There is a drastic need for reforestation in the Sahel region of Africa. International donors and local governments invest large sums of money for the purpose of planting trees. Unfortunately, the majority of reforestation efforts last only as long as the projects. Presently there is a push in the donor community to have more sustainable projects, increasing local participation and creating a situation in which reforestation efforts will continue beyond the scope of any one project. This thesis examines the potential opportunity for the use of eucalyptus in the domestic sawn wood markets of Senegal. It is hoped that with increased economic incentives the local population will become more inclined to plant trees. It is therefore important to identify the market opportunities for the products of reforestation. In this research it has been noted that more emphasis should be placed on determining the barriers to market entry for the goods to be produced from the reforestation and providing assistance to lower those barriers. In Senegal it is generally accepted that planting for fuel wood and housepoles does not provide enough of an economic incentive for increased local involvement in reforestation. This thesis finds that the domestic sawn wood market for eucalyptus in Senegal holds potential but will not provide tangible benefits until there are further improvements in the market infrastructure and communication to the farmer. To increase the participation in this market the people of Senegal need to see for themselves that reforestation can be financially beneficial. Reforestation projects rust have a longer-term vision and provide assistance throughout the productive cycle of the tree. / Master of Science

Relationships between the futures price, cash price, and U.S. Feeder Steer Price in the final eight weeks of trading on the feeder cattle futures contract were analyzed. Models were developed to examine continued problems with basis variability in the feeder cattle futures contract. The results of these models indicated that the change from physical delivery to cash settlement and the use of the U.S. Feeder Steer Price as a settlement index for the contract did not improve problems associated with basis variability. / Master of Science

M.S.

M.S.

This dissertation studies three models of sequential social learning, each of which has implications for the impact of the internet and social media on political discourse. I take three features of online political discussion, and consider in what ways they interfere with or assist learning.In Chapter 1, I consider agents who engage in motivated reasoning, which is a belief-formation procedure in which agents trade-off a desire to form accurate beliefs against a desire to hold ideologically congenial beliefs. Taking a model of motivated reasoning in which agents can reject social signals that provide too strong evidence against their preferred state, I analyse under which conditions we can expect asymptotic consensus, where all agents choose the same action, and learning, in which Bayesian agents choose the correct state with probability 1. I find that learning requires much more connected observation networks than is the case with Bayesian agents. Furthermore, I find that increasing the precision of agents’ private signals can actually break consensus, providing an explanation for the advance of factual polarisation despite the greater access to information that the internet provides. In Chapter 2, I evalute the importance of timidity. In the presence of agents who prefer not to be caught in error publicly, and can choose to keep their views to themselves given this, insufficiently confident individuals may choose not to participate in online debate. Studying social learning in this setting, I discover an unravelling mechanism by which non-partisan agents drop out of online political discourse. This leads to an exaggerated online presence for partisans, which can cause even more Bayesian agents to drop out. I consider the possibility of introducing partially anonymous commenting, how this could prevent such unravelling, and what restrictions on such commenting would be desirable. In Chapter 3, my focus moves on to considering rational inattention, and how this interacts with the glut of information the internet has produced. I set out a model that incorporates the costly observation of private and social information, and derive conditions under which we should expect learning to obtain despite these costs. I find that expanding access to cheap information can actually damage learning: giving all agents Blackwell-preferred signals or cheaper observations of all their neighbors can reduce the asymptotic probability with which they match the state. Furthermore, the highly connected networks social media produces can generate a public good problem in investigate journalism, damaging the ‘information ecosystem’ further still.

Cities, as epicenters of resource consumption and waste production, play a crucial role in spearheading the transition towards a circular economy, where waste is minimized and the lifecycle of resources is maximized. Fashion industry activities, in particular, are predominantly concentrated in the urban context, from design activities to consumption and disposal. Given their role as centers of entrepreneurship and innovation, what opportunities and challenges do cities present in facilitating an industrial paradigm shift towards circularity in the fashion industry? How do entrepreneurial actors and supportive intermediaries pave the way toward a circular system? This dissertation examines the processes of entrepreneurship and the dynamics of learning that propel the fashion industry toward a circular economy, or circular fashion. It brings together literature on circular economy businesses and entrepreneurship with economic geography insights into the localized processes of innovation and entrepreneurship within cultural and creative industries. The three papers presented contribute to the expanding field of research and practice in the circular economy and circular fashion by underscoring the significance of proximity relations, entrepreneurial initiatives, and the dynamics of knowledge intermediation. Through a systematic literature review and a case study of New York City’s fashion industry, the three papers cultivate a nuanced understanding on the micro-dynamics of circular fashion entrepreneurship and relational processes that accompany the transition towards circular fashion. They highlight the importance of the interplay between geographical and non-geographical proximities, place-based entrepreneurial initiatives, and knowledge coordination efforts, offering a comprehensive view of the circular fashion landscape and policy implications.

The study of educational and economic outcomes associa with participation in marketing and distributive education (MDE) was approached by first examining the impact of MDE participation on employment in marketing. Then selected characteristics of MDE students were examined and a determination of the effects those characteristics had on educational attainment, job attainment, unemployment, and wages was made. The selected variables were social background, race, sex, region of the country, community size, aptitude, MDE and cooperative program participation, grade point average, self-concept, career and educational aspirations, educational and job attainment. The data base for this study was the National Longitudinal Study of the High School Class of 1972. Participation in MDE had a positive impact on employment in marketing. The proportion of MDE participants employed in sales occupations was higher than expected for all but one year of the 7 year follow-up period. MDE students were employed initially in management positions in a higher proportion than expected but the effect was negative or negligible by the 5th year following graduation. For the category of other marketing jobs, there was no discernible pattern of employment, although in four of the follow ups there was a higher proportion of MDE students employed than expected. There was no effect of MDE participation on educational attainment but higher educational attainment for MDE students was associated with higher educational aspirations, higher aptitude, higher mother's education, not participating in a cooperative program, and being nonwhite. Higher job attainment in marketing was associated with higher educational attainment. being male, participating in MDE and cooperative education, higher grade point average, and higher motherts education. There was no effect of MDE on wages. The causal model for educational and economic outcomes compared favorably with other studies using similar determinants. However, the model failed to account for 58% the variance in educational attainment, 86% of the variance in job attainment, 94% of the variance in salary, and the model for unemployment: was responsive to the factors included. It was recommended that future research focus on improving the explanatory power of the model. It was also recommended that the outcomes associated with MDE participation be examined for those not employed in marketing and for those who participated in specialized MDE programs, and that the management training component of the secondary curriculum be reevaluated and possibly upgraded. Finally, it was recommended that secondary MDE programs be expanded. / Ed. D.

No description available.

The present study does not represent a general investigation of all the various divisions of the transportation phase of the petroleum industry but a very small segment of the industry, i.e., crude oil pipe lines. Rather than being an examination of the technical operations of the industry the study is directed towards a consideration of the instrumentalities of control of interstate pipe line facilities exercised at the hands of major or integrated companies.

The purpose of this thesis is to study the relationship of the fee system for certain business subjects in Texas high schools to certain principles of free public school education as provided for Texas public schools.