Get a GRIP: Should Area Revenue Coverage Be Offered through the Farm Bill or as a Crop Insurance Program? 2007

The successful expansion of the U.S. crop insurance program has not eliminated ad hoc disaster assistance. An alternative currently being explored by members of Congress and others in preparation of the 2007 farm bill is to simply remove the “ad hoc” part of disaster assistance programs by creating a standing program that would automatically funnel aid to hard-hit regions and crops. One form such a program could take can be found in the area yield and area revenue insurance programs currently offered by the U.S. crop insurance program. The Group Risk Plan (GRP) and Group Risk Income Protection (GRIP) programs automatically trigger payments when county yields or revenues, respectively, fall below a producer-elected coverage level. The per-acre taxpayer costs of offering GRIP in Indiana, Illinois, and Iowa for corn and soybeans through the crop insurance program are estimated. These results are used to determine the amount of area revenue coverage that could be offered to farmers as part of a standing farm bill disaster program. Approximately 55% of taxpayer support for GRIP flows to the crop insurance industry. A significant portion of this support comes in the form of net underwriting gains. The expected rate of return on money put at risk by private crop insurance companies under the current Standard Reinsurance Agreement is approximately 100%. Taking this industry support and adding in the taxpayer support for GRIP that flows to producers would fund a county target revenue program at the 93% coverage level.

How geographic distance and depth drive ecological variability and isolation of demersal fish communities in an archipelago system (Cape Verde, Eastern Atlantic Ocean)

Cape Verde is a tropical oceanic ecosystem, highly fragmented and dispersed, with islands physically isolated by distance and depth. To understand how isolation affects the ecological variability in this archipelago, we conducted a research project on the community structure of the 18 commercially most important demersal fishes. An index of ecological distance based on species relative dominance (Di) is developed from Catch Per Unit Effort, derived from an extensive database of artisanal fisheries. Two ecological measures of distance between islands are calculated: at the species level, DDi, and at the community level, DD (sum of DDi). A physical isolation factor (Idb) combining distance (d) and bathymetry (b) is proposed. Covariance analysis shows that isolation factor is positively correlated with both DDi and DD, suggesting that Idb can be considered as an ecological isolation factor. The effect of Idb varies with season and species. This effect is stronger in summer (May to November), than in winter (December to April), which appears to be more unstable. Species react differently to Idb, independently of season. A principal component analysis on the monthly (DDi) for the 12 islands and the 18 species, complemented by an agglomerative hierarchical clustering, shows a geographic pattern of island organization, according to Idb. Results indicate that the ecological structure of demersal fish communities of Cape Verde archipelago, both in time and space, can be explained by a geographic isolation factor. The analytical approach used here is promising and could be tested in other archipelago systems.

Bouncing Back, Recovery of Fish Productions, 2003

Water fact sheet for Iowa Department of Natural Resources and the Geological Bureau.

Fish Tissue Monitoring in Iowa, 2006

Iowa has nearly 72,000 miles of streams. With one week of camping, miles of paddling, on-going educational opportunities, and hundreds of dedicated and hard-working Iowans, Project AWARE can make a difference – one stretch of river, one week a year, one piece of trash at a time. If it seems like a vacation to the participants…it is. They just learn and improve the river as they go.

A fish-specific transposable element shapes the repertoire of p53 target genes in zebrafish.

Transposable elements, as major components of most eukaryotic organisms' genomes, define their structural organization and plasticity. They supply host genomes with functional elements, for example, binding sites of the pleiotropic master transcription factor p53 were identified in LINE1, Alu and LTR repeats in the human genome. Similarly, in this report we reveal the role of zebrafish (Danio rerio) EnSpmN6_DR non-autonomous DNA transposon in shaping the repertoire of the p53 target genes. The multiple copies of EnSpmN6_DR and their embedded p53 responsive elements drive in several instances p53-dependent transcriptional modulation of the adjacent gene, whose human orthologs were frequently previously annotated as p53 targets. These transposons define predominantly a set of target genes whose human orthologs contribute to neuronal morphogenesis, axonogenesis, synaptic transmission and the regulation of programmed cell death. Consistent with these biological functions the orthologs of the EnSpmN6_DR-colonized loci are enriched for genes expressed in the amygdala, the hippocampus and the brain cortex. Our data pinpoint a remarkable example of convergent evolution: the exaptation of lineage-specific transposons to shape p53-regulated neuronal morphogenesis-related pathways in both a hominid and a teleost fish.

