Gender Needs Awareness and Gender Asymmetry: An Analysis of a Rural Women Survey in Mountainous Areas of South-eastern Spain

Achieving gender symmetry in rural areas is an important target for the European Union. There is no shortage of talent, ideas and energy amongst women in rural areas, nor are there legal constraints. However, a range of cultural obstacles still stand in the way of their full participation in rural development (the persistence of traditional views about women's and men's roles in society, etc.) particularly in the Mediterranean areas. The integration of equal opportunities will no longer be a choice, but it will be an obligation in the design and implementation of rural development programmes and projects. Some European initiatives (NOW, EQUAL, LEADER, etc.) have already been taken to improve rural women's opportunities to participate more actively in economic and public life. In this context, surveying and the data collection will be considered an important preliminary step in the implementation of gender symmetry-focused development policies. In this paper, after briefly discussing the different gender paradigms in rural development, some results of a survey conducted on 304 rural women living in mountainous rural areas of the province of Granada (Southern Spain) are presented. The position of rural women as regards employment, family, socio-cultural, institutional matters, etc., is described. Then women's perception and awareness regarding both practical and strategic gender needs in the area are analysed. Factors related to how women stand with respect to gender needs have been identified using the probit regression model. From the above results, some conclusions have finally been drawn that could be helpful for designing strategies to achieve a better level of gender symmetry in the region, focusing sustainable rural development on a "gender planning" approach.gender needs, rural development, gender asymmetry, Southeastern Spain, Community/Rural/Urban Development, Labor and Human Capital, O18, Q01, R13,

Factors Related to the Adoption of Good Agrarian Practices (GAP) in Plastic Covered Horticulture of Southeastern Spain

The adoption by farmers of Good Agrarian Practices (GAP), that favouring the environment and assure food quality and safety, is being a frequent fact. Considering the plastic covered horticulture, these kind of practices can be of different nature: use of organic fertiliser, made of crops rotations, use of recyclable plastic as greenhouse cover, good management of organic residuals (use of containers), recycling of plastic containers, etc. This paper, wich try to analyse the adoption of GAP by protected vegetable growers, is based on a survey carried out to 114 farmers in the southeast coastline of Spain, asking for the level of adoption of a set of GAP. From the information gathered on the suvey, an aggregated index of adoption has been performed, and the relationship between this index and some structural and managerial characteristics of the greenhouses, and some sociocultural variables of the growers (age, study, agrarian formation, etc) has been analysed, trying to identify factors related to adoption of GAP, which could probably help to design strategies for the increase of the level of GAP adoption in the system.Crop Production/Industries,

Adoption of Soil Erosion Control Practices in Southern Spain Olive Groves

This paper presents results from a survey carried out in 2005 among 147 olive tree farmers from the Alto Genil River Basin in Southern Spain regarding the adoption of soil conservation and management practices. Olive tree groves in South-eastern Spain's mountainous areas are subject to a high risk of soil erosion and have to incur in high costs of soil conservation. This results in great difficulties to comply with cross-compliance and to benefit from agri-environmental schemes. Our main objectives are to analyse the current level of adoption of soil conservation practices and to analyse which socio-economic and institutional factors determine such adoption. Three Probit models are estimated. Dependant variables are three different soil conservation practices, namely tillage following contour lines, maintaining the rests of pruning on the ground, and non-tillage with weedicides.olive groves, soil erosion, soil conservation, cross compliance, Crop Production/Industries, Q12, Q24,

Adoption and diffusion of no tillage practices in Southern Spain olive groves

This paper analyses the process of adoption of no tillage in South-eastern Spain’s olive groves. Olive tree groves in South-eastern Spain’s mountainous areas are subject to a high risk of soil erosion, which is the main environmental problem for this crop, and have to incur in high costs of soil conservation. This results in a greater difficulty to comply with the practices required to benefit from both the single payment and agri-environmental schemes. In many high-steeped areas, farmers have opted for non-tillage practices as an alternative to other conservation practices. Using our own data from a survey carried out in 2006 among 215 olive tree farmers from the Granada Province in Southern Spain regarding the adoption of soil conservation and management practices, we model the diffusion process of no tillage practices using several specifications (logistic, Gompertz and exponential). We also estimate an ordered probit model to analyse which socio-economic and institutional factors determine the adoption of no tillage. Our results show that 90% of farmers in the area of study perform no tillage with either localized (21%) or no localized (69%) application of weedicides. The diffusion process of no tillage has been very intense since the middle nineties, and has been based on the interactions among farmers in the area of study rather than in external factors such as EU policies or extension services. Among other relevant factors that positively affect the adoption of no tillage practices in general, such as farm size and irrigation, the probability of a farmer adopting no tillage with non-localized application of weedicides increases when there is a relative that will continue with the farming activity, what causes the farmer to incorporate long term effects in his farming decisions, when the farmer is only a manager or when he bought the farm rather than inherited it (i.e. on more professionalized farms), and with his educational level. These results confirm some findings from previous studies in other nearby areas.Spanish olive groves, soil erosion, no tillage, Crop Production/Industries, Land Economics/Use,

