Regulation of relationships between heterogeneous farmers and an aquifer accounting for lag effects

Many environmental problems are due to damage caused by pollutants that accumulate with a time lag following their emission. In this study, we focus on nitrates used in agriculture, which can pollute groundwater many years after their initial application. A dynamic optimal control problem with heterogeneous farmers is proposed. The usual structural parameters such as the discount rate, the natural clearing rate and the lagged time interval between the occurrence of soil‐level pollution and the impact on groundwater are taken into account. We also examine pollution as caused by a continuous set of farms characterised by their individual performance index and by their individual marginal contribution to the pollution. The issue is further investigated by taking account of change in the information context, successively related to perfect information and to asymmetric information. As a result, when the delay between the spreading of N‐fertilizer and the impact on the aquifer increases, that is, the longer the lag, the steady‐state pollution stock and the steady‐state shadow price of the stock both increase. Moreover, we show that the optimal regulation may require a decreasing amount of fertilizer over time, even in the case of initial underpollution.     

New Networks of Technological Creation in Energy Industries: Reassessment of the Roles of Equipment Suppliers and Operators

Energy industry companies have succeeded in maintaining and even increasing their production of knowledge during the last 15 years (1985/1998) within a financial context of reducing their in-house R&D expenditures. To understand these apparently paradoxical changes, elements of analysis are sought within an evolutionary framework, and especially referring to the related developments to network-firms, user-supplier relationships, and interactive nature of innovation processes. Empirical data are provided on patents granted to a sample of the top 15 world largest companies, both operators and equipment suppliers, and for the oil production and power generation industries. Interpretation of the results suggests that two dynamics ought to be distinguished. On the one side, dynamics of the networks of technological creation are characterized by a movement upstream of the head of the network towards suppliers. On the other side networks of creation of competitive advantages and bargaining power continue to be based on the operators and their strategies of adaptation to the constraints and opportunities of their institutional, financial and competitive environment.     

Strategic implementation: Five approaches to an elusive phenomenon

The traditional textbook approach to strategy implementation was to treat ‘implementation’ as an activity following ‘formulation’. Usually, the topic was treated as a question of organization design, where systems and structures were manipulated in concert with strategic goals. More recent views treat implementation either as an issue of gaining prior group commitment through coalitional decision-making, or as a question of total organizational involvement through a strong corporate culture. This paper reviews the evolution of these approaches, developing four models to characterize them, and suggests a fifth one, with strategy emerging in an almost-implemented form from within the firm.     

Performance and consensus

Top management consensus on corporate objectives and on the competitive weapons employed to attain them was studied in 12 non-diversified public corporations. It was found that while agreement on both is associated positively with economic performance, agreement on means is significantly more important—in fact, agreement on goals without agreement on means correlates with poor performance. This suggests that strategy makers should concentrate on reaching consensus concerning means rather than ends (corporate goals) when formulating strategies for single-mission enterprises.     

The promotion of maize fertiliser packages: A cause of household food insecurity and peasant impoverishment in high rainfall areas of Zimbabwe

Child malnutrition is a continuing problem in Zimbabwe's communal areas. These include some high rainfall areas, which make a contribution to the country's maize surplus during non‐drought years. A survey of farmers and extension workers in four high rainfall communal areas was carried out to investigate the effects of following recommended practices for maize production on household economy and food security.

Thirty‐two per cent of communal farmers had applied all the officially recommended fertiliser to their 1990/91 maize crop, often by obtaining these inputs on credit in lieu of grain sales receipts from the subsequent harvest. Yet. yields were so low that 48 per cent of these farmers would have been unable to retain sufficient grain to satisfy their families’ minimum requirements, if they had reimbursed the full cost of the input credit.

The majority (64 per cent) of farmers had deviatedfrom the recommended practice by adopting ‘low external input strategies’. A key feature of most of these strategies was the substitution of manure for part or all of the recommended fertiliser. In three of the four communal areas studied, this had improved the chances not only of recovering input costs, but also of achieving maize self‐sufficiency.

These results suggest that policy‐makers should shift emphasis from a dependence on costly external inputs to the integration of low levels of fertiliser with a range of more natural methods of soil improvement, in an effort to improve household food security in the communal areas.     

New Networks of Technological Creation in Energy Industries: Reassessment of the Roles of Equipment Suppliers and Operators

Energy industry companies have succeeded in maintaining and even increasing their production of knowledge during the last 15 years (1985/1998) within a financial context of reducing their in-house R&D expenditures. To understand these apparently paradoxical changes, elements of analysis are sought within an evolutionary framework, and especially referring to the related developments to network-firms, user-supplier relationships, and interactive nature of innovation processes. Empirical data are provided on patents granted to a sample of the top 15 world largest companies, both operators and equipment suppliers, and for the oil production and power generation industries. Interpretation of the results suggests that two dynamics ought to be distinguished. On the one side, dynamics of the networks of technological creation are characterized by a movement upstream of the head of the network towards suppliers. On the other side networks of creation of competitive advantages and bargaining power continue to be based on the operators and their strategies of adaptation to the constraints and opportunities of their institutional, financial and competitive environment.     

企业财务危机运营战略

企业一旦出现财务危机，便站在了崩溃边缘，随时都有“生命危险”。化解财务危机，必须面对现实，分析原因，制定切实可行的财务重整计划；确定短期行动方案，降低现金需求、扩大现金来源；寻求过渡时期的资产支援；检讨企业策略与目标，吸取教训，拟定长期整顿方案及实施时间表。     

WHAT CEREALS WILL INDONESIA STILL IMPORT IN 2020?

Most existing projection models forecast that Indonesia will become a net importer of increasing amounts of basic cereals such as rice, maize and wheat, implicitly providing grounds for the government's continuing pursuit of food self-sufficiency at any cost. A growing urban population, increases in income per capita, trends in planted area and new technologies are determining factors used in these models. The present paper employs a scenario approach based on a combination of time-series models, qualitative assessments and a cross-country analogy with Malaysia to build a picture of likely food cereal production and consumption patterns in 2020. Consequent levels of imports are calculated and estimates of their weight in the Indonesian economy are presented, comparing four periods: 1975, 1990, 2005 and 2020. These estimates are then used in considering policy issues related to food security and self-sufficiency.