The Selection Process of Applications to the Portuguese Innovation Incentive System: Who Gets Financial Support?

Public policies to support entrepreneurship and innovation play a vital role when firms have difficulties in accessing external finance. However, some authors have found evidence of long-term inefficiency in subsidized firms (Bernini and Pelligrini, 2011; Cerqua and Pelligrini, 2014) and ineffectiveness of public funds (Jorge and Suárez, 2011). The aim of the paper is to assess the effectiveness in the selection process of applications to public financial support for stimulating innovation. Using a binary choice model, we investigate which factors influence the probability of obtaining public support for an innovative investment. The explanatory variables are connected to firm profile, the characteristics of the project and the macroeconomic environment. The analysis is based on the case study of the Portuguese Innovation.Incentive System (PIIS) and on the applications managed by the Alentejo Regional Operational Program in the period 2007 – 2013. The results show that the selection process is more focused on the expected impact of the project than on the firm’s past performance. Factors that influence the credit risk and the decision to grant a bank loan do not seem to influence the government evaluator regarding the funding of some projects. Past activities in R&D do not significantly affect the probability of having an application approved under the PIIS, whereas an increase in the number of patents and the number of skilled jobs are both relevant factors. Nevertheless, some evidence of firms’ short-term inefficiency was found, in that receiving public financial support is linked to a smaller increase in productivity compared to non-approved firm applications. At the macroeconomic level, periods with a higher cost of capital in financial markets are linked to a greater probability of getting an application for public support approved, which could be associated with the effectiveness of public support in correcting market failings.

Pine wilt disease and the pinewood nematode

Pine wilt disease (PWD) is one of the most damaging events affecting conifer forests (in particular Pinus spp.), in the Far East (Japan, China and Korea), North America (USA and Canada) and, more recently, in the European Union (Portugal). In Japan it became catastrophic, damaging native pine species (Pinus thunbergii and P. densiflora), and becoming the main forest problem, forcing some areas to be totally replaced by other tree species. The pine wilt nematode (PWN) Bursaphelenchus xylophilus, endemic, with minor damage, to North America, was introduced in Japan in the early XX century and then spread to Asia (China and Korea) in the 1980s. In 1999 it was detected for the first time in Portugal, where, due to timely detection and immediate government action, it was initially (1999-2008) contained to a small area 30 km SE of Lisbon. In 2008, the PWN spread again to central Portugal, the entire country now being classified as “affected area”. Being an A1 quarantine pest, the EU acted to avoid further PWN spreading and to eradicate it, by actions including financial support for surveyes and eradication, annual inspections and research programs. Experience from control actions in Japan included aerial spraying of insecticides to control the insect vector (the Cerambycid beetle Monochamus alternatus), injection of nematicides to the trunk of infected trees, slashing and burning of large areas out of control, beetle traps, biological control and tree breeding programs. These actions allowed some positive results, but also unsuccessful cases due to the PWN spread and virulence. Other Asian countries also followed similar strategies, but the nematode is still spreading in many regions. In Portugal, despite lower damage than Asia, PWD is still significant with high losses to the forestry industry. New ways of containing PWD include preventing movement of contaminated wood, cutting symptomatic trees and monitoring. Despite a national and EU legislative body, no successful strategy to control and eventually eradicate the nematode and the disease will prevail without sound scientific studies regarding the nematode and vector(s) bioecology and genetics, the ecology and ecophysiology of the pine tree species, P. pinaster and P. pinea , as well as the genomics and proteomics of pathogenicity (resistance/ susceptibility).

Un mercado beneficial: la mercantilización de beneficios eclesiásticos en Castilla y Portugal

Thanks to some classical and recent studies, we know the main features of the huge structure that served as financial support to the secular clergy in the Ancien Régime, the system of benefices. However, almost nothing has been said yet about the process that made possible the conformation around these benefices of a market of transnational nature, controlled by the Holy See, to which outflowed a great amount of capital from the Iberian Peninsula. So these pages are intended to sketch a research line, that of the commodification of ecclesiastical benefices, virtually unattended so far. It will be examined the instruments of this market, its practices and the comparative evolution of the phenomenon in cathedrals of Castile and Portugal.

The Spatial Convergence of Knowledge in Portugal

Human resources are an essential element in territorial development. When these are characterized by a high level of training, they also enhance a number of effects in fundamental areas of binomial territorial-social cohesion. In this respect, the existence of higher education institutions throughout the territory allows the spread of human resources’ qualification but, by itself, does not guarantee the retention of these resources in different regions. Thus, the objective of this paper is to undertake a spatial analysis of convergence of knowledge through studying the evolution of the percentage of population with higher education in the periods elapsed between the last three censuses in Portugal. Although that percentage has risen appreciably, the convergence is shown to be (very) insignificant.

On the spatial convergence of (un)employment in Portugal

Regarding the EU policies of territorial cohesion is common to assume that, having the same been successful (in Portugal), regional disparities decreased. The purpose of this article is to assess the veracity of this allegation, for that considering the values of employment and unemployment rates by municipalities, determined in the last two censuses held in Portugal, i.e. 2001 and 2011. In doing so, spatial econometric techniques are used, namely local indicators of spatial association and spatial clusters, in order to better understand the eventual process of spatial convergence that may have occurred in Portugal in that period. The results point towards a spatial convergence of employment rates (both in total and by genres) and also of female unemployment rates but a spatial divergence of male unemployment rates.