This book explores whether the world economy is breaking up into regional trading and currency blocs centred on the European Community, Japan and the United States. Frankel uses trade, investment and financial data to assess this issue. He concludes with an analysis of how trends in regional economic integration can be used as building blocks for a stronger multilateral system.

Regional Trading Blocs in the world economic system, reseñado por Antonio Ortiz-Mena L.N.

IFPRI has long argued that spending on agricultural research constitutes a sound investment in poverty reduction and agricultural and economic growth, through improvements in productivity. This argument is based partly on the reported evidence of high rates of return to agricultural research, typically believed to be in the range of 40–60 percent per year. Yet there continues to be controversy over whether these figures are to be believed, and over what they actually indicate. This study represents the first attempt to take a comprehensive look at all the available evidence on rates of return to investments in agricultural R&D since 1953, and the only attempt to do so in a formal statistical fashion. This report has compiled and documented the literature in ways that make it more accessible and more useful to other researchers and policymakers, as well as others interested in the evidence. The analysis reveals some systematic patterns and some sources of biases that make it easier to interpret the evidence and draw meaningful conclusions. (Excerpted from Summary by Per Pinstrup-Andersen)

http://impact.cgiar.org/sites/default/files/pdf/8.pdf

A meta-analysis of rates of return to agricultural R&D : ex pede Herculem?

Extending McCallum's (1995) result, based on a gravity model of 1988 trade flows, that a typical Canadian province trades 22 times more with other provinces than with US states of similar size and distance, this paper asks how Quebec trade patterns compare with those of other provinces The results, based on revised data for 1988, 1989 and 1990, show that while the typical province trades more than 20 times as much with other provinces as with comparable US states, for Quebec the multiple is even greater Thus trade between Quebec and the United States appears to be an even less viable alternative to interprovincial trade for Quebec than it is for the rest of Canada The implications of these results for international economics are considerable, as they show that trade linkages within a national economy are far greater than previously imagined If these results are confirmed, they imply that the fabric of national economies is far tighter than that of the global trading system, even for countries operating without substantial trade barriers

Do National Borders Matter for Quebec's Trade?

This paper reviews and compares the most common approaches used to evaluate public agricultural research investment. Ex post studies fall into two major groups: (a) consumer and producer surplus analyses, estimating average rates of return to research, and (b) production function analyses, estimating marginal rates of return to research. Ex ante studies fall into four groups: (a) those using scoring models to rank research activities, (b) those employing benefit-cost analysis to establish rates of return to research, (c) those using simulation models, and (d) those using mathematical programming to select an optimal mix of research activities.

Evaluating Returns to Agricultural Research: A Review

In this article we examine the economic benefits of the long history of public research in agriculture. Agricultural productivity continues to grow. Annual rates of return on research expenditure are of the order of 50 percent. Research oriented to science is profitable when associated with technological research. Decentralization, as in the system of state agricultural experiment stations and substations, has allowed close association of research oriented to science with that oriented to technology and to farming. The high rate of return shows that investment in public research in agriculture is too low. This is at least partially because research benefits spill over to other regions and to consumers, reducing the incentives for local support.

https://science.sciencemag.org/content/sci/205/4411/1101.full.pdf

Economic benefits from research: an example from agriculture.

The second edition of the groundbreaking Agricultural Policy, Agribusiness, and Rent-Seeking Behaviour expands upon its original analysis of the economic policies that affect agriculture and agribusiness Widening their lens to include information on the European Union, the authors continue to emphasize the role of farmers and agribusiness in the formation of policy, exploring the issues from both economic and historical perspectives More theoretical than the first volume in its discussions of welfare economics and the theory of public choice, the second edition also addresses the broad significance of agricultural policies such as biofuels, nutrition, multifunctionality, genetically modified organisms, and multinational firms The authors maintain and expand the empirical content to provide more practical examples suited to teaching and analyse specific problems including price and income stabilization, science policy, environmental policy, and food quality and safety

Agricultural Policy, Agribusiness and Rent-Seeking Behaviour

The adoption of conservation tillage technology since the 1970s has been one of the most remarkable changes in the production of crops on the Canadian Prairies. The decision whether to adopt conservation tillage technology or not requires the producer to go through a thorough decision-making process. In Canada, there has been little economic research on the question of what farm, regional, and environmental characteristics affect the adoption decision. Using 1991, 1996, and 2001 Census of Agriculture data together with other data sources we estimate a probit model explaining the adoption decision. We find that important variables include farm size, proximity to a research station, type of soil, and weather conditions.

