Technical Efficiency Estimates of Scottish Agriculture: Evidence from the dairy, sheep and cereals sector

Technical efficiency, the ratio of physical inputs to outputs, is a popular means of assessing agricultural performance. Benchmarking of these efficiencies is a fundamental tool for the farming industry. More sophisticated techniques have been developed recently which offer a greater degree of complexity for measuring technical efficiency. This paper adopts a parametric approach, referred to as stochastic production frontiers (SPF), to study three major sectors the Scottish agricultural economy, namely i) cereals, ii) dairy, and iii) sheep, over the period 1989 to 2004.Crop Production/Industries, Livestock Production/Industries, Productivity Analysis,

A Total Social Factor Productivity Index for the UK Food Chain Post-Farm Gate

The UK post-farm gate food chain comprises manufacturing, wholesaling , retailing and catering. Current turnover is around £250 billion per annum. Total factor productivity measures the ratio of inputs to outputs. However, most studies have only included the marketable inputs and outputs within the system. Following criticisms of the negative effects of the food chain this paper adopts a n index based approach to measuring Total Social Factor Productivity, which includes the major externalities within the food chain. Generally, whilst TFP growth rates are low over the period 1998-2002, these have reduced even further when negative externalities are included.Food Chain, Total Factor Productivity, Total Social Factor Productivity, Externalities, Industrial Organization, Productivity Analysis, Q56,

Effective Lagrangian for Two-photon and Two-gluon Decays of PP-wave Heavy Quarkonium χc0,2\chi_{c0,2} and χb0,2\chi_{b0,2} states

In the traditional non-relativistic bound state calculation, the two-photon decay amplitudes of the $P$-wave $\chi_{c0,2}$ and $\chi_{b0,2}$ states depend on the derivative of the wave function at the origin which can only be obtained from potential models. However by neglecting the relative quark momenta, the decay amplitude can be written as the matrix element of a local heavy quark field operator which could be obtained from other processes or computed with QCD sum rules technique or lattice simulation. Following the same line as in recent work for the two-photon decays of the $S$-wave $\eta_{c}$ and $\eta_{b}$ quarkonia, we show that the effective Lagrangian for the two-photon decays of the $P$-wave $\chi_{c0,2}$ and $\chi_{b0,2}$ is given by the heavy quark energy-momentum tensor local operator or its trace, the $\bar{Q}Q$ scalar density and that the expression for $\chi_{c0}$ two-photon and two-gluon decay rate is given by the $f_{\chi_{c0}}$ decay constant and is similar to that of $\eta_{c}$ which is given by $f_{\eta_{c}}$. From the existing QCD sum rules value for $f_{\chi_{c0}}$, we get $5\rm keV$ for the $\chi_{c0}$ two-photon width, somewhat larger than measurement, but possibly with large uncertainties.Comment: v3, LaTeX, 5 pages, 1 figure, minor typos corrected, to appear in Physical Review

Measuring the Sustainability of the UK Food Chain

Recent policy interest has been directed at the sustainability of food industries, in particular the post-farm gate food chain. This comprises of manufacturing, wholesaling, retailing and catering. In order to measure sustainability Byerlee and Murgai (2001) have argued that productivity measures, alongside key indicators of resource quality trends, should be used to indicate sustainable growth. This paper adopts this approach by presenting Fisher indexes of both Total Factor Productivity (TFP) index and for prominent externalities emerging from the food chain over the period 1998 to 2002. TFP shows an average annual growth rate of –0.52% per annum. Input growth, in particular intermediate purchases, has outstripped output growth over the entirety of this period. In addition, major externalities of environmental and social costs have increased over this period. Consequently, both sets of indicators give a somewhat bleak assessment of the sustainability of the UK food chain.Total Factor Productivity, Externalities, Sustainable Growth, Agribusiness,