Securing enough food for all

In the decade following the World Food Summit in 1996, the SDC has committed itself to reaching the objective set for 2015. This commitment has garnered support from a very large number of public and private partners and has led to initiatives and projects aimed at improving agricultural production and research, encouraging greater stewardship of natural resources and developing rural areas in regions where food security is a critical problem. The brochure presents a selection of the manifold projects SDC iniatied and supported in order to increase food security.

Coping with drought

People in arid and semi-arid regions face difficult living conditions, increasingly aggravated by extended periods of drought and advancing desertification. However, the populations of arid and semi-arid regions can also rely on the great potential for innovation and adaptation that they have developed over centuries of living in these environments. This brochure presents the reality of people living in the world’s arid and semi-arid regions, and shows how SDC supports them in developing innovations and improving their livelihoods.

Valence and agency influence striatal response to feedback in patients with major depressive disorder

BACKGROUND: Reduced sensitivity to positive feedback is common in patients with major depressive disorder (MDD). However, findings regarding negative feedback are ambiguous, with both exaggerated and blunted responses being reported. The ventral striatum (VS) plays a major role in processing valenced feedback, and previous imaging studies have shown that the locus of controls (self agency v. external agency) over the outcome influences VS response to feedback. We investigated whether attributing the outcome to one's own action or to an external agent influences feedback processing in patients with MDD. We hypothesized that depressed participants would be less sensitive to the feedback attribution reflected by an altered VS response to self-attributed gains and losses. METHODS: Using functional MRI and a motion prediction task, we investigated the neural responses to self-attributed (SA) and externally attributed (EA) monetary gains and losses in unmedicated patients with MDD and healthy controls. RESULTS: We included 21 patients and 25 controls in our study. Consistent with our prediction, healthy controls showed a VS response influenced by feedback valence and attribution, whereas in depressed patients striatal activity was modulated by valence but was insensitive to attribution. This attribution insensitivity led to an altered ventral putamen response for SA - EA losses in patients with MDD compared with healthy controls. LIMITATIONS: Depressed patients with comorbid anxiety disorder were included. CONCLUSION: These results suggest an altered assignment of motivational salience to SA losses in patients with MDD. Altered striatal response to SA negative events may reinforce the belief of not being in control of negative outcomes contributing to a cycle of learned helplessness.

Strengthening the food systems governance evidence base: Supporting commensurability of research through a systematic review of methods

Governance of food systems is a poorly understood determinant of food security. Much scholarship on food systems governance is non-empirical, while existing research is often case study-based and theoretically and methodologically incommensurable. This frustrates aggregation of evidence and generalisation. We undertook a systematic review of methods used in food systems governance research with a view to identifying a core set of indicators for future research. We gathered literature through a structured consultation and sampling from recent reviews. Indicators were identified and classified according to the levels and sectors they investigate. We found a concentration of indicators in food production at local to national levels and a sparseness in distribution and consumption. Unsurprisingly, many indicators of institutional structure were found, while agency-related indicators are moderately represented. We call for piloting and validation of these indicators and for methodological development to fill gaps identified. These efforts are expected to support a more consolidated future evidence base and eventual meta-analysis.

Das neue Stadium der Jewish-Agency-Frage

Robert Weltsch

Das neue Amtshaus der Jewish Agency in Jerusalem [Illustration]

Scan von Monochrom-Mikroform

Optimal Central Banker Contracts and Common Agency

This paper considers the contacting approach to central banking in the context of a simple common agency model. The recent literature on optimal contracts suggests that the political principal of the central bank can design the appropriate incentive schemes that remedy for time-inconsistency problems in monetary policy. The effectiveness of such contracts, however, requires a central banker that attaches a positive weight to the incentive scheme. As a result, delegating monetary policy under such circumstances gives rise to the possibility that the central banker may respond to incentive schemes offered by other potential principals. We introduce common agency considerations in the design of optimal central banker contracts. We introduce two principals - society (government) and an interest group, whose objectives conflict with society's and we examine under what circumstances the government-offered or the interest-group-offered contract dominates. Our results largely depend on the type of bias that the interest group contract incorporates. In particular, when the interest group contract incorporates an inflationary bias the outcome depends on the principals' relative concern of the incentive schemes' costs. When the interest group contract incorporates an expansionary bias, however, it always dominates the government contract. A corollary of our results is that central banker contracts aiming to remove the expansionary bias of policymakers should be written explicitly in terms of the perceived bias.

Der Dreizehnte Kongreß und die Jewish Agency

I. Waldmann