Production Entities Research Articles

Review of methodological approaches to the analysis of the transformation of the agricultural labor market in modern Russia

The article provides an overview and generalization of Russian studies of the transformation of the agricultural labor market in the post-Soviet period. Researchers of the Russian countryside reflect the obtained results in publications mainly describing the problems associated with the Russian countryside and the agricultural labor market. This is, first of all, the destruction of the rural infrastructure, poverty, unemployment, the interaction of old and new production entities (agricultural enterprises, peasant farms, private household plots and agricultural holdings), the loss of communication between villagers and agricultural enterprises, the villagers models of social adaptation and labor behavior. These processes served as a methodological support for the analysis and empirical evidence of how consciously villagers have been changing social and labor practices under the pressure of institutional transformations and agricultural modernization. Based on the choice of rational behavioral models in the labor market, they transformed the social structure of the village under the pressure of the market economy values, new rules, norms and institutional requirements. Modern processes in the agro-industrial field in the context of the property transformation contributed to the formation of a new agrarian structure, constructed by new subjects. The new and old production subjects interact in a multi-structured economy. They are important “players” in the institutional field of the agricultural sector, thus influencing the social and structural processes in the labor market. This determined a new configuration of the social rural groups employed in the formal and informal sectors.

Развитие методологии оценки экономической эффективности инвестиционных проектов

This article discusses the problem of evaluating the economic efficiency of investment in production capital. The article provides an overview of the theoretical and methodological framework developed by Russian scholars and practitioners. In the Soviet period, when the model of centrally planned economy prevailed, the evaluation methodology comprised the following methods: comparing the result of capital investment and its amount (calculation of the coefficient of capital investment effectiveness); comparing the coefficient’s estimated value with its normative value set for specific sectors of economy; and the category of national income (net production) being taken as the result of capital investment. The methodology was described in the officially approved document ‘Methodological Guidelines for Evaluation of the Effectiveness of Investment Projects (Second Edition)’, which corresponded to the guidelines of the research centre of the United Nations Industrial Development Organization. Our analysis brings to light certain drawbacks in the methods described in this document, more specifically, the inaccuracies in the evaluation criteria, the lack of methods for calculation of the corresponding indicators, and the shortcomings of the established indicators of economic effectiveness, in particular the main indicator -the net present value. In accordance with the established methodology, we calculate not the amount of net present value but only a part of it and the method of calculating this part boils down to testing whether the desired level of profitability is ensured or not. To improve this methodology, it is proposed to apply a combination of income- and property-based approaches. The newly generated value should be taken as the result of investment (on the national level — national income, on the level of production entities — net output). Since this approach focuses on the satisfaction of the economic interests of the government, investors and employees, apart from general effectiveness, it is recommended to differentiate between entrepreneurial, budget-related and labour-related components of effectiveness.

Development, implementation and evaluation of a hub and spoke multi-institutional national model to tertiary education in sheep and wool science

Context The sheep and wool industry is an important and established primary production entity for Australia. Specialised tertiary education in the field of sheep and wool is pivotal to the advancement of the industry. Sheep and wool education has evolved over time synchronously with changes in the presentation of tertiary teaching. The face-to-face teaching and 4-year specialised degree in animal and wool science has now developed into an online learning system, with individual units made available to students across the country. This is delivered using a hub institute, University of New England and spoke universities across Australia. Aims The study evaluated the development and delivery of the hub and spoke method of tertiary education in sheep and wool science. Methods The data for this study comprised routine information gathered during university enrolment and specific student survey data from two questionnaires. The first questionnaire was an annual (2010–2017) survey of enrolled students (n = 289) and the second questionnaire was a survey of graduates from 2012 to 2015 (n = 128) from sheep and wool science. Key results Student numbers studying sheep and wool science in the hub and spoke program have increased three and a half fold in 10 years. The employment success of students studying the sheep and wool units is over 50%. Conclusions Utilising a hub and spoke model for online education delivery allows one university to specialise in a specific curriculum that can be offered across multi-institutions. Implications The tertiary training package, developed by the sheep and wool industry, has provided an estimated 400 graduates into the industry in 10 years.