Posibles claves para rediseñar las relaciones euromediterráneas

Reseña de: Jerch, Martin, Democracia, desarrollo y paz en el Mediterráneo. Un análisis de las relaciones entre Europa y el mundo árabe, Universidad Autónoma de Madrid, Madrid, 200

Testing Choice Experiment for Benefit Transfer

Benefit transfer is a cost-effective method for estimating the value of environmental goods that relies on information obtained in previous studies. The multi-attribute approach of choice experiment should provide advantages in terms of benefit transfer allowing differences in environmental improvements between sites as well as differences in socio-economic and attitude characteristics between respondent populations. Furthermore, choice experiment allows the estimation of implicit prices and the welfare change for many scenarios. If the transferability of these values is confirmed, that would be good news for benefit transfer practitioners. This paper investigates the capability of choice experiment method to be used in environmental benefit transfer.choice experiment, benefit transfer, soil erosion, Research Methods/ Statistical Methods, Q30,

Modelling Spot Water Markets Under Uncertain Water Supply

Water availability in semiarid regions usually exhibits patterns of extreme variability. Even in intensively controlled basins, some users are subject to low levels of water reliability, and more vulnerable to periods of extreme scarcity. To reduce their risk exposure more flexible instruments, such as voluntary exchanges of water among users, are required. Recent changes in the Spanish water Law have given an initial impulse to allow for leases of water use rights. Properly designed and monitored, this instrument provides some flexibility to water management, and may increase the economic use efficiency as well as mitigate the adverse economic effects of droughts. This paper looks at the risks and uncertainty dimensions of water markets, which have not been paid much attention in the literature. It analyses, from theoretical and empirical standpoints, the role that uncertainty plays in market participants' decisions and its impact on gains from trade. Two models have been developed to carry out the empirical application. One is a stochastic and two-stage discreet programming model which simulates irrigators behaviour and the other is a spatial equilibrium model to compute market exchange and equilibrium. Water market price endogeneity is solved by an iterative process, which characterise price uncertainty from the results obtained from the spatial equilibrium model. Hydrological risk is characterised at the irrigation farm level through the variation of the water allowances served for irrigation. The application is performed on eleven irrigated farms in a district of the Guadalquivir Valley (Southern Spain. It is shown how water availability uncertainty reduces farmers' benefits because of the fact that they must take ex-ante decisions. However, if market participation is allowed once water allowances become known, even at an uncertain price, the benefit losses are partly mitigated. From a methodological standpoint, these results suggest that the agricultural water market benefits estimates found in the literature may be undervalued as a result of omitting the option to participate in the market in the mix of possible strategies. Exchanging water in annual spot markets allows for the reduction of farmers' economic vulnerability caused by the variability and uncertainty of water supply within an irrigation season.uncertainty, farm modelling, water markets, water supply, Resource /Energy Economics and Policy,

Food Labeling Use and Differentiated Consumers Behavior: A Survey Analysis in Spanish Food Market

Research on consumer’s use of food labels have been heavily increasing in the last 20 years from some pioneering works in the eighties. Different analytical approaches to the subject may be identified in the scientific literature, among them, the analysis of the use of different types of information often labeled in food markets, and its relationship with some consumer characteristics. The paper fall into the scope of this type of approach. From a survey to 1500 Spanish consumers, stratified by regions (zone) and type of habitat (rural, urban and metropolitan), a composite index, made by aggregating reading frequencies of nine different types of information (calories, ingredients, expiry date, nutritional composition, etc.) has been calculated, and both an OLS and a ordered multinomial Probit models have been estimated trying to find out the relationship between the intensity of using food labels and some characteristics and features of consumers. From this analysis some conclusions have, finally, been drawn.food labels, aggregate use index, consumer behavior, Consumer/Household Economics,

The Rise and Fall of the Ebro Water Transfer

This article analyzes the Ebro inter-basin transfer, which was the main project of the Spanish National Hydrological Plan. The Ebro transfer was prompted by pervasive pressures, scarcity and degradation of Southeastern basins in Spain. The heated policy debate on the Ebro transfer, highlights the difficulties of achieving a sustainable water management, because of the conflicting interests of stakeholders and regions. Alternatives to the Ebro transfer show that, acceptable outcomes combine demand and supply measures. Nevertheless, implementation could be difficult and requires compensation to farmers, otherwise an excessive burden on farmers would be met by social opposition leading to the failure of measures

Social ex-post evaluation of local development programs: application of a contingent valuation approach to the Guadix-Marquesado LEADER area (Spain)

As part of the evaluation of the activity of a district’s local development group (LAG), valuation by local society could be a potential element of interest. In this paper we present a social valuation of the LAG activity in the Guadix-Marquesado district (south-eastern Spain), where the contingent valuation method is one of the analytical elements used. A number of results show how the LAG has now become part the institutional network closest to local society, which values the increased welfare that its activity generates slightly more than its actual annual operating expenses. This somehow socially legitimizes the public funding it receives. Other results pertaining to change perception, familiarity with LAG activities and the scalar valuation of its social impact are also included.Social evaluation, Rural development, Contingent valuation method, Willingness to pay., Agricultural and Food Policy, O43, R11,