The competitiveness of domestic rice production in East Africa: A domestic resource cost approach in Uganda

The rapid increase of rice imports in sub-Saharan Africa under the unstable situation in the world rice market during the 2000s has made it an important policy target for the countries in the region to increase self-sufficiency in rice in order to enhance food security. Whether domestic rice production can be competitive with imported rice is a serious question in East African countries that lie close, just across the Arabian Sea, to major rice exporting countries in South Asia. This study investigates the international competitiveness of domestic rice production in Uganda in terms of the domestic resource cost ratio. The results show that rainfed rice cultivation, which accounts for 95% of domestic rice production, does not have a comparative advantage with respect to rice imported from Pakistan, the largest supplier of imported rice to Uganda. However, the degree of non-competitiveness is not serious, and a high possibility exists for Uganda’s rainfed rice cultivation to become internationally competitive by improving yield levels by applying more modern inputs and enhancing labour productivity. Irrigated rice cultivation, though very limited in area, is competitive even under the present input-output structure when the cost of irrigation infrastructure is treated as a sunk cost. If the cost of installing irrigation infrastructure and its operation and maintenance is taken into account, the types of irrigation development that are economically feasible are not large-scale irrigation projects, but are small- and microscale projects for lowland rice cultivation and rain-water harvesting for upland rice cultivation.

Análisis de los procesos de internacionalización en el sector petrolero : Ecopetrol, Petrobras Y Exxonmobil

El presente trabajo se centra en el fenómeno de la internacionalización dentro del sector petrolero. Para esto, se escogió a tres empresas: Ecopetrol, por ser la empresa colombiana más grande; Petrobras, el mayor representante de Latinoamérica; y Exxon Mobil, un gigante del petróleo a nivel mundial. Estas empresas, que se encuentran en diferentes etapas dentro de su proceso de la internacionalización, muestran comportamientos estratégicos similares. Son precisamente estas similitudes las que permitieron proponer un modelo de internacionalización generalizado para las diferentes empresas que componen dicho sector económico. Para alcanzar dicho modelo, se recurrió a diferentes teorías de internacionalización desarrolladas por varias escuelas de negocios en el mundo, tales como el Modelo Ecléctico, el de Uppsala o la Teoría de Redes. Cabe destacar que dicho modelo propuesto es una aproximación teórica a la realidad empresarial de las compañías petroleras, usando como marco de referencia una muestra pequeña de este tipo de organizaciones. Dentro de este modelo, los altos matices de complejidad propios del fenómeno de la internacionalización se ven reducidos de manera considerable, como parte del ejercicio académico propuesto en el presente estudio.

Efectos de la reducción del nivel del Lago Chad sobre la Seguridad Regional (Nigeria, Níger, Chad y Camerún) durante el período de 2000-2010

El Lago Chad ha sido durante varias décadas, una fuente de supervivencia económica para millones de personas que habitan en cuatro Estados a saber; Nigeria, Níger, Chad y Camerún. No obstante, el cambio climático, el aumento acelerado de la población, la explotación insostenible y la mala regulación de los Estados ribereños han sido los principales factores que han dado lugar, en la última década, a la dramática reducción del nivel del Lago Chad. Teniendo en cuenta que los Estados aledaños al Lago, se encuentran inmersos en una Interdependencia Compleja, este nuevo contexto, ha tenido un impacto directo en la región, debido a que ha agravado otras variables económicas, sociales, ambientales y políticas, dejando un ambiente de inseguridad regional. De esta manera, la reducción de la Cuenca del Lago Chad representa una amenaza compartida que vincula estrechamente a Nigeria, Níger, Chad y Camerún, lo que permite vislumbrar la existencia de un Subcomplejo de Seguridad Regional.

Role of the cultural values as a key part in the implementing of healthy practices : exploratory research

El concepto de organización saludable cada vez toma más fuerza en el ámbito empresarial y académico, a razón de su enfoque integral y al impacto generado en distintos grupos de interés. Debido a su reciente consolidación como concepto, existe un limitado cuerpo de investigación en torno al tema. Para contribuir a la generación de conocimiento en este sentido, se desarrolló un estudio exploratorio el cual tenía como objetivo identificar la relación existente entre la implementación de prácticas saludables en las organizaciones y los valores culturales. En el estudio participaron 66 sujetos a quienes se les administró un cuestionario compuesto por nueve variables, cinco provenientes del modelo de Hofstede (1980) y cuatro más que evaluaban la implementación de prácticas organizacionales saludables. Los resultados obtenidos muestran que los valores culturales predicen la implementación de prácticas saludables.