Differentiation of Companies’ Environmental Initiatives in the Light of the Research Results

<p>Theoretical background: The deteriorating condition of the natural environment, as a result of human activity, is one of the global problems that contemporary business entities must face. Companies in their attempts to comply with principles of environmental protection undertake activities aimed at better utilization of resources, production materials or improved efficiency. Such endeavours include the elimination of pollution, recycling of materials, reduction of waste generated, reduction of fuels and energy consumption, and limiting water usage. This contributes to improving corporate economic performance, thus, making production more efficient, more economical and safer.</p><p>Purpose of the article: The purpose of this article is to identify the company’s behavior with regard to environmental protection issues. The study tests the research hypothesis that the companies’ characteristics (i.e. company size, type of activity – production/non production, the scale of activity – local and regional, national, international) are factors that significantly differentiate the involvement of companies in activities for the environmental protection.</p><p>Research methods: The empirical analysis is based on primary data from 68 companies. It was carried out using the Mann–Whitney U test, chi-square independence test, and the correspondence analysis. The strength of the examined relationships was expressed by the V-Cramer coefficient.</p><p>Main findings: The research showed that the level of implementation of environmental initiatives depended on both the type of business activity and the size of the company. In the opinion of the surveyed entities, the implementation of pro-environmental activities aims at improving the company’s image and, to a lesser extent, at obtaining specific economic benefits. Large companies were often involved in the implementation of pro-environmental activities more than small and medium-sized entities. Production entities were more involved in it, compared to non-production companies.</p>

Features of agricultural producers economic behavior in Ukraine

The economic behavior of business structures in agriculture directly depends on the organization of their cooperation in the economic activity process. The aim of the article is to study the features of modern economic behavior of agricultural producers in Ukraine. To do this, the author identified the distribution factors of organizational and legal forms of agricultural production by economic behavior type, as well as organizational and legal features of individual models of economic behavior of agricultural production in Ukraine. Materials of thematic scientific publications, as well as empirical methods (observation and comparison) and theoretical methods (analysis and synthesis, modeling) were used to highlight the features of the object of study. The influence of the oligarchic model of the national economy of Ukraine on the structural transformation of agricultural production entities in the form of subordination of the interests of the state to the interests of individual social groups and the low effectiveness of antitrust legislation is investigated. The author found that in Ukraine the dual structure of agricultural entities was formed, in which two models of their economic behavior were simultaneously developing. The corporate model is represented by large commodity production of agricultural products based on utilization of the resource potential of the reorganized collective agricultural enterprises. Individual small-scale model is presented in agricultural production using the resource potential of private households and farms. The author found out that the organizational and legal forms of agricultural business entities will be determined by their participation in the contract system, the feasibility of cooperation or their integration. Prospects for further research in this area are a comparative analysis of the role of behavioral economy in the economic growth of organizational forms of agricultural producers in Ukraine, as well as assessing the impact of innovative technologies on the evolution of management approaches in the agricultural sector.

The Shortage of Technetium-99m and Possible Solutions

Following a major shortage of 99Mo in the 2009–2010 period, concern grew that the aging reactor production facilities needed to be replaced. Most producers were using highly enriched 235U (HEU) as the target material. The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development and the International Atomic Energy Agency sought to remedy these issues by removing HEU from medical isotope production and implementing full cost recovery to enable new production entities to compete with the existing multipurpose reactor facilities, which were heavily subsidized by their respective governments. This review examines the various approaches to producing 99Mo and/or 99mTc with a critical eye toward their potential success in ( a) producing the medical isotopes and ( b) being able to successfully enter and compete in the market. Because many of the new approaches are adapting existing technologies for commercial businesses, some of the details are of a proprietary nature and not available for in-depth technical review.

