Croatia is very close to meeting the requirements necessary for becoming a member of the European Union (EU). On February 6, 2008, the European Enlargement Commissioner Olli Rehn said that accession negotiations with Croatia are moving ahead well. As in all new member states (NMS), the...

In the course of economic development there is a general downward trend of agricultural employment, although structural change in agriculture is often delayed. In the EU-15, agricultural employment decreased by -2.3% p.a. (measured in regular persons) and -3.0% p.a. (measured in annual working...

Foot and Mouth Disease (FMD) is one of the most contagious animal diseases. Because of the easy transfer between animals, FMD is of importance to the domestic market, but also to international agricultural trade. Infected countries are often confronted with rigorous measures implemented by their...

This paper presents a new model which incorporates features of developing country agriculture that may be critical in shaping the welfare outcomes of alternative agricultural policies. The model features heterogeneous households linked through markets in a rural economy-wide structure, with...

Cotton is one of the most important smallholder cash crops in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA). How to ensure input supply, credit recovery and competition is a subject of intense policy debate. This paper examines the performance of cotton sector development policies in Mozambique and Zambia. Both...

The breakdown of the planned economy in the Czech Republic induced many changes for the Czech sugar industry. Successful restructuring should foster competitiveness of sugar production and processing. Another target of the sugar sector is its preparation for EU-accession by adjusting to EU...

Direct income payments (DIP) are in the centre of the discussion in the ongoing political debate whether agricultural policy objectives can be pursued in an economically more efficient and less distorting way. This paper discusses under which circumstances DIP are an appropriate and efficient...