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Automated valuation model for livestock appraisal in loaning practice
37-42Views:114Actualization of loan security (mortgage) value is of major importance in Hungarian loaning practice. Due to the recession in economics, the value of agricultural portfolio of banks has decreased a great deal, though not to such a great extent as other branches of the economy. Depreciation of estate stock is compensated with additional collateral security. Besides other stock, often temporarily and out of necessity, livestock is presented as additional collateral security. From the loaners’ point of view, however, the registered inventory value does not guarantee security. The authors have set up an appraisal method giving professional guidance through automated valuation as to how dairy stock can be used as mortgage for loan security. Hereby we are to present the details of both the theory and the methodology of a model that is appropriate for the valuation of dairy livestock on an MS Excel basis. Thus, the process is fast and has more prospects for all parties in the loaning or leasing business. The method involves the features of livestock technology, the expected realized profit, and breed stock value. By the implementation of this method, the loaners can calculate the value of loan recovery (loan to value) with acceptable security.
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The situation of the Hungarian agricultural higher education
73-77Views:143The knowledge-based, competitive economy places a great emphasis on the education system. The responsibility of higher education is to impart knowledge of high standard which is in harmony with the continuously changing environment. Higher education has a special role in the knowledge-based economy since it does not only have to fulfil educational but also research an innovation tasks. The decrease in the traditional role of agriculture as well as international tendencies facilitate diversification, i.e. the emergence of new roles and the relevant activities. Due to the diversification of agriculture fields like environmental protection, bioenergetics, and rural development have become more emphatic. The growing importance of these new fields is also significant from the point of view of education. Well trained professionals are of vital importance for the agriculture. A significant number of fresh graduates are not employed in their profession; they find a job in other areas or continue their education in a different field of interest. This research is based on a representative survey amongst agricultural graduates. Its objective is finding facts about how the graduates of the past five years assess higher education training and also about the factors employers take into consideration when employing a fresh graduate.
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Green house gas mitigation and headline targets of Europe 2020 strategy
109-117Views:164Climate change is considered as one of the biggest challenges of XXI century and global action is needed to mitigate greenhouse gases (GHG) and adapt to changing water levels and temperatures, which affect food supply and ecosystem integrity. Climate change will have significant economic and social impacts in many regions of EU and sectors like agriculture is considered to bear greater adverse affects. Less developed regions and certain sections of society (the elderly and/or low-income households) are expected to suffer more from climate change. Climate change policy of EU, adopted in December 2008, includes ambitious targets for 2020. The policy is focused on a sustainable future with an energy-efficient economy by (i) cutting greenhouse gases by 20% (30% if international agreement is reached), (ii) reducing energy consumption by 20% through increased energy efficiency and iii) meeting 20% of energy needs from renewable sources. In the frame of the headline targets of Europe 2020 Strategy, this paper discusses most important greenhouse gas-emitting activities in agriculture, emphasizes the importance structural changes through the modernisation of infrastructure particularly in developing regions of EU and calls for enhancing the competitiveness of economy to promote energy efficiency.
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The motivations for the diversification of the Nigerian economy focusing on sustainable agriculture
7-13Views:234Agriculture is one of the major branches of the economy in Nigeria, the most populous country in Africa. It employs around 70% of the population and its contribution to the national GDP ranges around 45% (2012). In spite of the fact that most of the area is arable the majority of food, the Nigerian population consumes, comes from imports. The paper attempts to provide in insight to the reasons, why Nigeria could still not achievew self sufficiency from major food crops and livestock. Beyond the rapid growth of the population, one of the major reasons is the rich oil and natural gas reserves, the exploitation and export of which has been providing with the country with “easy cash” for the recent few decades. Another reason is that the agricultural holdings are small and scattered, and farming is carried out with simple tools and techniques. Modern and large-scale farms are not common. The political leadership and economic decision makers of the country already recognized the necessity of the development of the food and agricultural sector, which – contrary to the oil industry – would exercise a deep and positive impact on the rural society as well. Nigerian agriculture is being transformed towards commercialization at small, medium and large-scale enterprise levels.
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The effects of the global economic crisis on the markets for fossil and renewable fuels
131-136Views:156The 2008/2009 world economic crisis had significant impact on oil and fuel markets. This crisis has been developed from the meltdown of the American mortgage and financial market and spread throughout the global economy. As each country reacted differently to the crisis, the changes in the fuel market have also shown significant geographic variation. In our present research, the changes of the US, German and Hungarian fuel markets were analysed, looking for answers to the reasons behind different crisis reactions. We examined the tendency of fuel consumption, the changes of gasoline and diesel price elasticity and the possible effects of the crisis on the regulatory system.
