EU income stabilization tool: potential impacts, financial sustainability and farmer’s risk aversion

The Income Stabilization Tool, a risk management scheme introduced within the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) 2014–2020, could help European Union farmers manage the income risks they face. This study assesses the potential impact of implementing this tool through the maximum level of contribution to the fund which determines an indifference to participate in the fund and its financial sustainability. The study relies on an expected utility approach and assesses the variability of loss ratios over time using a sample of Italian hazelnut farms as a case study. The participation depends on the level of farmers' contributions and their degree of risk aversion. However, the CAP public support makes the scheme financially sustainable.

A Rehabilitation of the Law of Diminishing Marginal Utility: An Ordinal Marginal Utility Approach

The model in which an individual maximizes his ordinal or cardinal total utility has long been the paradigm of individual choice theory. However, the two mainstream utility theories, the ordinal and cardinal total utility theories, have caused a dilemma, i.e. one has to sacrifice one of the following two: the good property of utility ordinality, or common-sense notions such as the law of diminishing marginal utility. Ordinal theory keeps the former but gives up the latter, while cardinal theory keeps the latter but sacrifices the former. We propose an ordinal marginal utility approach aiming to solve this dilemma by changing the very first assumption regarding individual choice.

Climate Change and Individual Obligations

This chapter concerns the nature of our obligations as individuals when it comes to our emissions-producing activities and climate change. The first half of the chapter argues that the popular ‘expected utility’ approach to this question faces a problematic dilemma: either it gives skeptical verdicts, saying that there are no individual emissions-related obligations, or it yields implausibly strong verdicts. The second half of the chapter diagnoses the problem. It argues that the dilemma arises from a very general feature of the view, and thus is shared by other views as well. It then discusses what an account of our individual obligations needs to look like if it is to avoid the dilemma. Finally, the discussion is extended beyond climate change to other collective impact contexts.

Evaluating Bayesian adaptive randomization procedures with adaptive clip methods for multi-arm trials

Bayesian adaptive randomization is a heuristic approach that aims to randomize more patients to the putatively superior arms based on the trend of the accrued data in a trial. Many statistical aspects of this approach have been explored and compared with other approaches; yet only a limited number of works has focused on improving its performance and providing guidance on its application to real trials. An undesirable property of this approach is that the procedure would randomize patients to an inferior arm in some circumstances, which has raised concerns in its application. Here, we propose an adaptive clip method to rectify the problem by incorporating a data-driven function to be used in conjunction with Bayesian adaptive randomization procedure. This function aims to minimize the chance of assigning patients to inferior arms during the early time of the trial. Moreover, we propose a utility approach to facilitate the selection of a randomization procedure. A cost that reflects the penalty of assigning patients to the inferior arm(s) in the trial is incorporated into our utility function along with all patients benefited from the trial, both within and beyond the trial. We illustrate the selection strategy for a wide range of scenarios.

ANALISIS RISIKO USAHA BUDIDAYA IKAN LELE DUMBO DI KECAMATAN KOTA GAJAH KABUPATEN LAMPUNG TENGAH

This research aims to determine the level of risk and behavior faced by farmers in dumbo catfish farming. This research was a survey conducted in Kota Gajah Subdistrict of Central Lampung Regency in August-September 2018. Respondents are 44 dumbo catfish farmers members of the Fish Cultivation Group (pokdakan) taken using simple random sampling. The results of this research showed that the dumbo catfish farming in Kota Gajah Subdistrict of Central Lampung Regency has the CV value price risk of 0.04 and the lower limit (L) of IDR15,320. The CV value less than 0.50 means that farmers risk suffered losses due to changes in low classified price. CV value of production risk is 0.04 and the lower limit (L) is 2,449.33 kg. The CV value less than 0.50 means that farmers risk experiencing losses due to changes in production relatively low. Based on the analysis that was done with the quadratic utility approach shows that dumbo catfish farmers in Kota Gajah Subdistrict are 41 farmers behave neutrally and 3 farmers behave boldly in facing the risk of catfish farming.Key words: behavior, dumbo catfish, farmers, risk

Multi-response optimization in wire electrical discharge machining (WEDM) of D2 steel using utility approach

Wire electrical discharge machining (WEDM) is a popular non-conventional machining process used particularly for making extrusion dies, blanking punches, and tools especially requiring tight dimensional tolerances. Because of the process limitation, the rate of cutting and maintenance of close dimensional tolerance is a challenging task. Given the above facts, the present work has been focused on achieving the maximum possible cutting rate (VC) maintaining good dimensional accuracy and corner radius (RC). In the present research work, a multi-response optimization method (i.e. Taguchi based Utility approach) has been used to obtain an optimum set of input parameters such as pulse on time (TON), pulse off time (TOFF), servo voltage (SV), and wire feed rate (WF) resulting into a best overall cutting performance. Analysis of variance (ANOVA) is also used to find out the significant effect of each machining parameter on the cutting performance. The analysis reported in this paper will be helpful for industry personnel to select the best set of process parameters for achieving a good result without the use of any software or statistical analysis.