With funding provided by the Center for Higher Education of the United States Agency for International Development, The Pennsylvania State University and Tuskegee University collaborated with the University of Nairobi in establishing women's NutriBusiness Cooperatives in the Rift Valley and Central Provinces of Kenya. Between 1992 and 1999, the cooperatives were established, facilities and equi...

In our first two columns, we described innovative practices that Advanced Practices Council (APC) members shared with their colleagues at recent meetings. In this column, we describe the ideas that Jim Tosone, a long-standing APC member, shared at the October APC meeting. A contributor to the recently published “Complete Idiot’s Guide to the U.S. Constitution,” Tosone explained how understandin...

For approximately the last forty years industrial organization economists have undertaken empirical studies to determine if an increase in the number of producers results in more competitive market outcomes. In recent years a number of empirical studies, many under the inspiration and guidance of Leonard Weiss, have focused directly on the relationship between the price of output in a market an...

The literature on strategic alliances is vast. Most authors are pro-alliances and the casual reader may thereby be lulled into a false sense of security concerning the advantages of strategic alliances. There are several possible advantages of strategic alliances however by joining an alliance several opportunities are also forsaken. The opposite strategic option, a "go it alone strategy" gener...

Changes in the market conditions for fruit and vegetables have induced Dutch cooperative auctions to restructure their sales and marketing activities. Nine auctions merged into VTN (VoedingsTuinbouw Nederland) and established the marketing organisation The Greenery BV. VTN/The Greenery has encountered problems in its relationship with the growers, which may undermine its stability. A model is p...

This paper reports the results of a survey of attitudes of commercial fanners and supply cooperative managers about agricultural supply cooperatives. Cooperative managers and fann­ ers frequently made significantly different responses to questionnaire statements. With a few exceptions, fann size and fanner age did not appear to influence perceptions about supply cooperatives. "",nether a fanner...