Private Supply Research Articles

AQUAPESQUISA: strategic diagnosis of institutions suppliers and demanders of technology in fisheries and aquaculture

The research project named Aquapesquisa aimed to do a survey and a database of public and private organizations, suppliers and demanders of technologies and knowledge of the Brazilian national fishing and aquaculture sector and, afterwards, with the application of a quantitative survey to the registered organizations, characterize and describe the profile of the companies in this sector. The first stage of this survey was conducted between February and December of 2012, which was the search for institutions that fit the categories: research and development; rural extension and technical assistance; science and technology; fishing colonies and associations. In this first stage 3,480 institutions were identified throughout Brazil. On a second stage, which was held between December of 2012 and July of 2013, the identified institutions were asked to answer voluntarily to some questionnaires, with 273 institutions responding to the survey. For this survey, four questionnaires were developed by the technical staff of Embrapa Fisheries and Aquaculture; the main questionnaire applied to all institutions, while the other 3 specific questionnaires were applied according with the area of work developed by each institution. The questionnaires were applied in electronic media via web or through phone calls. The results obtained from this survey is a diagnosis of the sector, presenting, among other information: the profile of the institutions that responded to the survey; the main aquatic species used in the work undertaken in each region; the main methods used for technology transfer; the main sponsors of research projects; the main public who have used the developed technologies; a list of the courses in fishing and aquaculture offered by the educational institutions and; the main demands of the technical assistance professionals for technologies and knowledge in fishing and aquaculture. It also presents a register of researchers and their respective areas of research.

Saving a creek one bid at a time: A uniform price auction for urban stormwater retention

Urban stormwater runoff degrades waterway health. We describe a market-based approach to identify the most efficient investments to reduce urban stormwater impacts at minimum cost. The framework involves the joint consideration of public and private supply of environmental services across scales; a metric to compare the benefits of interventions across and within scales; an environmental procurement auction to reveal and minimise the cost of private interventions; and an endogenous reserve price to select the optimal portfolio of investments. The paper discusses the economic and environmental rationale for the proposed approach, along with the results of Stormwater Tender, a field trial in Melbourne, Australia. To conceptualize the optimal portfolio of investments we draw the aggregate supply curve and the production possibility frontier (PPF) using data from the field trial. We find considerable heterogeneity in both the private and public cost of providing environmental benefits, highlighting the need to consider interventions across a range of scales. We also find that existing theory is limited in its ability to predict bidders' behaviour. Despite this, it is evident that using the PPF to select projects considerably improves the cost effectiveness of the investment. We therefore conclude that the approach is an effective way of maximising the benefits of policy interventions to reduce the impacts of stormwater on urban waterways.

Introduction of Long Acting Reversible Contraception (LARC) in a Clinical Trial Setting in Kwazulu-Natal

Background: Although debatable recent studies have shown a possible increased risk of HIV acquisition with injectable hormonal contraception. In KwaZulu-Natal (KZN) the epicenter of the HIV epidemic injectable contraception is widely used. Based on the recommendation by the World Health Organization (WHO) to increase contraceptive options the Microbicide Trials Network (MTN) formed a Contraceptive Action Team (CAT) tasked to improve the contraceptive options at MTN research sites. As part of this initiative the Medical Research Council (MRC) Clinical Research Sites (CRSs) embarked on a drive to provide Intrauterine Devices (IUDs) and implants at the CRSs. Methods: Challenges included lack of LARC knowledge; myths and misconceptions about LARC participant fears about partner objection and LARC side effects; preference to remain on current method provision of training to clinical staff and accessing LARC. Strategies used included: community education and awareness conducted during community meetings and outreach campaigns; ongoing training provided to clinical staff on LARC insertions in collaboration with the KZN Department of Health (DoH); accessing of LARC from private suppliers and current negotiation with DoH; counselling and education on LARC during waiting room discussions at the CRSs and individual contraception counselling sessions. At these discussions participant fears about partner objection and fear of side effects of LARC were also addressed. Results: We have received positive feedback from the wider community regarding LARC. Community programmes ensure that myths and misconceptions about LARC are dispelled. Clinical staff have been trained on insertion of LARC at three CRSs. Conclusions: The CAT initiative has been successful in introducing and implementing LARC within the MRC CRSs in KZN. Despite this ongoing efforts are still required to increase the number of clinical staff trained on IUD and implant insertions at the CRSs and to increase the utilisation of LARC.

