"“It seems like age and experience do have a role,” Mr. Nagel said in an interview.
From Floyd Norris in the NYTimes reporting a study of whether experienced fund managers did better or worse during the tech bubble.
Friday, July 04, 2008
Thursday, July 03, 2008
Big Farming--The Way It Starts
Josh Ruxin writes an op-ed in the Post about Africa's Food Crisis Opportunity--the idea that the food crisis in Africa still presents opportunities for change:
"But subsistence-level farmers who are not reliant on expensive fertilizer or oil-fueled machinery can sell their excess produce at higher prices, which are still less than prices for food that might be trucked or flown in. The resulting boomlet benefits sub-Saharan Africa's small farmers, who cultivate, on average, less than 2 1/2 acres and who can, with appropriate assistance, expand their production to meet increasing demand....And this is, in my opinion, how it starts. Someone doubles their income and invests wisely, maybe more land, more fertilizer, better seeds, better equipment. Doesn't go deeply into debt so when prices slump, as they always do, he or she can ride out the storm, pick up some land and be ready to profit by the next rise in prices. Slowly the operation gets bigger, until the farmer makes a mistake, has bad luck, or grows older and less ambitious. As it gets bigger, it tends to specialize. Gradually the farmers get on the "treadmill", as Professor Cochrane called it, the feedback loop of more productivity leading to lower commodity prices and higher land prices, leading to more specialization and more investment, meaning more productivity.
A colleague from Nigeria wrote to me this spring saying that while the cost of fertilizer had increased by 50 percent, the selling price of corn was up by 100 percent. In other words, those productive small farmers who had had access to the increased capital required to obtain fertilizer had doubled their income in a year. "
Wednesday, July 02, 2008
Compost and Manure
You can have one or the other, but not both, not in abundance. That seems to be the lesson I learned in the past, of which I've been reminded by a couple of the organic/gardening blogs I visit. We had a "slop" pail, into which went the vegetable scraps, beet tops, sour milk, etc. After lunch we'd top the pail up with some water and use it to wet down the chicken mash still left in the feeders. The hens would be attracted, both by the wet mash and by the slop, eat a bit more and presumably lay a few more eggs. And also excrete more manure, which dad and I would have to shovel from the house into the manure spreader to spread on the field. (Hen manure is much hotter than cow manure, so it had to be spread much thinner.)
My mother maintained a compost pile outside, under the lilac bush or in her garden, but with the competition from the hens it didn't really accumulate much. (Enough for her to brag about it though--compost in 1950 was just a tad rare in upstate NY.)
As I mentioned, a couple of the sites I visited mentioned the same sort of competition--you can feed vegetable scraps to the pigs, which are omnivores like us, or you can compost, but not both in full measure. (You also need a balance of materials for the compost, which is hard to achieve in ideal measure over the course of the year.) These are some of the little complications of organic gardening.
My mother maintained a compost pile outside, under the lilac bush or in her garden, but with the competition from the hens it didn't really accumulate much. (Enough for her to brag about it though--compost in 1950 was just a tad rare in upstate NY.)
As I mentioned, a couple of the sites I visited mentioned the same sort of competition--you can feed vegetable scraps to the pigs, which are omnivores like us, or you can compost, but not both in full measure. (You also need a balance of materials for the compost, which is hard to achieve in ideal measure over the course of the year.) These are some of the little complications of organic gardening.
Transparency
Government Executive reports on a growing movement for transparency in government, particularly in the field of government expenditures. As I commented there, I like it, mostly. EWG has done it to farmers for 12 years and they've mostly survived the experience.
Have I mentioned David Brin's Transparent Society recently? I like it.
I'd extend the idea to many areas. For example, Down to Earth has a post about McNuggets--how McDonald's has some housewives looking at their processes. Why shouldn't McDonalds stick video cameras hooked to the Internet in the places they want us to see, and the places we want to see (as mentioned in the post). Granted, very few people would ever want to watch 50,000 birds eating and sleeping, but PETA might check now and again.
If people can use cameras to watch pregnant cows and babysitters and somewhat senile oldsters, we can use them elsewhere.
Have I mentioned David Brin's Transparent Society recently? I like it.