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Adjustment of poland’s agriculture and food sector to challenges of agricultural policy of the European Union
39-44Views:174Paper is aimed in assessment of first period of Poland’s membership in EU and covering agriculture and rural areas with the support under the Common Agricultural Policy in the context of future challenges faced by the agricultural policy.Analysis shows that accession to EU became a strong impulse for growth of the Polish food economy, however the main challenge for the Common Agricultural Policy in future, from Poland’s perspective, will be strengthening the multifunctional agriculture, i.e. territorial cohesion and positive effects of agricultural activity on natural environment.
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Civic organizations and citizens-an alternative approach to understanding civic engagement
137-141Views:124The importance of nonprofit, and inside classic civic sector is usually approached on the basis of figures of the Statistical Office. Based on these, we may assume these to have a slight or intermediate role in the greater economy regarding economic capacity and human resources. Actually, we cannot have a closer look into local conditions and circumstances which would contribute to a better understanding of how civic organizations are connected to citizens. It is difficult to estimate the background, effect, personal movements behind the civic sector; international literature discusses this issue in the framework of civic engagement. In a private examination, I may also contribute to the alternative approach to the importance of the civic organization sector by studying and measuring the complex indicator termed “civic involvement”. Additionally, a small scale pilot examination has revealed a better, more precise description of the connection between citizens and civic organizations, which may also enable the better planning of local municipal interventions.
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The effects of global real economic crisis on the markets for fossil and renewable fuels
51-56Views:148The 2008/2009 world economic crisis had significant impact on the oil and fuel markets. The crisis developed from the meltdown of American and European mortgage and financial markets and rapidly involved the global real economy. As each country reacted differently to the crisis, the changes in the fuel market also showed significant geographic variation. In our present research, the actions of the US, German and Hungarian fuel markets were analysed for the answer to the reasons for the differences in crisis reactions. We examined the tendency of fuel consumption, the changes of price elasticity for gasoline and diesel and the possible effects of the crisis on the regulatory system.
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Agribusiness higher education development – training needs analysis
107-120Views:171With the tremendous changes in political and economic systems of the Republic of Croatia after independence, new challenges have been put to the higher education system as well. The system used to be structured to serve a centrally planed economy with predominantly state ownership. Universities were producing graduates to be employed on statefarms,inagri-foodsystems(socalled„kombinats“),the state owned processing industry or cooperatives. The graduates were specialised in particular branches, such as crop production, vegetable production or livestock husbandry. Therefore, they were not educated to understand the whole system of a company or the agri-food system. In one word, they were not prepared to run firms as managers, although they were highly educated. Small and medium size entrepreneurs in agri-food business have been rather an exception than a rule, and prior to the transition there was not to much experience in managing, financing or marketing for such a firms.
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New tools and opportunities in growth and climate friendly greening for small and medium enterprises in the European Union
25-31Views:187The role of Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) is unquestionable in the European economies, while financial opportunities are still inadequate for them. The more than 20 million SMEs play a significant role in European economic growth, innovation and job creation. According to the latest EC Annual Report , SMEs are accounting for 99% of all non-financial enterprises, employing 88.8 million people and generating almost EUR 3.7 tn in added value for our economy. Despite the fact that there is plenty of EU funding available for these SMEs, for certain reasons these funds hardly reach them. But we have to see that the EU supports SMEs by various way, e.g. by grants, regulatory changes, financial instrument, direct funds. On the other hand, SMEs and decision makers realised that the environmental sustainability has to be attached to the economic growth, therefore more and more tools are available for these enterprises. Over the last few years, public institutions, the market, the financial community and non-governmental associations have explicitly demanded that firms improve their environmental performance. One of the greatest opportunities might lay in the Climate- and Energy Strategy till 2030 as 20% of the EU budget is allocated to climate-related actions, however the easy access to finance is still a key question. Does the EU recognise the actual difficulties? Is there a systemic reason behind the absorption problems? Is the EU creating a more businessfriendly environment for SMEs, facilitating access to finance, stimulates the green and sustainable growth and improving access to new markets? The paper analyses the current European situation of the SMEs and the effectiveness of some new tools, which are specially targeting SMEs.
JEL classification: Q18
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Agribusiness higher education development – ahead: The project results at a glance
95-98Views:181his booklet that has caught your attention contains basic information about the AHEAD project sponsored by the EU’s TEMPUS grant. This project was carried out between University of Zagreb (and other Croatian partners) and four EU-based universities. The project was very ambitious and it is my pleasure to state that the great majority of the objectives were carried out with high quality during the 3 years project time span. The main results of the AHEAD project can be found in this booklet, and I would like to mention just a few of them:
• A new MBA training started in Zagreb with international recognition
• 61 subjects of 3 BSc/MSc trainings were reviewed and modified,
• a study was created in order to determine the short – and long – term expert demand of the Croatian national economy,
• computers, equipment and modern textbooks were purchased from European grant and
• finally a personal note: it was spectacular to see the rapid development of University of Zagreb and generally the whole Croatia during the last 3 years. If our project contributed just a little bit to it, the effort certainly was worthwhile. -
Agriculture of the countries of the Western Balkans and European integrations
93-97Views:167The paper presents the results of research of agriculture of the countries of the Western Balkans in the period of 2002–2009. Specifically, general economic (GDP per capita, share of agriculture in GDP, inflation rate, and unemployment rate), resource (share of arable land in the total utilized agricultural land, of employees in agriculture in the total number of employees, and of rural population in the total population), and value indicators (value added of agriculture in % of GDP, value added of agriculture per employee in agriculture, producers’ prices of wheat, corn, and bovine milk, share of agriculture in the values of export and import) were compared.
