects for Australian households

Reducing dependence on fossil fuels by decreasing energy consumption is a common environmental policy. One mechanism used to achieve this is to encourage increased energy efficiency. However, improving efficiency may have an opposing effect and cause an increase in energy consumption if the intensity of use changes. This phenomenon is known as the rebound effect. We estimate direct rebound effects for energy use in Australia based on both aggregate residential energy use data and on household energy expenditure data. Our approach implements a new methodology developed by Hunt and Ryan (2014, Catching on the rebound: Why price elasticities are generally inappropriate measures of rebound effects. Surrey Energy Economics Discussion Paper Series SEEDS 148; 2015, Energy Economics 50, 273) that explicitly relates energy service use with energy source demand and directly incorporates measures of efficiency changes. The results indicate that the rebound effect is relatively high for energy use by Australian households. Due to the unique nature of our household data set, we can examine the influence of demographic and housing characteristics. We find that low‐income households and households with vulnerable members have the largest rebound effects. The relatively large rebound effects found here suggest that consumers gain from efficiency by improved energy services, and thus, policy targeting energy efficiency is not likely to be successful at reducing energy consumption.     

On the Opportunity Cost of Crop Diversification

Distance functions are increasingly being augmented, with environmental goods treated as conventional outputs. A common approach to evaluate the opportunity cost of providing an environmental good is the exploitation of the distance function's dual relationship to the value function. This implies that the opportunity cost is assumed to be non‐negative. This approach also requires a convex technology set. Focusing on crop diversification for a balanced sample of 44 cereal farms in the East of England for the years 2007–2013, this paper develops a novel opportunity cost measure that does not depend on these strong assumptions. We find that the opportunity cost of crop diversification is negative for most farms.     

Impact of the 2014 Suspension Agreement on sugar between the United States and Mexico

In December 2014, the U.S. and Mexico agreed to a suspension agreement that set a $22.25/cwt import price floor on U.S. sugar imports from Mexico. A partial equilibrium trade model was developed to estimate the economic impact the agreement would have had if it had been in effect from 2008 to 2014. In years when the price floor would have been binding, on average, U.S. producers would have gained $138 million and Mexican producers would have lost $218 million. However, total Mexican welfare would have actually increased by $11.5 million. Furthermore, the average price floor that would have maximized total Mexican welfare over that period is $22.76/cwt. Also, under certain supply and demand elasticity conditions, the average price floor that would have maximized joint U.S. and Mexican producer welfare over that period is $21.91/cwt. The latter two estimates are both close to the actual price floor agreed to in the 2014 Suspension Agreement.     

Spatial determinants of productivity growth on agri‐food Spanish firms: a comparison between cooperatives and investor‐owned firms

This study analyses the effect of the spatial factor, location, and interaction effects among peer companies, on the productivity growth of agri‐food companies in Spain. With this aim, we build a productivity growth index and apply a multiequational Seemingly Unrelated Regression on a sample of 344 Spanish cooperatives and investor‐owned firms for the period 2010–2012. Our findings show that agri‐food firms are influenced by spatial factors finding interesting differences between cooperatives and investor‐owned firms. With regard to the geographical location, cooperatives in the western of Spain show higher productivity growth rates, whereas investor‐owned firms in the northeast of Spain present better results. The interaction effect among closer peer companies is also a relevant factor to determine the productivity growth in agri‐food companies. This factor is more relevant for cooperatives than for investor‐owned firms.     

Peer effects in the diffusion of water‐saving agricultural technologies

We investigate the role of peer effects in the diffusion of an important water‐saving irrigation technology: low energy precise application (LEPA). Using detailed irrigation behavior data for growers in the High Plains Aquifer region of Kansas covering 1990–2014, we find clear evidence of peer influence in adoption of LEPA, net of environmental factors. Specifically, an additional neighboring LEPA installation within 1 km increases the probability of adoption by about 0.3 percentage points, on average, and this effect diminishes with distance. Our empirical estimates indicate that in the absence of peer effects, LEPA adoption would have been about 10% lower (1,000–1,600 fewer installations) per year. In addition, we find that growers install LEPA in response to higher energy prices.     

房地产市场有效性研究综述

研究目的:综述房地产市场有效性的研究成果。研究方法:文献回顾法、归纳法。研究结论:有效性是市场研究的重要内容。自从市场有效性概念提出后,尤其是Fama将市场有效性分为三类后,关于市场有效性的实证检验渐多。但主要是集中在对金融市场有效性的研究上。国外对房地产市场有效性的研究主要是从投资角度进行的,研究主要集中在两个方面:一是对采用数据的研究;二是对某一市场的有效性进行检验。国内对市场有效性的研究历史很短,主要是运用已有的方法对中国资本市场有效性的研究。对房地产市场有效性的研究,多半将重点放在规范性研究上,主要集中在制度完善和发展趋势的定性研究上,对房地产市场有效性达到什么程度还没有正面的定量研究。     

Agricultural Policy Reform and Off‐farm Labour Decisions

Off‐farm labour decisions of a sample of Kansas farmers are evaluated. The central question of our analysis pertains to whether 1996 US farm policy reforms may have altered the decisions to work off the farm. The effects of policy decoupling on off‐farm labour are complex: different aspects of policy changes can have opposing effects on off‐farm work decisions. Essentially, this makes this issue an empirical question. Results show that the introduction of fixed, decoupled payments in 1996 might have reduced the likelihood of off‐farm labour participation. However, the new policy environment may have increased farm households’ revealed aversion to risk, motivating a higher participation in non‐farm labour markets. The effects of 1996 policy reforms on farm income variability could have been attenuated by changes in US crop insurance programmes and by an increase in emergency assistance payments towards the end of the 1990s. The reduction in price supports may have increased the motivation for working off the farm. The net effect of the overall reforms on off‐farm work participation is not likely to have been large.     

Incorporating risk in a positive mathematical programming framework: a dual approach

In this study we develop a new methodological proposal to incorporate risk into a farm‐level positive mathematical programming (PMP) model. We estimate simultaneously the farm nonlinear cost function and a farmer‐specific coefficient of absolute risk aversion as well as the resource shadow prices. The model is applied to a sample of representative arable crop farms from the Emilia‐Romagna region in Italy. The estimation results confirm the calibration ability of the model and reveal the values of the individual risk aversion coefficients. We use the model to simulate different scenarios of crop price volatility, in order to explore the potential risk management role of an agri‐environmental scheme.