I'd extend the idea to many areas. For example, Down to Earth has a post about McNuggets--how McDonald's has some housewives looking at their processes. Why shouldn't McDonalds stick video cameras hooked to the Internet in the places they want us to see, and the places we want to see (as mentioned in the post). Granted, very few people would ever want to watch 50,000 birds eating and sleeping, but PETA might check now and again.
If people can use cameras to watch pregnant cows and babysitters and somewhat senile oldsters, we can use them elsewhere.
Tuesday, July 01, 2008
Bottled Water; or Michael Pollan Might Be Right
I typically respond negatively to those, like Michael Pollan, who say that food manufacturers have stuffed Americans with high sugar drinks. Don't they realize Americans are independent thinkers not to be led around by the nose?
But then I read a story on bottled water, like the one by Shenkar Vedantam in Monday's Post, "What's Colorless and Tasteless And Smells Like . . . Money?" and I think, maybe they have a point; maybe cola companies do have the power to stuff us with sugar water and make us pay for it.
But then I read a story on bottled water, like the one by Shenkar Vedantam in Monday's Post, "What's Colorless and Tasteless And Smells Like . . . Money?" and I think, maybe they have a point; maybe cola companies do have the power to stuff us with sugar water and make us pay for it.
Giving Hypocrisy a Bad Name
John Tierney at the Times has a post on hypocrisy, taking off from McCain and Obama's reversals of positions to discuss psychologists' studies of hypocrisy. He describes an interesting tidbit--given a situation in which people are hypocrites (although acknowledging option B is fair and A is unfair, they take option A), if you keep their brain busy with another task like remembering numbers, the same people suddenly take the fair option. It's fascinating, but...
I like to think well of people, at least until I run into some road-hogging whippersnapper in a Hummer, so I'd quibble with Tierney's premise. He dings McCain for switching positions on Bush's tax cuts over a period of 7 years or so, and Obama for switching on public financing. But note both politicians are being hypocrites, if they are, over time. And we're all hypocrites over time. Is there a parent with soul so dead, who never to his kid has said, don't ever do X, when buried in his memory is all the X ever done? Forgive the poor try at poetry, but my serious point is that time changes our viewpoint. And our politicians, unlike the subjects of the psychologists studies, are making decisions in time.
I like to think well of people, at least until I run into some road-hogging whippersnapper in a Hummer, so I'd quibble with Tierney's premise. He dings McCain for switching positions on Bush's tax cuts over a period of 7 years or so, and Obama for switching on public financing. But note both politicians are being hypocrites, if they are, over time. And we're all hypocrites over time. Is there a parent with soul so dead, who never to his kid has said, don't ever do X, when buried in his memory is all the X ever done? Forgive the poor try at poetry, but my serious point is that time changes our viewpoint. And our politicians, unlike the subjects of the psychologists studies, are making decisions in time.
- McCain can reasonably say: I opposed the tax cut in the situation in 2001 based on the information I had, in 2008 the situation is different, the future looks different, and my judgment differs.
- And Obama can reasonably say (perhaps with a tad more difficulty but remember I'm a Dem): no one, not even me or my wife, thought I'd be in the situation I'm in today; no one thought I'd have this fundraising base. I made my pledge as a means to an end, reforming our politics. My campaign has been a model for how our politics can change (no lobbyists, no 527's) and this decision is the right one to ensure my success in achieving office.
Monday, June 30, 2008
Seeing the Future (of Oil, Wheat, etc.)
Tyler Cowen at Marginal Revolution has an interesting post on Julian Simon, an economist who famously bet Paul Ehrlich that prices of metals would drop. His logic was, the most important resource we have is the human brain--the more brains we have the better everyone (on average) will do and brains can remedy any shortfall in any seemingly scarce resource. His heyday was during the last run-up in prices of oil and grains and other commodities in the 1970's, when he was a contrarian voice who seemed for 25 years to have been more right than wrong. But with today's prices, Tyler asks whether people can believe his thesis, at least enough to short oil, etc.
