No 4/2010, December | Agris on-line Papers in Economics and Informatics

Risk and Subsidies in Czech Agriculture - an ex-ante Analysis of Farmers´ Decision-making

L. Jelínek I.Foltýn J. Špička T. Ratinger No 4/2010, December

ABSTRACT

This paper deals with the ex-ante analysis of the effects of farm subsidies on farm behaviour. Beside that the risk factor is implemented in the farm model to reflect and quantify potential (negative) impact on farm results. A farm-level optimization model is used to assess the effects of different kind of policies and risk on production structure, income indicators and land use management. It appeared that a reasonable level of risk (via income variation) have impact, but not significant. If liberalisation would have happened (zero direct and disadvantageous payments) production would homogenised, 30% of land would remained abandoned, production and income would clearly decline. Other scenario points out that environmental objectives (here through more extensively managed land) could not be necessarily more costly, but in such a case without accompanying livestock. To increase profitable livestock production requires to provide grassland and animal payments above the current level (obviously in addition to stimulating production economizing) whereas both payments should be conditional to each other.

KEYWORDS

Agrarian policy, risk assessment, farm model, direct payments.

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Normative Economics or Improvement of Economic Life at Regional Level in the Czech Republic.

R. Klufová J. Friebelová I. Faltová Leitmanová No 4/2010, December

ABSTRACT

In the context of improvement of economic life, normative economics has to cope, if it is not only a theoretical construct, with various facts which are brought by the economic reality. Becoming aware of the mutual causality of economic phenomena and processes, the consideration of these facts should first define factually a particular area of interest and then identify formally a direction of its improvement. To reduce regional disparities, the key points are both the selection of disparities identification criterions and the specification of values of these criterions.The paper deals with the area which is nowadays relatively common – regional disparities. The improvement in this sense focuses on the decreasing of differences between particular regions regarding the defined values, respectively levels of partial criterions which serve as a base for identification of regional differences. Data envelopment analysis (DEA) and cluster analysis are used to evaluation of the regions.

KEYWORDS

Normative economics, region, regional disparities, Data Envelopment Analysis, Cluster Analysis.

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Sectoral Production Function of Chicken Broiler Fattening

T. Maier L. Pánková No 4/2010, December

ABSTRACT

The function was formed on the basis of sectional data from seven Czech businesses using data from seven to eight annual observations. The Least Square Dummy Variable Model was used to estimate the power function. The information presented in the article is the product of working on the Institutional Research Plan MSM 6046070906, "The Economics of Czech agriculture resources and their efficient use within a multifunctional agri-food systems framework".

KEYWORDS

Production Function, Broiler Chicken, Model.

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Specifics in the chosen production chain?

L. Pánková No 4/2010, December

ABSTRACT

It is possible to consider the production chain as a highly complicated system, within the framework of which different links and mutual relations function. Therefore it is necessary to analyze the complexity of the production chain functioning for the purpose of enhanced knowledge on the existence and the regularities functioning among different production elements. The contribution deals with an analysis of the price transmission in the production chain of cereals, within which only certain partial parts have been earmarked. Cointegration analysis, VECM and impulse-response analysis have been used for the price transmission analysis. Information mentioned in the paper resulted from the solution of a research intention VZ MSM 6046070906 „The Economics of resources of Czech agriculture and their efficient use in framework of multifunctional agrifood systems“.

KEYWORDS

Price transmission, wheat, industrial producers’ price, agricultural producers’ price, fodder mixtures, poultry meat, pork.

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Vision Statements and Road-Map Methodology for Knowledge Management Adoption

K. Charvát P. Gnip M. Gemtou T. Vogeltanzová No 4/2010, December

ABSTRACT

The present paper describes the strategy of introducing future knowledge management system at farms. The FUTUREFARM and PREZEM projects strive to apply new knowledge management methods in arable farming where they guarantee an easy adaptation of the farming sector to the everchanging conditions in short, middle and long-term perspective. The knowledge management methods have to be put into practice on strategic, tactic and operational planning levels. Based on the project analysis and workshops with farmers, the paper brings an outline of the main goals and obstacles for new knowledge management methods adoption and furthermore defines the target groups and relevant methods of dealing with them.

KEYWORDS

Knowledge management, adaptation, arable farming.

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Selected approaches of variables weighting in frame of composite indicator analysis

T. Hlavsa No 4/2010, December

ABSTRACT

Composite indicators are useful as tool for complex evaluation and aggregation of different variables of regional development. Variables which are aggregated in a composite indicator have first to be weighted. All variables may be given equal weights or they mea be given differing weights which reflect the significance, reliability or other characteristics of the underlying data. The weights given to different variables heavily influence the outcomes of the composite indicator. Aim of this paper is an evaluation of selected methods for weighting of particular variables in frame of composite indicator construction. Evaluation is verified on group of regional economic variables based on Strategy of regional development.

KEYWORDS

Composite indicator, region, principal component analysis, expert.

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The Optimization of Pastry Delivery for NOPEK Bakery in Vysoké Mýto

P. Kučera M. Jarkovská No 4/2010, December

ABSTRACT

While transporting some material a circular way of the transportation is usually applied. Usually due to some capacity or time constraints or other reasons it is necessary to use more routes (i.e. more vehicles, or one vehicle must go out from its home place more times). This case is called the vehicle routing problem and there exist many types of this task because of the variety of reasons causing the necessity of use more than one route. Practically all the vehicle routing problems belong among the so-called NP-complete or NP-hard problems. This means that there exists no effective method which would succeed in finding a precise theoretical optimum for them. In such tasks, we can employ different approximation methods which provide us with solutions similar to a theoretical optimum and acceptable as an economic optimum. In practice, however, companies seldom pay enough attention to dealing with such problems, especially if transportation is not their principal work load and if it concerns a transportation task of a medium size. This article presents a case study of NOPEK Bakery in Vysoké Mýto. It demonstrates the effectiveness of the approximation method during the planning of the bakery products delivery to its customers. By the optimization of one of the so-called “fast deliveries“, we succeeded in the reduction of the number of vehicles needed for the delivery – about 18% – which turned out necessary. Similar savings of all “fast deliveries” in the company may lead to the reduction of tenure price (tenure fixture) by 17 mil. CZK. At the same time the profit will increase by 0.6 mil. CZK and profitability will go up by 2.5%. We also managed to ensure a balanced use of the vehicles. This made it possible for the bakery to deliver the goods to its customers in deadlines that they found more convenient.

KEYWORDS

Bakery products delivery, vehicle routing problem, heuristics (approximation method).

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New approaches to presenting information in the agrarian sector and country areas – Technological solution of the agris web portal

P. Šimek J. Vaněk E. Červenková J. Jarolímek T. Vogeltanzová No 4/2010, December

ABSTRACT

The present paper brings an overview of both technological and functional upgrade of the agrarian web portal AGRIS (http://www.agris.cz). Agris 4.0 version has been developed, tested and launched in the course of 2010. Agris 4.0 is built and runs on Microsoft technologies within the framework of MS IIS web server. Model-View- Controller (MVC) architectural pattern, an inherent part of the technology .NET framework 3.5, has been used.

KEYWORDS

WWW portal, web browser, AGRIS, agrarian portal, ASP.NET, MVC.

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