Statistical modeling of Electric Vehicle electricity consumption in the Victorian EV Trial, Australia

The market share of Electric Vehicles (EVs), an attractive alternative to conventional vehicles, is expected to exceed 30% of all vehicles by 2033 in Australia. Although the expected EV uptake may place greater burdens on electricity networks, the potential impacts contributed by different EV user categories and vehicle models to peak loads at different times during the day are not well understood. This paper addresses the issue through statistical analysis of the charge events in the Victorian EV Trial in Australia as well as modeling the charging behaviors according to participant categories and vehicle models. The analysis was performed on 4933 charge events that were recorded by both private and public Electric Vehicle Supply Equipment. In total, these events consumed over 33MWh of energy over 12,170h by the 178 trial participants, out of which about 70% were household participants while the others were fleet participants. Based on a range of EV uptake scenarios and modeled charging behaviors from the trial, the power demand in the summer of 2032/33 was estimated for all of Victoria. The results of the simulations show that the broad scale uptake of EVs produces a relatively small increase in overall power demand (estimated to be between 5.72% and 9.79% in 2032/33).

Game Theory Analysis of Private Supply in Farmland Water Conservancy

From the perspective of quasi-public goods, this paper studies the investment of the farmland water infrastructure, and uses game theory to analyze government and private investors. It is found that in the presence of investment constraints, the government can not complete quasi-public goods investment in farmland water infrastructure independently, so the government needs to provide appropriate policies to increase the marginal benefit of private investors to attract private cooperation. Then this paper compares spontaneous investments and incentive investment from private investors, and concludes with policy recommendations.

New Educational Strategies Regarding Quality of Life for Elderly People

There is an acknowledged tendency in nowadays Romania that there is a demographic aging of population i.e. a phenomenon that the western countries already deal with. This study presents challenges of contemporary society, the growing needs of the elderly people and proposes adaptive strategies used in adult education. In this respect, strategies to educate elderly people regarding social-medical need to be found in order to improve their quality of life. Social pedagogy can bring a significant contribution by adapting the pedagogic methods of teaching adults to the new informatics and communication technologies. The necessity of medical services and social protection is not determined by a high rate of persons of a certain age or older, but by other much more relevant factors such as progress, technology, the increasing complexity of co-morbidity correlated to age. All social actors have to take part and concentrate their efforts in order to ease and improve the mechanism of maintaining the adult in his family. The social policies in the area of elderly social protection need to foresee the development of complex programmes of adults’ education by promoting certain proactive attitudes regarding the prolonged behaviour and psychological-social-medical care at home. Where there is a possibility, the public and private suppliers would take care of these needs.

Physicians' engagement in dual practices and the effects on labor supply in public hospitals: results from a register-based study.

BackgroundPhysician dual practice, a combination of public and private practice, has attracted attention due to fear of reduced work supply and a lack of key personnel in the public system, increase in low priority treatments, and conflicts of interest for physicians who may be competing for their own patients when working for private suppliers. In this article, we analyze both choice of dual practice among hospital physicians and the dual practices’ effect on work supply in public hospitals.MethodsThe sample consisted of 12,399 Norwegian hospital physicians working in public hospitals between 2001 and 2009. We linked hospital registry data on salaries and hospital working hours with data from national income and other registries covering non-hospital income, including income from dual work, cohabiting status, childbirths and socioeconomic characteristics. Our dataset also included hospital variables describing i.e. workload. We estimated odds ratio for choosing dual practice and the effects of dual practice on public working hours using different versions of mixed models.ResultsThe percentage of physicians engaged in dual practice fell from 35.1% for men and 17.6% for women in 2001 to 25.0% and 14.2%, respectively, in 2009. For both genders, financial debt and interest payments were positively correlated and having a newborn baby was negatively correlated with engaging in dual practice. Larger family size and being cohabitating increased the odds ratio of dual practice among men but reduced it for women. The most significant internal hospital factor for choosing dual practice was high wages for extended working hours, which significantly reduced the odds ratio for dual practice. The total working hours in public hospitals were similar for both those who did and did not engage in dual practice; however, dual practice reduced public working hours in some specialties.ConclusionEconomic factors followed by family variables are significant elements influencing dual practice. Although our findings indicate that engagement in dual practice by public hospital physicians in a well-regulated market may increase the total labor supply, this may vary significantly between medical specialties.