La pratique du semis direct depuis les annees 1970 constitue l'un des changements les plus notables de la production des cultures dans les Prairies canadiennes. Avant de decider d'adopter ou non cette pratique, le producteur doit s'engager dans un processus rigoureux de prise de decisions. Au Canada, peu d'etudes economiques se sont penchees sur les caracteristiques agricoles, regionales et environnementales qui influencent la decision d'adopter ou non. Au moyen des donnees tirees du Recensement de l'agriculture de 1991, 1996 et 2001, combinees a d'autres sources de donnees, nous avons estime un modele probit pour expliquer la decision d'adopter ou non. Nous avons estime que les variables importantes incluent la taille de l'exploitation, la proximite d'une station de recherche, le type de sol et les conditions meteorologiques.

Factors That Affect the Adoption Decision of Conservation Tillage in the Prairie Region of Canada

Public and private investment in Research and Development are an important source of economic growth. This article documents the high rate of return to society from investment in agricultural research. The analysis took the form of estimating the gains in producer and consumer surplus from research that improved rapeseed yield in western Canada and related these gains to research expenditures by calculating an internal rate of return. The distribution of the return between consumers and producers were estimated. The internal rate of return was found to be 101 percent and indicates an underinvestment in this type of research. Of the total net benefits, consumers captured 53 percent and producers 47 percent.



L'argent public et prive investi dans la recherche et le developpement est une source importante de croissance economique. Le present article fournit une documentation sur le taux elve des profits que rapportent a la societe les investissements dans la recherche en agriculture. Notre analyse a pris la forme d'une estimation des gains en surplus realises par le producteur et le consommateur, a la suite de recherches ameliorant le rendement de la semence du colza dans l'ouest canadien, puis nous avons etabli un rapport entre ces gains et les depenses pour la recherche en calculant un taux de profits internes. Nous avons evalue la repartition des profits entre consommateurs et producteurs. Le taux des profits internes s'est avereetre de 101 pour cent, et cela signifie un sous-investissement dans ce type de recherche. Les consommateurs ont realise 53 pour cent du total des beneficies nets, alors que les producteurs en ont recupere 47 pour cent. 1928 ems

Economic costs and returns from crop development research: the case of rapeseed breeding in Canada

Public research institutions are turning increasingly to the private sector for additional financial support. Such a trend, in the short run, lessens the need for public research expenditures, but may, in the long run, prove to be very costly to the economy as a whole. This is because private funding increases the chance that the direction of research will shift so that private benefits are enhanced. Such a shift is especially costly if public research funds are then not forthcoming that would have the potential of producing the maximum level of benefits to the economy as a whole. A case study of Canadian barley research is used to illustrate this problem.

https://www.jstor.org/stable/pdfplus/1884644.pdf

Public and Private Returns from Joint Venture Research: An Example from Agriculture

This paper investigates the effect of innovation on primary agricultural and processed food product exports among the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) countries. A theoretical gravity equation that accounts for innovation is derived. The empirical exercise uses panel data sets covering 21 OECD countries for the period 1990-2003. The R&D capital stock is employed as a tangible way of measuring innovation. Empirical results show that R&D has enhanced exports in the primary agricultural sector. Meanwhile, the market expansion effect of R&D appears to be more than offset by the market power effect in the food processing sector, resulting in a decrease in exports. Also, evidence was found of a positive vertical channeling effect through which R&D in the primary agricultural sector increases exports of processed food products.

W. Hartley Furtan

Papers

Agricultural Policy, Agribusiness and Rent-Seeking Behaviour

Factors That Affect the Adoption Decision of Conservation Tillage in the Prairie Region of Canada

Economic costs and returns from crop development research: the case of rapeseed breeding in Canada

Public and Private Returns from Joint Venture Research: An Example from Agriculture

The Effect of Innovation on Agricultural and Agri-food Exports in OECD Countries