Many countries restricted their exports to world agricultural markets during the most recent price peaks in order to insulate their domestic agricultural prices from price developments in international markets. Their ultimate aim was countering the rise in food price inflation and protecting...

An evaluation of 35 research papers into the impact of financial speculation on agricultural commodities markets has revealed: The vast majority of studies did not confirm the concerns that prevail in public discourse. The current state of knowledge indicates only a few, and weak, findings that...

Eine Auswertung von 35 Forschungsarbeiten über den Einfluss der Finanzspekulation auf die Agrarrohstoffmärkte gelangt zu folgenden Ergebnissen: Die weit überwiegende Mehrheit der Studien kann die in der öffentlichen Diskussion vorherrschenden Befürchtungen nicht bestätigen. Gemäß...

This paper argues that mainstream economics does not follow the positivist research tradition it (often implicitly) claims to follow and expresses some serious doubt that econometrics in particular can make economics a hard science. Mathematical rigour and sophisticated statistical techniques...

Changes in the rural labour market, especially the increase of rural non-farm employment are recognised as one dimension of structural change. Labour allocation decisions are driven by economic incentives such as wage differentials, but also non-economic motives may play a decisive role. This...

Rural Networks have been implemented as an instrument to enhance EU rural development policies in the funding period 2007-2013. Gaps in European programme documents concerning the networks' purpose and their evaluation led to a survey of the National Network Units being conducted in 2010....

Der Transformationsprozess Russlands von einer zentralstaatlich geplanten Volkswirtschaft hin zu einer Marktwirtschaft nach westlichem Vorbild liefert eine aufschlussreiche Fallstudie über die von William Baumol (1990) vertretene These der institutionellen Steuerbarkeit von produktivem...

Rising energy prices for fossil fuels, the unreliable supply of energy imports during the last winters and - concerning the 12 new members states (NMS) - the demand by the European Union (EU) for developing National Renewable Energy Action Plans have stimulated the national discussion and...

Differences in farm structures between Russia and western market economies can hardly be made consistent with the neoclassical textbook idea of a technologically determined farm size operating in a perfect market environment. The main aim of the paper is to identify embedded institutions that...

Seit den 1990er-Jahren befindet sich die Ukraine in andauernden Umgestaltungen des politischen und ökonomischen Systems. Durch die institutionellen, strukturellen und wirtschaftlichen Reformen und Integrationsbemühungen veränderte sich unter anderem die Produktions- und Handelsstruktur...