The myth of the early aviation patent hold-up--how a US government monopsony commandeered pioneer airplane patents

The prevailing historical accounts of the formation of the US aircraft �patent pool� in 1917 assume the US government necessarily intervened to alleviate a patent hold-up among private aircraft manufacturers. We show these accounts to be inconsistent with the historical facts. We show that despite the existence of basic aircraft patents, aircraft manufacturers faced no patent barriers in the market dominated by government demand. We show that the notion of the aircraft patent hold-up is a myth created by government officials and used to persuade the Congress to authorize eminent domain condemnation of basic aircraft patents. Government officials used the threat of condemnation to impose a depressed royalty structure on aircraft patents and induce key patent owners to enter a cross-licensing patent pool. We show that this cross-licensing agreement was not an archetypical private patent pool, but had been structured to suit the preferences of the government as monopsonist; it imposed on private suppliers to the government a nearly costless technology transfer.

Public investment does not crowd out private supply of environmental goods on private land

In landscapes where private land tenure is prevalent, public funds for ecological landscape restoration are sometimes spent subsidising the revegetation of cleared land, and the protection of remnant vegetation from livestock. However, the total area treated may be unclear because such projects are not always recorded, and landholders may undertake similar activities without subsidisation. In the absence of empirical data, in the state of Victoria, Australia, a reporting assumption has been employed that suggests that wholly privately funded sites match publicly subsidised sites on a hectare for hectare basis (a so-called “x2” assumption). Conversely, the “crowding out” theory of investment in public goods such as environmental benefits suggests that public investment may supplant private motivation. Using aerial photography we mapped the extent of revegetation, native vegetation fencing and restoration on 71 representative landholdings in rural south-eastern Australia. We interviewed each landholder and recorded the age and funding model of each site. Contrary to the local “x2” reporting assumption, about 75% of the total area of the 412 sites was from subsidised sites, and that proportion was far higher for the period after 1997. However, rather than displacing unsubsidised activity, our modelling showed that landholders who had recently been subsidised for a project were more likely to have subsequently completed unsubsidised work. This indicates that, at least in terms of medium-term economic impact, the large increase in public subsidies did not diminish privately funded activity, as might be expected according to the theory of crowding out.

Modelling the supply of private used cars: a study of two prominent brands in Fiji

In this paper, we model the resale value of private used cars in Fiji. We consider Toyota and Nissan cars which are the two relatively prominent brands in Fiji. Drawing on a sample of 175 Toyota used cars and 108 Nissan used cars over the period January 2012 to December 2012 from Car4Sale.com.fj website, and using ordinary least squares method, we explore the elasticity coefficients of key determinants of the resale values of private used cars. Our results show that for Toyota cars, the resale value is positively affected by model year and transmission type (manual or automatic) and negatively affected by mileage. For Nissan cars, the resale value is positively influenced by the engine capacity and model year and negatively affected by the mileage. Subsequently, both brands of used cars resale value behave similar with respect to the model year and mileage, and somewhat differs with engine capacity and transmission types.

Competition in Lending and Credit Ratings

This article relates corporate credit rating quality to competition in lending between the public bond market and banks. In the model, the monopolistic rating agency's choice of price and quality leads to an endogenous threshold separating low-quality bank-dependent issuers from higher-quality issuers with access to public debt. In a baseline equilibrium with expensive bank lending, this separation across debt market segments provides information, but equilibrium ratings are uninformative. A positive shock to private (bank) relative to public lending supply allows banks to compete with public lenders for high-quality issuers, which threatens rating agency profits, and informative ratings result to prevent defection of high-quality borrowers to banks. This prediction is tested by analyzing two events that increased the relative supply of private vs. public lending sharply: legislation in 1994 that reduced barriers to interstate bank lending and the temporary shutdown of the high-yield bond market in 1989. After each event, the quality of ratings (based on their impact on bond yield spreads) increased for affected issuers. The analysis suggests that strategic behavior by the rating agency in an issuer-pays setting dampens the influence of macroeconomic shocks, and explains the use of informative unsolicited credit ratings to prevent unrated bond issues, particularly during good times. Additionally, the controversial issuer-pays model of ratings leads to more efficient outcomes than investor-pays alternatives.