Factors that have shaped the eEvolution of bilateral trade between Canada and Colombia in the long run (1953-2003)

Currently bilateral trade between Canada and Colombia is low. In 2003, this trade amounted to US $489 million, with Co­lombian imports from Canada totaling US $ 213 million (DOTS, 2004). Canada supplied approximately 4.0% of Colombia’s total trade (total imports and total ex­ports), in contrast Colombia supplied only around 0.1% of the Canadian total trade. In 2005, Colombia was the third largest Canadian partner in South America after Brazil and Venezuela. The objective of this paper is to analyze the trade performance between Canada and Colombia using a modified gravity equation to identify the most relevant historical factors that have shaped the evo­lution of this bilateral trade in the long run (during the period from 1953 to 2003). The analysis includes traditional economic va­riables (such as population and income of the importing and exporting countries). In order to understand the qualitative nature of the evolution of this bilateral trade the second objective is to review the evolving nature of trade including commodity com­position and trade characteristics.  

Demand of children in Colombia : guessing or planning

El artículo analiza los determinantes de la presencia de hijos no deseados en Colombia. Se utiliza la información de la Encuesta Nacional de Demografía y Salud (ENDS, 2005), específicamente para las mujeres de 40 años o más. Dadas las características especiales de la variable que se analiza, se utilizan modelos de conteo para verificar si determinadas características socioeconómicas como la educación o el estrato económico explican la presencia de hijos no deseados. Se encuentra que la educación de la mujer y el área de residencia son determinantes significativos de los nacimientos no planeados. Además, la relación negativa entre el número de hijos no deseados y la educación de la mujer arroja implicaciones clave en materia de política social.

The changing structure of diets in the European Union in relation to healthy eating guidelines

Objective: Our objective in this paper is to assess diets in the European Union (EU) in relation to the recommendations of the recent World Health Organization/Food and Agriculture Organization expert consultation and to show how diets have changed between 1961 and 2001. Data and methods: Computations make use of FAOSTAT data on food availability at country level linked to a food composition database to convert foods to nutrients. We further explore the growing similarity of diets in the EU by making use of a consumption similarity index. The index provides a single number measure of dietary overlap between countries. Results: The data confirm the excessive consumption by almost all countries of saturated fats, cholesterol and sugars, and the convergence of nutrient intakes across the EU. Whereas in 1961 diets in several European countries were more similar to US diets than to those of other European countries, this is no longer the case; moreover, while EU diets have become more homogeneous, the EU as a whole and the USA have become less similar over time. Conclusions: Although the dominant cause of greater similarity in EU diets over the period studied is increased intakes in Mediterranean countries of saturated fats, cholesterol and sugar, also important are reductions in saturated fat and sugar in some Northern European countries. This suggests that healthy eating messages are finally having an impact on diets; a distinctly European diet may also be emerging.

European Union: Shadow WTO agricultural domestic support notifications

The notification of the level of domestic support to the World Trade Organization (WTO) is intended to reflect compliance with obligations entered into at the time of the Uruguay Round. WTO members have often been slow to provide notification of domestic support levels. This makes the process of notification less useful as an indicator of the degree to which changes in policy have or have not benefited the trade system as a whole and exporting countries in particular. The notification of domestic support in the E.U. illustrates the value of a measure that reflects current policies and can therefore act as a basis for negotiation of further disciplines where these are necessary. The E.U. has made major changes in its Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) over the period since 1992 when the MacSharry reforms were implemented. Payments originally notified in the blue box (related to supply control) have over time been changed until in their present form they are unrelated to current production or price levels, and hence can satisfy the criteria for the green box. The E.U. has therefore much more latitude in trade talks to agree to reductions in the allowable trade-distorting support. This paper reproduced the E.U. notifications relating to 2003/04 and extends these with official statistics to the year 2006/07. It then projects forward the components of domestic support until the year 2013/14, based on forecasts of future production and estimates of policy parameters. The impact of a successful Doha Round is simulated, showing that the constraints envisaged in the WTO draft modalities document of May 19, 2008, would be binding by the year 2013, at about the time the next budget cycle in the E.U. starts. Without the Doha Round constraints, further reform might still happen for domestic reasons, but the framework provided by the WTO for domestic policy spending would be less relevant. In that case, much could hinge on the legitimacy of the Single Farm Payment system under the current rules governing the green box.