Analyzing Pathways of Nurturing Informal Seed Production into Formal Private Ventures for Sustainable Seed Delivery and Crop Productivity: Experiences from Ethiopia

Sustaining crop production and productivity in sub-Saharan Africa requires the availability and use of quality seed of improved varieties by smallholder farmers. The private sector has been considered as the best way to sustain seed supply and crop productivity. Unfortunately, the private sector’s share in the seed production and delivery in sub-Saharan Africa countries has not been very substantial for decades. As a consequence, farmer access to quality seed of recently released varieties remains very low. This manuscript analyzes the experiences of informal seed producers who graduated to formal private seed enterprises to understand the effectiveness of the support they receive to become viable seed ventures. We used comparative research methods to analyze the qualitative and quantitative data collected to understand the underlying mechanisms. The findings showed that the analyzed seed enterprises started with as little as about USD 300 and have already multiplied over tenfold their initial capital. They benefited from a wide variety of supports, e.g., quality seed production, marketing, partnerships, and value chain development trainings and infrastructures, from extension workers, research centers, national and international NGOs, and the other private seed enterprise operators like large public seed enterprises and agro-dealers. The seed enterprises are producing pre-basic, basic, and certified seed of cereals and self-pollinated legume crops delivered directly to farmers, institutional markets, and agro-dealers. The seed production data have been increasing for the past three years with an area expanding from about 30 ha to over 150 ha per year for chickpea. The seed production and delivery practices being employed are smallholder farmer-based practices that are environmentally friendly. For sustainable and reliable seed production and delivery systems in sub-Saharan Africa, a bold step is needed whereby the informal seed production entities are nurtured and upgraded into formal certified seed production ventures that deliver social and economic benefits to the promotors and the communities.

Antitrust and Platform Monopoly

Contrary to common belief, large digital platforms that deal directly with consumers, such as Amazon, Apple, Facebook, and Google, are not “winner-take-all” firms. They must compete on the merits or otherwise rely on exclusionary practices to attain or maintain dominance, and this gives antitrust policy a role. While regulation may be appropriate in a few areas such as for consumer privacy, antitrust’s firm-specific approach is more adept at addressing most threats to platform competition. When platforms exert market power over other firms, liability may be apt, but remedy presents another puzzle. For the several pending antitrust complaints against Google and Face-book, for instance, what should be the remedy if there is a violation? Breaking up large firms that benefit from extensive economies of scale and scope will injure consumers and most input suppliers, including the employees who supply labor. For many situations a better approach would be to restructure management, rather than assets, which would leave the platform intact as a production entity but make decision making more competitive. A second, better option to breaking up firms would be to require interoperability—and in the information context, mandate the pooling of valuable information. These measures could promote competition and simultaneously increase the value of positive network effects. Finally, this Article examines another aspect of platforms—their acquisitions. For the most salient category of platform acquisitions of nascent firms, the greatest threat to competition comes from platforms’ acquisitions of complements or differentiated technologies. Current merger-enforcement tools are ill suited to analyze this new variation on competitive harm. New approaches are required.

Design and Development of Coffee Production Information System to Support Coffee Production Productivity in Farmers Group

The purpose of this study is to create an information system that processes the resulting data of coffee plantations produced in Laksana Village Farmers Group (Kelompok Tani), Majalaya, Bandung district with the type of coffee produced are Arabica coffee. The main problem that exists at this time is the lack of information about raw materials in the warehouse, so that sometimes the production process is constrained. Entities involved in this system are the production department, the warehouse section, farmers, and farmer group officers. The system approach method used is prototype and system development method using Object Oriented, with a tool for depicting system design using the Unified Modeling Language (UML). While the application program of the information system is made on a desktop-based. With this information system, the stock of raw materials will be accessible to all entities involved and the information produced will be more accurate. The implementation of the information system produced in Laksana Village Farmers Group applied to solve the problem of lack of information availability in raw material of production that slow production activities down. The inner entities involve production entities, warehouse and farmer group officers on this information systems are connected in one integrated database, which facilitates information accurately is acceptable.

