The extinction of genetic resources as a consequence of land development, especially in ‘biodiversity hot spots’like rain forests in South America or South East Asia, is becoming a serious problem - not only for local communitiesbut also for international firms in the pharmaceutical...

Sometimes authorities are unable to identify rapidly the origin of a tainted product.In such cases, recalls or warnings often apply to all suppliers, even to those thathad not contributed to the contamination. Traceability enables more targetedrecalls by identifying more specically the product's...

A methodology for measuring public agricultural research capital is developed anddescribed for the first time, new public agricultural research capital measures for each of the 48contiguous US states, 1970-1999, are presented, and a new econometric analysis of the contributionof public...

Niche markets of agricultural products are experiencing rapid growth. One suchniche market is organic pork. Organic pork production is a relatively new and expandingsegment of the pork industry. Similar to some other niche markets, it has also experiencedrapid growth (Organic Trade...

This paper examines the impact of public and private agricultural research andextension on agricultural total factor productivity at the state level. We test the hypothesis thatthe composition of agricultural experiment station funding—share of funding from impact offederal competitive grants...

This paper presents new econometric evidence on state government’s demand for resources to support local agricultural experiment station research. The econometric model consists of a complete-demand system covering four major resource sources, and it is fitted to annual observations on 48...

Two interested parties dominate the current debate on genetically modified (GM) foods: environmental groups and agribusiness companies. For the average consumer to arrive at an informed decision on these new foods, they must rely on information from interested parties. Unfortunately, information...

This paper analyses the empirical determinants of contract length, a key andyet neglected dimension of contractual structure. I estimate contract length andcontract type jointly using original data on tenancy agreements signed between1870 and 1880 in the district of Siracusa, Italy.The findings...

The choice of cultivation techniques is a key determinant of agricultural productivityand has important consequences for income growth and poverty reductionin developing countries. Using household data from Nicaragua this papershows that the choice of cultivation techniques depends on farmers’...

This chapter develops a unified analytical framework, drawing on and extending the existing literatureon the subject, for studying the role of property rights in economic development. Itaddresses two fundamental and related questions concerning the relationship between propertyrights and...