The rise of the far right in debtor and creditor European countries: the case of European Parliament elections

While the 2014 European Parliament elections were marked by the rise of far right-wing parties, the different patterns of support that we observe across Europe and across time are not directly related to the economic crisis. Indeed, economic hardship seems neither sufficient nor necessary for the rise of such parties to occur. Using the cross-national results for the 2004, 2009 and 2014 EP elections in order to capture time and country variations, we posit the economy affects the rise of far right-wing parties in more complex ways. Specifically, we compare the experience of high debt countries (the ‘debtors’) and the others (the ‘creditors’) and explore the relationship between far right-wing party success on the one hand, and unemployment, inequality, immigration, globalization and the welfare state on the other hand. Our discussion suggests there might be a trade off between budgetary stability and far right-wing party support, but the choice between Charybdis and Scylla may be avoided if policy makers carefully choose which policies should bear the brunt of the fiscal adjustment.

Contribution to the ground-based follow-up of the Gaia space mission

The Gaia Space Mission [Mignard, F., 2005. The three-dimensional universe with Gaia. ESA/SP-576; Perryman, M., 2005. The three-dimensional universe with Gaia. ESA/SP-576] will observe several transient events as supernovae, microlensing, gamma ray bursts and new Solar System objects. The satellite, due to its scanning law, will detect these events but will not be able to monitor them. So, to take these events into consideration and to perform further studies it is necessary to follow them with Earth-based observations. These observations could be efficiently done by a ground-based network of well-equipped telescopes scattered in both hemispheres. Here we focus our attention at the new Solar System objects to be discovered and observed by the Gaia satellite [Mignard, F., 2002. Observations of Solar System objects by Gaia I. Detection of NEOS. Astron. Astrophys. 393, 727] mainly asteroids, NEOs and comets. A dedicated ground-based network of telescopes as proposed by Thuillot [2005. The three-dimensional universe with Gaia. ESA/SP-576] will allow to monitor those events, to avoid losing them and to perform a quick characterization of some physical properties which will be important for the identification of these objects in further measurements by Gaia. We present in this paper, the beginning of the organization of a Latin-American ground-based network of telescopes and observers joining several institutions in Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil and other Latin-American countries aiming to contribute to the follow-up of Gaia science alerts for Solar System objects. (C) 2008 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Collagen fibril organization in the pregnant endometrium of decorin-deficient mice

In the pregnant mouse endometrium, collagen fibrillogenesis is characterized by the presence of very thick collagen fibrils which are topographically located exclusively within the decidualized stroma. This dynamic biological process is in part regulated by the small leucine-rich proteoglycans decorin and biglycan. In the present study we utilized wild-type (Dcn+/+) and decorin-deficient (Dcn-/-) time-pregnant mice to investigate the evolution of non-decidualized and decidualized collagen matrix in the uterine wall of these animals. Ultrastructural and morphometric analyses revealed that the organization of collagen fibrils in the pregnant endometrium of both non-decidualized and decidualized stroma showed a great variability of shape and size, regardless of the genotype. However, the decidualized endometrium from Dcn-/- mice contained fibrils with larger diameter and more irregular contours as compared to the wild-type littermates. In the Dcn-/- animals, the proportion of thin (10-50 nm) fibrils was also higher as compared to Dcn+/+ animals. On day 7 of pregnancy, biglycan was similarly localized in the decidualized endometrium in both genotypes. Lumican immunostaining was intense both in decidualized and non-decidualized stroma from Dcn-/- animals. The present results support previous findings suggesting that decorin participates in uterine collagen fibrillogenesis. In addition, we suggest that the absence of decorin disturbs the process of lateral assembly of thin fibrils, resulting in very thick collagen fibrils with irregular profiles. Our data further suggest that decorin, biglycan and lumican might play an interactive role in collagen fibrillogenesis in the mouse endometrium, a process modulated according to the stage of pregnancy.

Racial discrimination in Brazil: interviews with leaders of the black movement

Racism in Brazil has some specificities when compared to other countries, for, differently from, for instance, South Africa and the United States, Brazilian Constitutions, ever since the Independence (1822), have never distinguished the citizens according to race or color. Furthermore, since the mid-1900s, Afro-Brazilian cultural manifestations, such as, for example, samba and capoeira, started to be valued as a part of our “national identity”. These specificities make race relations in Brazilian society a much more complex issue. This paper is focused on selected parts of interviews that deal with the nature of racial discrimination in Brazil, extracted from interviews with leaders of the black movement produced within the scope of the project “The History of Black Movement in Brazil: organization of a collection of Oral History Interviews”, developed by CPDOC, Getulio Vargas Foundation (Rio de Janeiro). These “histories within history”, as told by our interviewees, may be transformed into images that will be able to condense a given reality, thus allowing us to evaluate the gains obtained by oral history methodology.

