Inter-temporal and Spatial Price Dispersion Patterns and the Well-Being of Maize Producers in Southern Tanzania

We revisit a methodology to gauge the short-term effect of price changes on smallholder farmer's welfare that is popular amongst policy makers and academia. Realising that farmers face substantial seasonal price volatility over the course of an agricultural year, we pay particular attention to the timing of sales and purchases. In addition we depart from the implicit assumption that all farmers scattered across rural areas face the same prices when interacting with markets. Using maize marketing during the 2007–2008 agricultural season in a sample of smallholders in Tanzania as an illustration, we find that especially poor farmers face greater losses than what a standard analysis would suggest. We also relate our methodology to factors that are likely to affect potential benefits or costs from inter-temporal and spatial price dispersion, such as means of transport, access to price information and credit

Global Retail Chains, International Trade and Developing Country Farmers:Evidence from Madagascar.

Global retail companies (“supermarkets”) have an increasing influence on developing countries, through foreign investments and/or through the imposition of their private standards. The impact on developing countries and poverty is often assessed as negative. In this paper we show the opposite, based on an analysis of primary data collected to measure the impact of supermarkets on small contract farmers in Madagascar, one of the poorest countries in the world. Almost 10,000 farmers in the Highlands of Madagascar produce vegetables for supermarkets in Europe. In this global supply chain, small farmers’ micro-contracts are combined with extensive farm assistance and supervision programs to fulfill complex quality requirements and phyto-sanitary standards of supermarkets. Small farmers that participate in these contracts have higher welfare, more income stability and shorter lean periods. We also find significant effects on improved technology adoption, better resource management and spillovers on the productivity of the staple crop rice. The small but emerging modern retail sector in Madagascar does not (yet) deliver these benefits as they do not (yet) request the same high standards for their supplies.

Coordination Dependence of Hyperfine Fields of 5sp Impurities on Ni Surfaces

We present first-principles calculations of the magnetic hyperfine fields H of 5sp impurities on the (001), (111), and (110) surfaces of Ni. We examine the dependence of H on the coordination number by placing the impurity in the surfaces, on top of them at the adatom positions, and in the bulk. We find a strong coordination dependence of H, different and characteristic for each impurity. The behavior is explained in terms of the on-site s-p hybridization as the symmetry is reduced at the surface. Our results are in agreement with recent experimental findings.Comment: 4 pages, 3 figure

Decreased soluble guanylate cyclase contributes to cardiac dysfunction induced by chronic doxorubicin treatment in mice

Aims: The use of doxorubicin, a potent chemotherapeutic agent, is limited by cardiotoxicity. We tested the hypothesis that decreased soluble guanylate cyclase (sGC) enzyme activity contributes to the development of doxorubicin-induced cardiotoxicity. Results: Doxorubicin administration (20 mg/kg, intraperitoneally [IP]) reduced cardiac sGC activity in wild-type (WT) mice. To investigate whether decreased sGC activity contributes to doxorubicin-induced cardiotoxicity, we studied mice with cardiomyocyte-specific deficiency of the sGC alpha 1-subunit (mice with cardiomyocyte-specific deletion of exon 6 of the sGC alpha 1 allele [sGC alpha 1(-/-CM)]). After 12 weeks of doxorubicin administration (2 mg/kg/week IP), left ventricular (LV) systolic dysfunction was greater in sGC alpha 1(-/-CM) than WT mice. To further assess whether reduced sGC activity plays a pathogenic role in doxorubicin-induced cardiotoxicity, we studied a mouse model in which decreased cardiac sGC activity was induced by cardiomyocyte-specific expression of a dominant negative sGC alpha 1 mutant (DNsGC alpha 1) upon doxycycline removal (Tet-off). After 8 weeks of doxorubicin administration, DNsGC alpha 1(tg/+), but not WT, mice displayed LV systolic dysfunction and dilatation. The difference in cardiac function and remodeling between DNsGC alpha 1(tg/+) and WT mice was even more pronounced after 12 weeks of treatment. Further impairment of cardiac function was attenuated when DNsGC alpha 1 gene expression was inhibited (beginning at 8 weeks of doxorubicin treatment) by administering doxycycline. Furthermore, doxorubicin-associated reactive oxygen species generation was higher in sGC alpha 1-deficient than WT hearts. Innovation and Conclusion: These data demonstrate that a reduction in cardiac sGC activity worsens doxorubicin-induced cardiotoxicity in mice and identify sGC as a potential therapeutic target. Various pharmacological sGC agonists are in clinical development or use and may represent a promising approach to limit doxorubicin-associated cardiotoxicity

Concurrent adaptation to opposing visual displacements during an alternating movement.