Outsourcing in the Italian NHS: a Measure of Mismatch Between Private and Public Operators

Outsourcing is a useful tool for improving partnership between private and public companies. The budgetary constraints recently imposed by the Italian government on health industry are enhancing the urgency to outsource to face costs. Our study deals with the relationship between ASLs (Aziende Sanitarie Locali, the Italian local health authorities) and private operators outsourcing in Italy. In particular we hypothesize that the level of matching between public demand and private supply of outsourcing can affect the outsourcing development in Italian National Health Service. Under this hypothesis we present an analysis that aims at quantifying the level of mismatch between pharmaceutical companies offer and ASL needs in order to understand the future developments of outsourcing. We studied 44 pharmaceutical companies (with a yearly turnover of about € 6 billion) and 34 ASLs (with about 12 million users) to find out the areas in which they used outsourcing, the amount and the frequency of such investment, their satisfaction and their future intentions. We analysed the answers in search for possible relationships between location, size, frequency of use and other features to uncover a possible convergence between public and private interests in outsourcing. To quantify the convergence for each area we used a mismatch index to measure the discrepancy between public and private operators. The results suggest that public and private outsourcing have a low mismatch which seems increasing in the future.

Public–Private Partnerships and Supply Chain Security: C‐TPAT as an Indicator of Relational Security

Following the attacks of September 11th, public and private entities recognized a need to protect the global supply chain from terrorist disruption. In response to this need, the U.S. Government partnered with industry to create the Customs‐Trade Partnership Against Terrorism (C‐TPAT) program. This research investigates the public–private partnership (PPP) relational aspects of C‐TPAT. C‐TPAT encourages firms to voluntarily improve their security competence and that of their supply chain partners. We introduce the concept of relational security in the context of PPPs. We define relational security as all activities that establish, cultivate, and maintain successful security exchanges between parties. We establish C‐TPAT as one indicator of relational security by demonstrating its ability to establish, cultivate, and maintain successful security exchanges between parties. Results indicate certified firms outperform noncertified firms in security performance, firm performance, and resilience.

The Generalized Network Problem

Many transport and other service problems come down to simple network choices: what mode and/or route to take, if some of the routes and modes are congested and their use can be priced or not priced by different operators. The operators can have different objective functions: public or private monopoly, private duopoly, etc.. This standard problem has been studied in many variants, mostly using the assumption of perfect substitutability between alternatives, so that in the deterministic Wardrop equilibrium, all routes that are used have the same generalized cost. This paper examines in more detail the role of the perfect substitutability assumption. Users of a network consume transport services, which are differentiated in two ways. There are objective differences in quality (length of route, congestion level) perceived by all users and there are individual idiosyncratic preferences for transport services. The resulting stochastic equilibrium is analysed on a simple parallel network for four types of ownership regimes: private ownership, coordinated public ownership, mixed public-private and public Stackelberg leadership. We find that, firstly, when total demand is fixed and there is congestion, then by controlling one route a government can achieve the First Best allocation, although the second route is privately operated or unpriced. This result holds whatever the level of substitutability and whatever the levels of congestion. Secondly, whenever imperfect substitutability is present, private supply of one of the two routes becomes relatively less efficient because the private supplier has an additional source of market power to exploit. If the better of the two routes is privately supplied it is always insufficiently used. However, if only one route can be privately operated, then this should always be the intrinsically better route.

Supply-Chain Spillover Effects of IPOs

We test whether there are liquidity-related spillovers of IPOs on supply-chain partners (the IPO spillover hypothesis). We find that private suppliers and customers of IPO firms achieve higher growth rates of revenue, cash, and PP&E than do comparison or matched firms. The transmission mechanism differs between suppliers and customers. For suppliers, the expected negative effect on accounts receivable growth is offset by higher revenue growth. Suppliers also gain enhanced access to loans when important customers go public. For customers, liquidity is transmitted through growth in accounts payable. The results enhance our understanding of trade credit as a liquidity transmission mechanism.