The impact of OFDI on economic growth countries. An econometric approach using panel data and time-series evidence

The thesis at hand adds to the existing literature by investigating the relationship between economic growth and outward foreign direct investments (OFDI) on a set of 16 emerging countries. Two different econometric techniques are employed: a panel data regression analysis and a time-series causality analysis. Results from the regression analysis indicate a positive and significant correlation between OFDI and economic growth. Additionally, the coefficient for the OFDI variable is robust in the sense specified by the Extreme Bound Analysis (EBA). On the other hand, the findings of the causality analysis are particularly heterogeneous. The vector autoregression (VAR) and the vector error correction model (VECM) approaches identify unidirectional Granger causality running either from OFDI to GDP or from GDP to OFDI in six countries. In four economies causality among the two variables is bidirectional, whereas in five countries no causality relationship between OFDI and GDP seems to be present.

Speak now or forever hold your peace: an empirical investigation of whistleblowing in Brazilian organizations

À medida que ajudam as organizações a prevenir condutas irregulares e a manter um ambiente de trabalho mais éticos, as denúncias (whistleblowing) são frequentemente apontadas pela literatura como um benefício à sociedade como um todo. Entretanto, pouco se sabe a respeito de muitos aspectos associados à decisão de denunciar uma irregularidade. No Brasil, em especial, onde o assunto permanece sendo negligenciado por pesquisadores, elementos culturais específicos podem obstruir o caminho da denuncia, além de impor restrições à generalização dos resultados de pesquisas anteriores, quase sempre voltadas para a realidade anglo-saxônica. Com base nesses pressupostos, este estudo busca identificar os antecedentes do whistleblowing interno nas organizações brasileiras. De modo geral, os resultados da pesquisa empírica realizada com uma ampla amostra de profissionais oriundos de empresas púbicas e privadas dão suporte ao modelo proposto e reforçam a noção de que o ato de denunciar é o resultado complexo da interação entre fatores da organização, do indivíduo da situação observada. Em particular, os resultados sugerem que os indivíduos são mais propensos a realizar a denúncia quando a irregularidade observada é percebida como grave e quando a própria denuncia é vista como um curso de ação ético. Por outro lado, os indivíduos podem optar pelo silêncio se o alvo da denúncia for alguém com alto status na organização, se eles não sentirem apoio da organização ou se temerem retaliações. A influência negativa do medo de retaliação sobre a intenção de denunciar, contudo, pode ser atenuada se o indivíduo está convencido de que o correto a fazer é denunciar. Por fim, os resultados também sugerem que profissionais em posição gerencial são mais propensos a denunciar irregularidades do que os demais membros de uma organização. As implicações desses resultados, bem como as limitações e contribuições do estudo para a teoria e para a prática são discutidas em detalhe, juntamente com sugestões para pesquisas futuras.

After the demise of neoliberalism but not of conservatism, a third developmentalism?

Neoliberalism and developmentalism are the two alternative forms of economic and political organization of capitalism. Since the 2008 global financial crisis we see the demise of neoliberalism in rich countries, as state intervention and regulation increased, opening room for a third historical developmentalism (the first was mercantilism, the second, Fordism). Not only because of major market failures, not only because the market is definitely unable to assure financial stability and full employment, an active macroeconomic policy is being required. Modern economies are divided into a competitive and a non-competitive sector; for the coordination of the competitive sector the market is irreplaceable and regulation as well as strategic industrial policy will be pragmatically adopted following the subsidiarity principle, whereas for the non-competitive sector, state coordination and some state ownership are usually more efficient. Besides, the fact that capitalist economies are increasingly diversified and complex is an argument against the two extremes – against statism as well as neoliberalism – in so far that they require market coordination combined with increased regulation. But the third developmentalism probably will not be progressive as was the second, because the social-democratic political parties are disoriented. They won the battle for the welfare state, which neoliberalism was unable to dismantle, but the competition of low wage developing countries and immigration continue to offer arguments to conservative political parties that defend the reduction of the cost of labor contracts or the or precarization of labor.