The link between behaviour of a stockperson towards animals and the animals' behavioural response to humans is an important indicator of animal welfare. However, the economical importance of the human-animal relationship has only recently been acknowledged. The potential to improve animal productivity by improving these human-animal interactions is a positive step towards improving the welfare ...

In an attempt to go beyond the so called "smart" subsidies, Nigeria has embarked on a potentially innovative mobile phone-based input subsidy program that provides fertilizer and improved seed subsidies through electronic vouchers. In this article, we examined the productivity and welfare effects of the program using household-level data from rural Nigeria. The article employed instrumental var...

Publications signal a professor’s productivity and may lead to raids by other universities. Professors attach different values to non-wage benefits at a raiding university, and will quit only if benefits elsewhere are relatively high. The social value of these benefits means research may increase welfare even without a direct social value from research. Other results are: welfare would be reduc...

This paper studies how different unionisation structures affect firm productivity, firm performance, and consumer welfare in a monopolistic competition model with heterogeneous firms and free entry. While centralised bargaining induces tougher selection among heterogeneous producers and thus increases average productivity, firm-level bargaining allows less productive entrants to remain in the m...

Brazil is the world leader in broiler production and export. It achieved this position mainly to its excellent supply chain structure and climate, which favor poultry and grain production throughout its territory. Although Brazilian egg production is not as important as broiler production, this segment presents great potential of increasing its share in the global market. However, as elsewhere ...

This paper examines how trade liberalization affects the innovation incentives of firms, and what this implies for industry productivity and social welfare. For this purpose we develop a reciprocal dumping model of international trade with heterogeneous firms and endogenous R&D. We identify two effects of trade liberalization on productivity: a direct effect through changes in R&D investment, a...

The propensity to show moral behaviour has evolved in all animals living in complex societies as it promotes social stability. All major religions provide a structure for a moral code. The code is valuable in the societies where the religions have influence. The most important aspects of morality are the same in all countries. Because of their moral code, people consider that they have obligati...

A stockperson has a significant influence on the productivity and welfare of his animals depending on his stockmanship competence. In this study, stockmanship competence (SC) is defined as the capacity of the stockperson to ensure the welfare of his animals by providing his animals' needs. The study was conducted to evaluate the SC of backyard goat raisers and examine its relationship to goat p...

The primary responsibility of veterinarians is to the animals in their care, so veterinary students need to be aware of important issues and factual information relevantto animal welfare. Veterinarians have tended to concentrate on physical aspects of welfare, but also need to take account of mental aspects (including pain) and naturalness. A crucial first step in animal welfare education is to...