It has been suggested that, during tasks in which subjects are exposed to a visual rotation of cursor feedback, alternating bimanual adaptation to opposing rotations is as rapid as unimanual adaptation to a single rotation (Bock et al. in Exp Brain Res 162:513–519, 2005). However, that experiment did not test strict alternation of the limbs but short alternate blocks of trials. We have therefore tested adaptation under alternate left/right hand movement with opposing rotations. It was clear that the left and right hand, within the alternating conditions, learnt to adapt to the opposing displacements at a similar rate suggesting that two adaptive states were formed concurrently. We suggest that the separate limbs are used as contextual cues to switch between the relevant adaptive states. However, we found that during online correction the alternating conditions had a significantly slower rate of adaptation in comparison to the unimanual conditions. Control conditions indicate that the results are not directly due the alternation between limbs or to the constant switching of vision between the two eyes. The negative interference may originate from the requirement to dissociate the visual information of these two alternating displacements to allow online control of the two arms

Agriculture in the Face of Changing Markets, Institutions and Policies: Challenges and Strategies

Since the late 1980s, agriculture in Central and Eastern European Countries (CEECs) has been under considerable adjustment pressure due to changing political, economic and institutional environments. These changes have been linked to the transition process, as well as the ongoing integration into the European Union and the world market. Reduced subsidies, increased environmental and food quality demands, as well as structural changes in the supply, processing and food retailing sector call for major structural adjustments and the improvement of farmersâ managerial abilities. Though such changes always carry significant threats to farms, they also offer new opportunities for the farms' entrepreneurial engagement. Upcoming changes in the agricultural environment and their possible consequences for farm structures across Europe are thus still timely subjects. The objective of the IAMO Forum 2006 is to contribute to the success of agriculture in the CEECs, as well as their neighboring countries, in todayâs increasingly competitive environment. Concrete questions the conference focuses on are: What are the most suitable farm organizations, cooperative arrangements and contractual forms? How to improve efficiency and productivity? Where do market niches lie and what are the new product demands? This book contains 33 invited and selected contributions. These papers will be presented at the IAMO Forum 2006 in order to offer a platform for scientists, practitioners and policy-makers to discuss challenges and potential strategies at the farm, value chain, rural society and policy levels in order to cope with the upcoming challenges. IAMO Forum 2006, as well as this book, would not have been possible without the engagement of many people and institutions. We thank the authors of the submitted abstracts and papers, as well as the referees, for their evaluation of the abstracts from which the papers were selected. In particular, we would like to express our thanks to OLIVER JUNGKLAUS, GABRIELE MEWES, KLAUS REINSBERG and ANGELA SCHOLZ, who significantly contributed to the organization of the Forum. Furthermore, our thanks goes to SILKE SCHARF for her work on the layout and editing support of this book, and to JIM CURTISS, JAMIE BULLOCH, and DÃNALL Ã MEARÃIN for their English proof-reading. As experience from previous years documents, the course of the IAMO Forum continues to profit from the support and engagement of the IAMO administration, which we gratefully acknowledge. Last but not least, we are very grateful to the Robert Bosch Foundation, the Federal Ministry of Nutrition, Agriculture and Consumer Protection (BMELV), the German Research Foundation (DFG), the Haniel Foundation and the Leibniz Institute of Agricultural Development in Central and Eastern Europe (IAMO) for their respective financial support.Agribusiness, Community/Rural/Urban Development, Farm Management, Industrial Organization, International Development, Labor and Human Capital, Land Economics/Use, Productivity Analysis,