As you might expect, it gets lots of comments. (Also as you might expect, Simon's outlook is not popular among the Bill McKibben's of the world.) Anyone who is interested in the argument might also look at the study from Humboldt U. (Berlin) which basically argues that Simon was right (at least for food over the 1870-2000 period) but we face a changed environment. (It's nice to get a perspective from outside of the usual parties in the U.S.--we often are blind to our own biases.) An excerpt:
As you might expect, it gets lots of comments. (Also as you might expect, Simon's outlook is not popular among the Bill McKibben's of the world.) Anyone who is interested in the argument might also look at the study from Humboldt U. (Berlin) which basically argues that Simon was right (at least for food over the 1870-2000 period) but we face a changed environment. (It's nice to get a perspective from outside of the usual parties in the U.S.--we often are blind to our own biases.) An excerpt:
European Union agriculture has long stopped producing homogenous commodities. Rather it has become “boutique agriculture”. Farmers produce a wide range of goods which are characterised by differing production cost and sold for differing prices in the market place. Domestic consumers and those from abroad choose those qualities that best meet their individual preferences and income. It is likely that sustained higher market prices for agricultural products will act to slow down the growth in the demand for organic food. Moreover, the price of organic food relative to that of other food has declined in recent years, making organic food less profitable to produce.And from the conclusion:
In this study the driving forces of changes in agricultural world market prices and their implications for European Union agriculture have been analysed for the time period 2003/05 -2013/15. The mega-trend of declining world market prices, which is sometimes referred to as the Agricultural Treadmill, has ended. Since the turn of the millennium, world market prices for agricultural goods have been increasing. This trend can be expected to continue for at least the time period analysed here. Not only will prices have a tendency to increase, but also fluctuations of agricultural world market prices are likely to be higher in the future than they have been in the past.
The reason for the positive trend in agricultural world market prices is that global demand growth outstrips the growth in global supply, and this trend will continue in the foreseeable future. Global demand for food will continue to grow at a fairly rapid pace mainly for two reasons. One is the continued growth in world population; the other is the sustained growth in per capita incomes in developing and newly industrialising countries, with a corresponding increase of per capita food consumption.
Green Milk
No, it's not a belated St. Patrick's Day story, but a piece in the NYTimes on new milk containers, touted as more efficient and greener, because there are no milk crates to wash. The 1-gallon milk jugs must be shipped from bottler (jugger?) to grocery store in crates "because the shape of old-fashioned milk jugs prohibits stacking them atop one another. The crates take up a lot of room, they are unwieldy to move, and extra space must be left in delivery trucks to take empty ones back from stores to the dairy." And, in one bottling plant, it takes 100,000 gallons of water to wash the crates.
The article says Wal-mart and Costco are pushing it, but consumers have problems learning how to pour (if I understand, the new container is basically a box). But if I can adapt to coffee cans that are cubical plastic jobbies, consumers for the sake of the earth can learn how to pour milk from these. After all, I can remember lots of different milk containers, lots of improvements.
We used to sell (raw) milk to a couple of neighbors, who'd bring a stainless steel container, which we would fill. Other neighbors had milk delivered, in the glass quart bottles, which made interesting shapes when it was zero and the milk wasn't taken in promptly. That milk was pasteurized and homogenized and took a while for me to get used to the taste. (But my mother had TB, so you won't find me a strong defender of raw milk.) Of course, the glass bottles had a deposit and were returnable, just as the pop (soft drink) bottles were back then. When I went to college, the cafeteria I worked in dispensed milk from a machine, the milk arriving in a plastic bag within a cardboard box. The boxes were good for packing books in at the end of the term when it was time to head back to the farm. The Army may have had a similar system, but fortunately I didn't do enough KP to remember. (Youngsters ask: "KP? What's KP") Then in civilian life and married life we bought milk in the waxed cardboard cartons, then the plastic gallon jugs. (I don't remember when we switched--funny how we don't notice the small changes in our lives.)
But, as I say, there's always a tradeoff. At each step along the way the new system may be more efficient and maybe more safe, but it also requires dairy companies to invest in new equipment (rather like the old days when farmers had to get milk coolers to put their milk cans in--the next step was requiring bulk tanks). So it's also another straw on the camel's back for the dairy company that's just getting by, day-to-day, and which can't afford the new equipment to compete. People, at least those who drink milk, gain; those who work at the companies who can't compete, don't.
