Agricultural Economics, 2013 (vol. 59), issue 2

Segmenting farms in European UnionOriginal Paper

Maria José Palma Lampreia DOS SANTOS

Agric. Econ. - Czech, 2013, 59(2):49-57 | DOI: 10.17221/28/2012-AGRICECON  

The main objective of this work is to characterize and segment the farms of the twenty-seven Member States of the European Union (EU). For this purpose, the techniques of cluster analysis and cluster of cases segment the farms, based on a sample of farms of the Farm Accountancy and Information Network. The results show the existence of four types of farms in the EU that are distinguishable by their (i) structural characteristics, in particular, for their Utilized Agricultural Area, the total output, by the percentage of contract work and the total work, (ii) by their financial characteristics, i.e., by their total assets and the cash flow of the EU...

The priorities of rural development in EU countries in years 2007-2013Original Paper

Arkasiusz SADOWSKI, Wawrzyniec CZUBAK

Agric. Econ. - Czech, 2013, 59(2):58-73 | DOI: 10.17221/102/2012-AGRICECON  

The diversified level of agricultural development and directions of evolution of rural areas in the individual EU countries results in complex and diversified problems for the agricultural policy. That was a basic reason of giving a relatively great freedom to the individual member states to choose measures within the individual axes of the Rural Development Programmes. The allocation of expenses to the individual measures Member States should ensure that synergies among the economic, environmental and social aspects and, by assumption, it is supposed to reflect the priorities of rural development. The analysis of the allocation of expenses within...

Sustainable development - indicatorsOriginal Paper

Vladimír JENÍČEK

Agric. Econ. - Czech, 2013, 59(2):74-80 | DOI: 10.17221/11/2012-AGRICECON  

Most governments are already trying, or should do so in the near future, to start the way towards sustainable development. The reason why the way is so difficult is the fact that the quantitative measures of it - the suitable indicators to show the measure of the development in the desirable direction - are missing. The information is of irreplaceable importance in the process of transition towards sustainability. All institutions as well as individuals need information, whether their decisions and behaviour is contributing to sustainability or not, and this information has to motivate them, at the same time, to the change of behaviour.

Cartels and its behaviour on food marketsOriginal Paper

Lucie SEVEROVÁ, Stanislav BENDL

Agric. Econ. - Czech, 2013, 59(2):81-89 | DOI: 10.17221/52/2012-AGRICECON  

Collusive oligopoly is an oligopolistic market model with several companies producing the same or similar products (services) and acting in the market as a monopoly. The goal of the paper is to find out whether the collusive oligopolies are created in the food-products market, in what range the cartel agreements appear in the given sector and whether they can notably influence the price level of the food products and therefore have an important impact on consumer demand in the Czech Republic. The result of the analysis is that, although a substantial part of the agro-production arises outside of the oligopolistic structure (in conditions of monopolistic...

The impact of health on off-farm income of China's migrant workersOriginal Paper

Lijian QIN, Shuangquan YU, Chenggang WANG, Zhongyi JIANG

Agric. Econ. - Czech, 2013, 59(2):90-99 | DOI: 10.17221/114/2012-AGRICECON  

The purpose of this study is to empirically examine the impact of health on the off-farm income of China's migrant workers by the Heckman model. The dataset collected from the Research Center for Rural Economy, the Ministry of Agriculture of China between 2003 and 2007 was used in this paper. The results of both qualitative and quantitative analysis show that the health of flowing workers significantly influences their off-farm income. Flowing workers associated with a poor health condition earn less than those who are of good health, and the off-farm income gap due to the health condition widens year by year. In addition, poor health negatively impacts...