New insights on interpretation of velocity anomalies in the offshore Nile Delta basin, Egypt

Several issues associated with existing velocity models and their anomalies affecting the petroleum geology of the offshore Nile Delta basin are described. The paper aims to present velocity and pressure variations and their associated pitfalls in the deeper Nile Delta, where the ambiguities exist in the interpretation of depth structures, especially in between sea bottom and Oligocene sequences. Different conceptualized geological, velocity, and seismic models are generated. We make use of data cubes to generate data views for geological interpretation. The connectivity is established between velocity anomalies and corresponding seismic times, ascertaining that the depth structures have geological implications. The visualization of representative schematic data views of velocity anomalies facilitates the interpretation of new knowledge and the connectivity between seismic and geological models. The velocity attributes significantly influence the seismic data interpretation in the offshore Nile Delta basin and have an impact on the overall cycle of the exploration and production entities.

Features of integrated interaction of agricultural market entities

Introduction. Effective functioning and stability of vertically integrated structures of agro-industrial production is of strategic importance in the context of solving the problems of food security of the state and the formation of the export potential of its economy. In this context, integrated structures are designed to ensure the competitiveness of agro-industrial enterprises, as well as a stable vector of structural modernization of production. The purpose of the article is to determine the features of the integration interaction of agricultural production enti-ties at this stage of development of the agricultural market of Ukraine. Results. It is established that the development of integration processes in agro-industrial production is initiated by the subjects of agricultural processing and wholesale trade in the background of the aspirations of agricultural enterprises to increase the economic efficiency of their activities. The peculiarities of integration interaction are outlined depending on which of the subjects of the agrarian market acts as an integrator. It is substantiated that the level of capital concentration of agricultural enterprises is a determining indicator of their state of resource potential, the mobilization of which determines the level of economic efficiency. At the same time, the deepening of the integration interaction of agricultural enterprises in the horizontal and vertical directions creates opportunities for improving the resource provision of the main activity and increasing the level of its economic efficiency. The main trend in the development of integration processes of agricultural enterprises is the deepening of the vertical interaction of agricultural enterprises with processing and wholesale enterprises. It is determined that the main forms of integration are the creation of holding-type associations, the establishment of man-agement companies control over the activities of integrated agricultural enterprises through participation in their capital through the implementation of acquisition and merger procedures. Keywords: agricultural enterprises, development, integration process, integration formation, economic efficiency.

The activities of rural women in home economy

A study was carried out on the rural women and the daily activities that they carry out in their homes and the work of agriculture and livestock; as a producer and participates in the home economy; even though she feels unproductive and the community reinforces that false and cruel mental stereotype. To value the activities of rural women in the home; It is intended to give human and economic value to all the activities carried out by it and to combat the mental stereotype that it is the only man, who intervened in the home economy. Quantitative research, bibliographic review, statistical analysis is carried out by tabulation of the results obtained through the survey applied to rural women. From the researchers' perspective, the role of the peasant woman must be observed and reconsidered as a productive entity to discard ideas outside of what she represents as a thinking human being, free and owner of her decisions.

Status, Impact, and Factor Determining Rural Non-farm Economy of India: A Review

The rural non-farm sector (RNFS) involves a spectrum of economic activity in rural areas and encompasses all rural productive entities other than farm holdings. It has the potential to play a pivotal role in holistic and inclusive development of India’s rural areas by increasing the employment and wages of rural labour, which can reduce income inequalities. The review was carried out in order to explain the present status of RNFE state wise as well as overall to get a comprehensive view on the topic. The review study also focuses to disaggregate RNFE on the basis of gender, size of landholding and castes. Literature depicting the impact of RNFE on rural livelihoods especially in employment and poverty and factors determining it also been compiled to get an overall idea on the study.