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The problems of regional development in Montenegro
85-88Views:124Economic development is a continuous, stochastic process considering that development depends on a multitude of historical, political, economic, cultural, ethnic and other factors. In the process of development, each country puts effort into strengthening their manufacturing potential, increasing the competitiveness of their economy by modernizing technology, and raising the level of education, culture etc. Owing to the accentuated actions of these factors, and different social, economic and other circumstances, there has been emerging polarizations in regional development, urbanization and so on. Proof of a country’s level of economic development can be found in various indicators such as capital equipment; the share of manufacturing, agriculture, and foreign trade; the share of the private sector in total ownership; the development of financial institutions and capital markets; the development and stability of the legal system; the development of transport, telecommunication and other infrastructure; the realized standard of living; the development of democracy and human rights protection; preserved environment etc. Economies of developing countries, including Montenegro, are usually characterized by a low capital equipment and low labor productivity, expensive manufacturing and insufficient share of world trade, high import dependence, uncompetitiveness, high unemployment, undeveloped entrepreneurship, and an undeveloped financial institutions. Polarized countries in an economic and development sense, are therefore those which are unevenly developed, and are constantly faced with highly pronounced problems of disparity in regional development and demographic problems. Solving these problems is a long-term process and necessitates. The design of a regional policy that is more efficient than the previous ones, as well, as building a different procedure for fulfilling the adopted regional policies.
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The direct and indirect costs associated with food hypersensitivity in households: A study in the Netherlands, Poland, and Spain
107-117Views:231Background: Recent studies show that food hypersensitivity, such as food allergy or food intolerance, has the potential to affect direct, indirect and intangible economic costs experienced by individuals and their families. This research assesses the direct and indirect economic costs of food hypersensitivity at the household level in the Netherlands, Poland, and Spain.
Methods: A self-administered postal survey was conducted (n=1558). Respondents with food hypersensitivity were clinically diagnosed cases recruited through clinical centres in Poland and Spain. In the Netherlands, food hypersensitivity cases were recruited through hospitals, patient organisations and advertisements. The controls formed the baseline sample and were obtained from households in which none of the members had food hypersensitivity. The monetary value of indirect costs, forgone time, was calculated using the opportunity cost method. The indirect and direct costs were expressed in purchasing power parity. Analysis of co-variance on the cost items was used to test the within-country differences between respondents with food hypersensitivity and respondents without food hypersensitivity, as well as across the three countries.
Results: The average total direct and indirect costs across all countries for families with food hypersensitive family members are not higher than for households without food hypersensitive members. However, the intangible costs for food hypersensitive individuals appear to be higher than for individuals in the control group.
Conclusions: These results do not support the hypothesis that all food allergies incur high costs to the individual. However, being hypersensitive to foods may have a negative impact on quality of life compared to people who are not food hypersensitive. -
Analysis of economic issues relating to the dairy sector, with emphasis on price transmission
61-70Views:161The dramatic decline in consumption after 1990 was an important problem during the analysis of the sector. Even today, consumption is still below the degree that was before the political change, and significantly lags behind the EU level.The importance of this topic is emphasized by the fact that surplus milk could be marketed through the increased domestic consumption; this would create a more stable and calculable situation for farmers. Therefore, I considered it important to reveal what factors and by what shares influence the consumption of milk and dairy products. The relationship, time series and cross-sectional analysis based on national and international databases demonstrate the relationship between the consumption of milk and dairy products and the other determining factors of consumption in Hungary and in the EU-25 through diagrams. I draw the conclusion that there is a medium correlation between the development of the economy, the higher income level and the consumption of milk and dairy products. Just before our EU accession, the dairy sector was one of the most critical industries of Hungarian agriculture, which is why I chose this for my analysis. I regard as a new scientific result the econometric analysis of the asymmetric market conditions in the price transmission approach within our dairy sector between 1995 and 2003. I confirmed and quantified that the market is under an oligopoly and defined the direction of price adjustment. Furthermore, I regard as a new result in the price transmission analysis (also published in the article published with Dr. József Tóth), that the three possible dimensions (elasticity, a symmetry relations,lag) are analysed simultaneously.Therefore,a more sophisticated picture is given on price transmission. The theoretical advantages and disadvantages are verified by an example of a vertical coordination based on the horizontal cooperation in the dairy sector (Alföldi Tej Ltd).
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