Serial private infrastructures

This paper investigates private supply of two congestible infrastructures that are serial, where the consumer has to use both in order to consume. Four market structures are analysed: a monopoly and 3 duopolies that differ in how firms interact. It is well known that private supply leads too high usage fees, and that a serial duopoly leads to even higher fees than a monopoly, as firms are monopolists on their sections. But, as this paper finds, a duopoly can also lead to a different capacity rule than the first-best one, and this distortion differs from with two parallel facilities. Finally, four auction formats for the right to build and operate facilities are investigated. With a bid auction, the competition is on how much to pay the government. This auction leads to the same outcome as no auction. An auction on the facility’s capacity leads to an even lower welfare than no auction, as firms set overly large high capacities. Conversely, an auction on the generalised price or number of users leads to the first-best outcome, which they do when the facilities go to one or two winners and both with serial as with parallel facilities.

Rhino Poaching: Supply and Demand Uncertain

In their Policy Forum Legal trade of Africa's rhino (1 March, p. [1038][1]), D. Biggs et al. point out that trade ban on rhino horn has not been successful in reducing rhino poaching, which reached a record high of 668 in 2012. They argue that trade bans support illegal organizations, whereas a regulated legal market could reduce poaching effort and provide much-needed income for conservation. In making their case, Biggs et al. overlook a few important points. Biggs et al. write that legal trade can only work if, among other things, the demand does not escalate to dangerous levels as stigma associated with illegality of product is removed. It is unclear whether any stigma is associated with rhino horn usage in eastern countries, but phenomenally high price for horn, along with rising real income and population growth in major consumer markets, is likely to indicate rising demand. Biggs et al. point out that technology to profile rhino DNA is now affordable. In past, illegal buyers have been unable to determine easily whether they are using real or fake products. With affordable DNA profiling, however, supply of fake rhino horns [which is, by some accounts, extensive ([ 1 ][2])] will diminish, thus further increasing demand pressure for genuine horn. ![Figure][3] CREDIT: THINKSTOCK On supply side, there is currently insufficient evidence as to whether farmed rhinos would breed at same rate as in wild. An additional concern is that South Africa's white rhino population is based on a very small gene pool. After nearly being hunted to extinction in 19th century, with only a small number of white rhinos surviving in one South African park (Hluhluwe-Umfolozi), population grew to 840 in 1960 ([ 2 ][4]). These white rhinos were used to populate national and private game reserves. Intensive breeding programs would thus have to consider this potential genetic weakness. According to Africa Guide ([ 3 ][5]), gestation period of a rhino is 15 to 16 months and calf stays with cow for 2 to 3 years in case of white rhino and 2.5 to 4 years for black rhino. It thus would take up to 5 years for an adult rhino population to produce a generation sufficiently mature for regular harvesting of horn. Biggs et al. acknowledge that there are well-resourced criminal currently engaged in illegal horn trade. However, they fail to take into account reaction of illegal traders to establishment of legal suppliers. extent to which illegal organizations will retaliate is contingent on effectiveness of auction releases in reducing horn price. If prices remain high, illegal suppliers will remain in business and vigorous turf wars are likely to emerge ([ 4 ][6]). It is unlikely that such criminal will respond passively; rather, they would seek to interrupt regulated supply chain though acts of sabotage and even stronger poaching effort. The characterization of supply chain as a single body—the Central Selling Organization (CSO)—is oversimplified. In practice, supply side consists of a disparate mix of public and private providers with different objectives and motives. Regulation and management are unlikely to be simple, as a CSO represents only one stage of supply chain. More research is needed in terms of what such a CSO would do. For example, would it be able to provide adequate enforcement and incentives to prevent private suppliers from selling outside legal market? 1. [↵][7]1. T. Milliken, 2. J. Shaw , The South Africa–Viet Nam rhino horn trade nexus: A deadly combination of institutional lapses, corrupt wildlife industry professionals and Asian crime syndicates (TRAFFIC, Johannesburg, South Africa, 2012). 2. [↵][8]1. M. 't Sas-Rolfes , Saving African rhinos: A market success story (PERC Case Studies, Bozeman, MT, 2010); . 3. [↵][9]The Africa Guide, Rhinoceros ([www.africaguide.com/wildlife/rhino.htm][10]). 4. [↵][11]1. A. C. Carpenter , Conflict Resolution Quart. 27, 401 (2010). [OpenUrl][12][CrossRef][13] [1]: /lookup/doi/10.1126/science.1229998 [2]: #ref-1 [3]: pending:yes [4]: #ref-2 [5]: #ref-3 [6]: #ref-4 [7]: #xref-ref-1-1 View reference 1 in text [8]: #xref-ref-2-1 View reference 2 in text [9]: #xref-ref-3-1 View reference 3 in text [10]: http://www.africaguide.com/wildlife/rhino.htm [11]: #xref-ref-4-1 View reference 4 in text [12]: {openurl}?query=rft.jtitle%253DConflict%2BResolution%2BQuart.%26rft.volume%253D27%26rft.spage%253D401%26rft_id%253Dinfo%253Adoi%252F10.1002%252Fcrq.20004%26rft.genre%253Darticle%26rft_val_fmt%253Dinfo%253Aofi%252Ffmt%253Akev%253Amtx%253Ajournal%26ctx_ver%253DZ39.88-2004%26url_ver%253DZ39.88-2004%26url_ctx_fmt%253Dinfo%253Aofi%252Ffmt%253Akev%253Amtx%253Actx [13]: /lookup/external-ref?access_num=10.1002/crq.20004&link_type=DOI