Discussion on high quality development and authentication system construction of Dao-di herbs based on blockchain

Dao-di herbs are an important part of clinical medicine in traditional Chinese medicine. They are also precious wealth left to human beings from history, which contain deep traditional Chinese cultural connotations and play an important role in supporting and serving the Chinese medicine business. The relevant policy documents introduced by various national ministries and commissions have many contents and requirements related to the promotion of Dao-di herbs protection and industrial development. Due to the Dao-di herbs industry has a series of characteristics, such as a long chain, many involved links, long cycles, multiple production entities, multiple locations, and various types, the high-quality development of the industry has put forward higher requirements on the linkage between upstream and downstream, production entities, traceability of the whole process and information sharing. This article takes Dao-di herbs certification work as an application scenario and entry point, and discusses it from the perspective of block chain and information technology. It proposes the following work ideas: establish multi-party consensus from the macro-organizational management, business, and operational technical levels, and unblock channels for data and information, to achieve institutionalization of certification; establish certification-related standards and specifications to achieve certification standardization; build a certification hardware system to achieve certification networking; build a certification software system to develop functions for specific information content such as identity, origin, production, production process, quality, product and brand of authentic medicinal material production interactively, and realize certification programmatic; data security and sharing of related production activities to achieve socialization of certification. Make full use of modern technologies such as blockchain, the internet of things, big data and information technology, and through the joint participation of management, production, use and the public, the whole process information of Daodi herbs is integrated to form an interconnected information sharing application mode, thus, to serve and promote the high-quality development of Dao-di herbs industry.

INFLUENCE OF TERRITORIAL-INDUSTRIAL ENTITIES ON THE DEVELOPMENT SOCIAL INFRASTRUCTURE

New progressive forms of interconnection of territorial production entities of social infrastructure in the form of local and global clusters are proposed.Key words: social infrastructure, region, social development, transformation, cluster, modernization, economic development. Calculations were made and new groups of regions were identified according to the degree of development and the level of utilization of the resource potential. For this purpose, a cluster approach and a system of indicators by the main blocks (natural resource, production, labor, financial, infrastructure, investment character) were used. Taking into account the scale and closed production cycles on the basis of resource potential and information capabilities in territorial production entities, the ability to initiate the further introduction of new activities through the development of new types of projects is ensured.

COMPLEX EVALUATION OF COMPETITIVENESS OF AGRICULTURAL ENTERPRISES

The objective of the article is to determine a complex evaluation of competitiveness of agricultural enterprises. It is established that the analysis of the activity of an enterprise regarding increasing its competitiveness involves an assessment of the achieved level of utilization of available potential (organizational, technical, production and technological, social, economic, etc.). Modern world and local methods for determining competitiveness at different levels have been considered. The competitiveness factors against the state level have been analyzed and it is stated that in relation to economic entities and agricultural enterprises, in particular for the objective evaluation of competitiveness, the evaluation should be supplemented by such indicators as profitability of production, labor productivity, conformity of prices to solvent demand of the population. The well-known approaches to evaluating competitiveness of agricultural products have been analyzed, and it has been revealed that they do not take into account such indicators as climatic conditions, location, labor, material, energy capacity, etc. It has been stated about the necessity to take into account economic and technical parameters (they determine the profile of a product in terms of its falling under a certain type or class of products), including constructive ones that reflect technical and engineering solutions inherent in a certain type of products, as well as regulatory parameters (compliance with standards, norms, rules). It has been stated that the competitiveness of new goods should be outstripping. The need to consider the strategy of competitors has been identified. The basic directions of formation of a system for ensuring necessary competitiveness of production has been proposed. The complex evaluation model of competitiveness of the enterprise has been suggested. It is stated that the more successful the tasks of social, ecological and economic nature are solved in a specific organizational and production entity, the more stable its position is in the internal and external consumer markets and the higher its competitiveness is.

Reflexiones sobre la vocación profesional para avanzar hacia la cobertura nacional de una educación permanente

