Pradeep Agrawal

CONTRACTUAL STRUCTURE IN AGRICULTURE

Abstract This paper develops a generalized double-sided moral hazard model of contract choice in agricultural production, with mutual monitoring of each other by the landlord and the tiller, who generally have different levels of farming efficiency and are risk-averse. Using this model, we formally prove that the optimal contract maximizes the output net of the risk-bearing and agency costs, of both the parties and carry out a simulation exercise which helps explain many of the tenancy-related issues. The difference in the farming efficiency of the two sides, often ignored in previous analysis, turns out to be the principal determinant of the contract offered to a tiller.

India: Crisis and Response

The first signs of India’s most recent balance of payments crisis became evident in the second half of 1990–91 when foreign exchange reserves began to fall. The immediate cause of the loss of reserves, which started in September 1990, was the rise in world oil prices following the annexation of Kuwait. This led to a sharp escalation in India’s oil import bill, from an average of

Measures of Competitiveness

287 million per month in June–August 1990 to

Relationships among some risk premia

671 million per month in the following six months. The effect of the increase in oil prices was aggravated by the events that followed. Indian workers employed in Kuwait had to be airlifted back to India and their remittances ceased to flow in. Further, the UN trade embargo on Iraq led to the stoppage of exports to Iraq and Kuwait, imposing a loss of approximately

Selective Policies: Instruments, Outcomes and Institutional Contexts

280 million on the economy. Thus, from a level of

Fundamentals: Labour Markets and Human Resource Development

3.11 billion at the end of August, India’s foreign exchange reserves had dwindled to

Fundamentals: The Macroeconomic Environment, Savings, Investment and the Financial Sector

896 million on 16 January 1991.

Introduction: The State of the Debate

In this chapter we provide a quantitative description of the behaviour of the variables that we use as indicators of competitiveness; the revealed comparative advantage ratio (RCA), supplemented by market shares or export shares where appropriate. Initially, we discuss the computational aspects of these measures and some of the problems associated with their interpretation, particularly that of the RCA. We attempt to justify its use on the grounds that, given particular trends in the behaviour of exports in the East Asian countries, this ratio does allow us to make inferences about the relative performance over time, and across countries and commodities.

A Conceptual Framework

Abstract We consider several risk premia associated with providing insurance through income and factor prices and obtain relationships among them. Our most interesting result is that certain factor price risk premia are marginal versions of the Arrow-Pratt income risk premium.

Economic Restructuring in East Asia and India

This chapter investigates the role of selective policies in the achievement of industrial competitiveness for the sample of countries under consideration. As we indicated in the introductory chapter, the issue of selective intervention raises two basic questions. Firstly, is such intervention necessary? Secondly, if it is undertaken, under what conditions is it likely to be ‘successful’?