An analysis of the accounting principles applied by the European Farm Accountancy Data Network

In spite of its relative importance in the economy of many countriesand its growing interrelationships with other sectors, agriculture has traditionally been excluded from accounting standards. Nevertheless, to support its Common Agricultural Policy, for years the European Commission has been making an effort to obtain standardized information on the financial performance and condition of farms. Through the Farm Accountancy Data Network (FADN), every year data are gathered from a rotating sample of 60.000 professional farms across all member states. FADN data collection is not structured as an accounting cycle but as an extensive questionnaire. This questionnaire refers to assets, liabilities, revenues and expenses, and seems to try to obtain a "true and fair view" of the financial performance and condition of the farms it surveys. However, the definitions used in the questionnaire and the way data is aggregated often appear flawed from an accounting perspective. The objective of this paper is to contrast the accounting principles implicit in the FADN questionnaire with generally accepted accounting principles, particularly those found in the IVth Directive of the European Union, on the one hand, and those recently proposed by the International Accounting Standards Committee’s Steering Committeeon Agriculture in its Draft Statement of Principles, on the other hand. There are two reasons why this is useful. First, it allows to make suggestions how the information provided by FADN could be more in accordance with the accepted accounting framework, and become a more valuable tool for policy makers, farmers, and other stakeholders. Second, it helps assessing the suitability of FADN to become the starting point for a European accounting standard on agriculture.

Fish Kills in Iowa, 2008

This monthly report from the Iowa Department of Natural Resources is about the water quality management of Iowa's rivers, streams and lakes.

Common Iowa Fish, 2008

This monthly report from the Iowa Department of Natural Resources is about the water quality management of Iowa's rivers, streams and lakes.

Accounting information and the prediction of farm viability

Until recently farm management made little use of accounting and agriculture has been largely excluded from the scope of accounting standards. This article examines the current use of accounting in agriculture and points theneed to establish accounting standards for agriculture. Empirical evidence shows that accounting can make a significant contribution to agricultural management and farm viability and could also be important for other agents involved in agricultural decision making. Existing literature on failureprediction models and farm viability prediction studies provide the starting point for our research, in which two dichotomous logit models were applied to subsamples of viable and unviable farms in Catalonia, Spain. The firstmodel considered only non-financial variables, while the other also considered financial ones. When accounting variables were added to the model, a significant reduction in deviance was observed.

New opportunities for farm accounting

There is a gap between the importance given to accounting and the low level of bookkeeping and accounting practice in the agricultural sector. Current general accounting rules do not adapt very well to the particularities of farming and are difficult and expensive to implement. The Farm Accountancy Data Network (FADN) and IASC's Proposed International Accounting Standard on Agriculture (PIASA) could be key elements to improve the use of accounting in European farms. The PIASA provides a strong conceptual framework but might need further instruments for its implementation in practice. FADN is an experienced network that has elaborated very detailed farm accounting procedures. Empirical data indicate that current FADN reports are already considered useful by farmers for different purposes. Some changes in the FADN procedures are suggested, while some aspects of FADN are worthwhile for the future IAS on agriculture.

Measuring and explaining farm inefficiency in a panel data set of mixed farms

This paper aims to estimate a translog stochastic frontier production function in the analysis of a panel of 150 mixed Catalan farms in the period 1989-1993, in order to attempt to measure and explain variation in technical inefficiency scores with a one-stage approach. The model uses gross value added as the output aggregate measure. Total employment, fixed capital, current assets, specific costs and overhead costs are introduced into the model as inputs. Stochasticfrontier estimates are compared with those obtained using a linear programming method using a two-stage approach. The specification of the translog stochastic frontier model appears as an appropriate representation of the data, technical change was rejected and the technical inefficiency effects were statistically significant. The mean technical efficiency in the period analyzed was estimated to be 64.0%. Farm inefficiency levels were found significantly at 5%level and positively correlated with the number of economic size units.

Insights into low fish mercury bioaccumulation in a mercury-contaminated reservoir, Guizhou, China.

We examined Hg biogeochemistry in Baihua Reservoir, a system affected by industrial wastewater containing mercury (Hg). As expected, we found high levels of total Hg (THg, 664-7421 ng g(-1)) and monomethylmercury (MMHg, 3-21 ng g(-1)) in the surface sediments (0-10 cm). In the water column, both THg and MMHg showed strong vertical variations with higher concentrations in the anoxic layer (>4m) than in the oxic layer (0-4 m), which was most pronounced for the dissolved MMHg (p < 0.001). However, mercury levels in biota samples (mostly cyprinid fish) were one order of magnitude lower than common regulatory values (i.e. 0.3-0.5 mg kg(-1)) for human consumption. We identified three main reasons to explain the low fish Hg bioaccumulation: disconnection of the aquatic food web from the high MMHg zone, simple food web structures, and biodilution effect at the base of the food chain in this eutrophic reservoir.

Observations of flying-fish (Exocoetidae) between northern Peru and Panama, october - december 1977

Estudio de observación de los peses voladores durante la travesia del CSS BAFFIN entre Panamá y el norte del Perú

Distribution and abundance of six species of fish larvae in peruvian waters and their relationship with physical and biological environment

Estudio de muestras recolectadas con el BIONESS a varias profundidades en trece estaciones.