Optimal mechanism design for the private supply of a public good

We study the problem of finding the profit-maximizing mechanism for a monopolistic provider of a single, non-excludable public good. Our model covers the most general setting, namely, we allow for correlation in the signal distribution as well as for informational externalities in the valuations. We show that the optimal deterministic, ex-post incentive compatible, ex-post individual rational mechanism can be computed in polynomial time by reducing the problem to finding a maximal weight closure in a directed graph. Node weights in the graph correspond to conditional virtual values, while the network structure is arising from the monotonicity constraints. We discuss what can be achieved if we relax our core assumptions one by one, i.e., if we go for randomized, interim individual rational or Bayes–Nash implementable mechanisms. Finally, we demonstrate that our techniques can be adapted for the excludable public good problem as well.

Supply-chain spillover effects of IPOs

Abstract We use the IPOs of supply-chain partners as precipitating events and test for positive spillovers on private firms (the “IPO spillover hypothesis”). A trading partner’s IPO may benefit its suppliers through increased demand and its customers by reducing an input-related growth constraint. A newly public firm may also transmit additional liquidity to trading partners through trade credit practices. Using Japanese data on important relationships between IPO firms and their private suppliers and customers, we find that suppliers and customers experience significantly higher rates of growth in revenue, cash balances, and PP&E than do other private firms. The paper appears to be the first to document real and financial effects of positive liquidity shocks on supply-chain partners.

International Side-payments to Improve Global Public Good Provision when Transfers are Refinanced through a Tax on Local and Global Externalities

This paper discusses a tax-transfer scheme that aims to address the under-provision problem associated with the private supply of international public goods and to bring about Pareto optimal allocations internationally. In particular, we consider the example of the global public good ‘climate stabilization’, both in an analytical and a numerical simulation model. The proposed scheme levies Pigouvian taxes globally, while international side-payments are employed in order to provide incentives to individual countries for not taking a free-ride from the international Pigouvian tax scheme. The side-payments, in turn, are financed via environmental taxes. As a distinctive feature, we take into account ancillary benefits that may be associated with local public characteristics of climate policy. We determine the positive impact that ancillary effects may exert on the scope for financing side-payments via environmental taxation. A particular attractive feature of ancillary benefits is that they arise shortly after the implementation of climate policies and therefore yield an almost immediate payback of investments in abatement efforts. Especially in times of high public debt levels, long periods of amortization would tend to reduce political support for investments in climate policy.