Actualmente, debido a la brecha curricular que existe entre la educación básica y la superior, el rol que desempeña la educación media superior (EMS) es de vínculo entre estas dos. En este trabajo se considera que, al no romper esta condición de falta de metas compartidas entre los currículos de la educación básica y la superior y seguir trabajando de forma aislada, el Estado mexicano queda sometido a un reduccionismo educativo que impacta de manera negativa en el desarrollo sostenible del pueblo. Por ello, el objetivo es generar condiciones de equidad educativa entre organismos públicos y privados que imparten la EMS de manera que permitan fomentar e integrar la vocación de los individuos en su desarrollo profesional o laboral. Este documento de reflexión gira en torno a la oportunidad que tiene la EMS para ser un medio que les permita a los mexicanos convertirse en personas soberanas y autónomas a través del seguimiento y atención de su vocación profesional o laboral por parte de los sistemas educativos. Solo así será posible generar una alta satisfacción profesional y laboral que permita a la población económicamente activa ser consciente de su entorno y de su ecosistema y que motive a cada individuo a evolucionar como una persona que vive en armonía con sus semejantes y procurar el bien común entre entidades productivas y sociales. Entre las conclusiones se encuentra que la concurrencia de metas en el currículo de la educación básica, la EMS y la superior, motivada por la orientación vocacional, genera acciones concretas a favor de la cobertura formativa por medio de la educación permanente, la cual permitirá recobrar las condiciones y características del bien común, como la dignidad de los docentes y la atención individualizada a los estudiantes.

ІННОВАЦІЇ – ОСНОВНИЙ МЕТОД АКТИВІЗАЦІЇ ІНВЕСТИЦІЙНИХ ПРОЦЕСІВ У СІЛЬСЬКОМУ ГОСПОДАРСТВІ

The article highlights the problems of the development of innovative activities of agricultural production entities, and also draws the attention of state authorities to the development of agricultural science. The mechanism of state management of innovative processes of the agricultural industry has been developed.

Methodology of business analysis of the technical component processing organizations

The development of processing organizations in a changing environment requires constant updating of approaches to assessing the processes of their economic activity, including the knowledge of methods and tools for analyzing the technical component of a business. As the main analysis tool, special techniques are usually used based on a certain sequence of calculation of analytical units. Existing approaches to the business analysis of fixed assets are based on level terminology and provide fragmented methodological procedures that include complexes of traditional, rather than key indicator systems. Considering the peculiarities of the dialectical methodological postulate of the transition of quantity into quality and taking into account the process nature of the subject of business analysis, it is advisable to develop an algorithm for methodological procedures for evaluating the technical component of the economic activity of organizations processing agricultural raw materials; justify the possibility of taking advantage of the comparative approach to algorithmization; identify meaningful relationships between the attributive properties of static and dynamic key performance indicators. Using the proclaimed targets, a five-stage business analysis algorithm for the technical component of the economic activity of sugar production entities has been formed, taking into account the specific features of these processing organizations. The distinguishing features of the developed algorithm is the ranking of key indicators, organizations themselves and periods of assessment. The selection of key indicators was carried out on the basis of the systemic method and cost approach, the combination of which makes it possible to ensure the fulfillment of the requirements of reliability and accuracy. Recommended business analytical procedures systematically cover the entire process of movement of fixed assets in organizations, which allows us to eliminate existing gaps in the formation of an information base for evaluating the technical component and identify benchmark areas for making proactive management decisions in terms of mobilizing all the possibilities for the intensive use of fixed assets organizations.

When the Law Distinguishes Between the Enterprise and the Corporation: The Case of the New French Law on Corporate Purpose

A recent French reform has revised the legal definition of the corporation. In essence, the law stipulates that the corporation must be run with due regard to the social and environmental impacts of its activity. It also introduces the notion of raison d’être and affords the possibility for any corporation to assign social or environmental purposes to itself, defined in its by-laws. This reform is similar to recent reforms in the UK and the US, but is based on an original and distinctive theoretical argument. The aim of our article is to analyze the fundamental tenets of this reform and their implications for the theory of the corporation. It shows that the new law is based on a new positive definition of the enterprise as not only an economic organization or a productive entity, but more fundamentally a space for innovative collective action. We argue that this view of the enterprise challenges our conceptualization of the corporation in two important ways. First, it shows that the traditional theories overlook the activities of the enterprise and their related impacts, and that the corporation is not necessarily the appropriate legal vehicle for the innovative enterprise. Second, it suggests that the stipulation of the enterprise’s purpose or raison d’être in the corporate by-laws can provide new promising legal foundations for corporate responsibility.