Tobin’s Q-theory of investment has been linked to firm merger activity by Jovanovic and Rousseau. They showed that firms with higher Q-values, that is the ratio of market to book values, tend to be the ones buying other firms and not the ones being acquired. Market values should theoretically...

The nature of public agricultural research changed in 1980 when the Bayh-Dole Act allowed universities to retain title to inventions that were created with Federal funds, and the court case Diamond v. Chakrabarty allowed patenting of living tissue and eventually other bio-engineered products. In...

Technological innovation is vital to enhancing agricultural productivity and reducing poverty in many developing countries. Public investment in research and development has historically driven technological change in agriculture; however, recent trends suggest that the private sector may play a...

This research addresses two questions: Why is fertilizer not yet fulfilling its potential as a major stimulus to agricultural productivity in SSA? What can be done to improve the situation? Our answers are based on an extensive review of fertilizer response, profitability, and policy literature...

To reverse the declining trends in soil fertility levels in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA), the use of fertilizers and other land augmenting technologies needs to increase. While overall fertilizer consumption in SSA has increased by as much as 200% from 1970 levels, the growth has been highly...

The purpose of this paper is to provide a conceptual framework that can be used by agricultural leaders, administrators, policy makers, and seed program managers to (1) understand key factors affecting seed system development; and (2) compare organizational and institutional strategies for...

The nature of the observed market structure and R&D competition in genomics research is used as the basis for a comparative analysis of research under a mixed oligopoly, pure oligopoly and monopoly when the timing of the innovation outcome is uncertain (as in an R&D race), the winner-take-all...

This paper examines the role of patents in the development and use of two platform technologies for plant biotechnology - plant transformation techniques and structural genomics. We find that patents were important in inducing private firms to develop these platform technologies. There...