The article says Wal-mart and Costco are pushing it, but consumers have problems learning how to pour (if I understand, the new container is basically a box). But if I can adapt to coffee cans that are cubical plastic jobbies, consumers for the sake of the earth can learn how to pour milk from these. After all, I can remember lots of different milk containers, lots of improvements.
We used to sell (raw) milk to a couple of neighbors, who'd bring a stainless steel container, which we would fill. Other neighbors had milk delivered, in the glass quart bottles, which made interesting shapes when it was zero and the milk wasn't taken in promptly. That milk was pasteurized and homogenized and took a while for me to get used to the taste. (But my mother had TB, so you won't find me a strong defender of raw milk.) Of course, the glass bottles had a deposit and were returnable, just as the pop (soft drink) bottles were back then. When I went to college, the cafeteria I worked in dispensed milk from a machine, the milk arriving in a plastic bag within a cardboard box. The boxes were good for packing books in at the end of the term when it was time to head back to the farm. The Army may have had a similar system, but fortunately I didn't do enough KP to remember. (Youngsters ask: "KP? What's KP") Then in civilian life and married life we bought milk in the waxed cardboard cartons, then the plastic gallon jugs. (I don't remember when we switched--funny how we don't notice the small changes in our lives.)
But, as I say, there's always a tradeoff. At each step along the way the new system may be more efficient and maybe more safe, but it also requires dairy companies to invest in new equipment (rather like the old days when farmers had to get milk coolers to put their milk cans in--the next step was requiring bulk tanks). So it's also another straw on the camel's back for the dairy company that's just getting by, day-to-day, and which can't afford the new equipment to compete. People, at least those who drink milk, gain; those who work at the companies who can't compete, don't.
Bureaucracy and Farm Bill Implementation
Whenever there's a new program enacted, the question becomes which bureaucracy will implement it. The Sustainable Agriculture Coalition reports on the infighting in their weekly newsletter:
Farm Bill Implementation News: Two letters have been sent this week from Capitol Hill to USDA to clarify beginning farmer provisions in the new farm bill. On Thursday, House Chairman Peterson (D-MN) and Senate Chairman Harkin (D-IA) wrote to Secretary Schafer to provide a clear direction that the farm bill designates the Beginning Farmer and Rancher Development Program to be administered by the Cooperative State Research Education and Extension Service (soon to be renamed the National Institute for Food and Agriculture). The letter came in response to surprising news from the Department that the program might be assigned to either Rural Development or to the new Office of Outreach and Advocacy. The clear intent of Congress, supported by SAC, was for this program to go to CSREES.
On Friday, a letter from Senator Feingold (D-WI) and Chairman Harkin was sent to the Secretary to outline their intent, as the Senate champions for the new Office of Outreach and Advocacy and its Small Farms and Beginning Farmers and Ranchers sub-unit, regarding the placement and mission of the new office. SAC has been working closely with the Rural Coalition on the implementation of this new office, which also includes a sub-unit for Socially Disadvantaged Farmers and Ranchers. The newly-positioned and enhanced office will be at the executive level of the Department, reporting directly to the Secretary, not through any department mission area and Under Secretary.
The program sponsors want it placed as high in the bureaucracy as possible and in as sympathetic bureaucracy as possible. If the sponsors succeed, the bureaucrats naturally feel gratitude to the sponsors. It's a very different process than a public adminisration-type analysis of the logic and appropriateness of the bureaucratic setup.
Sunday, June 29, 2008
Pigford and Discrimination
The case of blacks who tried to maintain their family farms and failed, originally labeled as "Pigford", was revived in the new farm bill.
The NY Times has an update today--actually it's an AP story carried in the Times. It makes these points:
The NY Times has an update today--actually it's an AP story carried in the Times. It makes these points:
- it summarizes the case--73,000 claimed to have missed the filing period under the original Pigford agreement.
- the new provision in the farm bill passed only because the cost estimate was only $100,000. (The article cites possible costs of $1.5 to 2.4 billion.)
- 800 have already filed suit under the new provision.
- Rep. Davis seems to concede he deliberately low-balled the cost estimate.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)