Absence of thrombospondin-2 causes age-related dilated cardiomyopathy

BACKGROUND: The progressive shift from a young to an aged heart is characterized by alterations in the cardiac matrix. The present study investigated whether the matricellular protein thrombospondin-2 (TSP-2) may affect cardiac dimensions and function with physiological aging of the heart. METHODS AND RESULTS: TSP-2 knockout (KO) and wild-type mice were followed up to an age of 60 weeks. Survival rate, cardiac function, and morphology did not differ at a young age in TSP-2 KO compared with wild-type mice. However, >55% of the TSP-2 KO mice died between 24 and 60 weeks of age, whereas <10% of the wild-type mice died. In the absence of TSP-2, older mice displayed a severe dilated cardiomyopathy with impaired systolic function, increased cardiac dilatation, and fibrosis. Ultrastructural analysis revealed progressive myocyte stress and death, accompanied by an inflammatory response and replacement fibrosis, in aging TSP-2 KO animals, whereas capillary or coronary morphology or density was not affected. Importantly, adeno-associated virus-9 gene-mediated transfer of TSP-2 in 7-week-old TSP-2 KO mice normalized their survival and prevented dilated cardiomyopathy. In TSP-2 KO animals, age-related cardiomyopathy was accompanied by increased matrix metalloproteinase-2 and decreased tissue transglutaminase-2 activity, together with impaired collagen cross-linking. At the cardiomyocyte level, TSP-2 deficiency in vivo and its knockdown in vitro decreased the activation of the Akt survival pathway in cardiomyocytes. CONCLUSIONS: TSP-2 expression in the heart protects against age-dependent dilated cardiomyopath

Bimodal crystallization at polymer-fullerene interfaces

The growth-kinetics of [6,6]-phenyl C61-butyric acid methyl ester (PCBM) crystals, on two different length-scales, is shown to be controlled by the thickness of the polymer layer within a PCBM-polymer bilayer. Using a model amorphous polymer we present evidence, from in situ optical microscopy and grazing-incidence X-ray diffraction (GIXD), that an increased growth-rate of nanoscale crystals impedes the growth of micron-sized, needle-like PCBM crystals. A combination of neutron reflectivity and GIXD measurements, also allows us to observe the establishment of a liquid-liquid equilibrium composition-profile between the PCBM layer and a polymer-rich layer, before crystallization occurs. While the interfacial composition-profile is independent of polymer-film-thickness, the growth-rate of nanoscale PCBM crystals is significantly larger for thinner polymer films. A similar thickness-dependent behavior is observed for different molecular weights of entangled polymer. We suggest that the behavior may be related to enhanced local-polymer-chain-mobility in nanocomposite thin-films

A 24-Week, Randomized, Treat-to-Target Trial Comparing Initiation of Insulin Glargine Once-Daily With Insulin Detemir Twice-Daily in Patients With Type 2 Diabetes Inadequately Controlled on Oral Glucose-Lowering Drugs

OBJECTIVE - To determine whether glargine is noninferior to detemir regarding the percentage of patients reaching A1C <7% without symptomatic hypoglycemia <= 3.1 mmol/l. RESEARCH DESIGN AND METHODS - In this 24-week trial, 973 insulin-naive type 2 diabetic patients on stable oral glucose-lowering drugs with A1CS. 7.0-10.5% were randomized to glargine once daily or detemir twice daily. Insulin doses were systematically titrated. RESULTS - 27.5 and 25.6% of patients reached the primary outcome with glargine and detemir, respectively, demonstrating the noninferiority of glargine. Improvements in A1C were -1.46 +/- 1.09% for glargine and -1.54 +/- 1.11% for detemir (P = 0.149), with similar proportions of patients achieving A1C <7% (P = 0.254) but more detemir-treated patients reaching A1C <6.5% (P = 0.017). Hypoglycemia risk was similar. Weight gain was higher for glargine (difference: 0.77 kg, P <0.001). Glargine doses were lower than detemir doses: 43.5 +/- 129.0 vs. 76.5 +/- 50.5 units/day (P <0.001). CONCLUSIONS - In insulin-naive type 2 diabetic patients, glargine reached similar control as detemir, with more weight gain, but required significantly lower dose