The agricultural sector of African economies has faced considerable challenges within the past 50 years or so. Although agricultural production on the continent rose by an annual average of 2% between 1965 and 1980 and has continued to increase by 1.8% annually since then, population growth of 2.9% per year has resulted in a per capita decline in agricultural production. From self-sufficiency i...

The global COVID-19 pandemic of 2020 triggered disruption in almost all areas the Food Supply Chain (FSC). During this year many confounding factors contributed to normal FSC and impacted system adversely. This includes agricultural food production system, first phase FSC, final delivery consumers. was lost or wasted as farmers were unable transfer distribute retailers. shortages became problem...

Since agricultural activities were first recorded, there have been shortages of pollinators. Today it seems that pollination systems in many areas of agriculture are threatened by the inadequacy or lack of sustainable managed, indigenous, or imported pollinators. Pollinator shortages can adversely affect crop production and commodity markets. This paper presents an economic model than can be us...

There are growing concerns about the health impacts of climate change with ecosystem degradation and global warming, finite reserves of non-renewable energy, water shortages in food-producing regions, limits to contemporary agriculture with its dependence on exhaustible petrochemical nitrogen and rock phosphate fertilizers, and failure of the global financial system. To date, health security ha...

The paper models the interaction between risk taking in the financial sector and central bank policy for the case of pure illiquidity risk. It is shown that, when bad states are highly unlikely, public provision of liquidity may improve the allocation, even though it encourages more risk taking (less liquid investment) by private banks. In general, however, there is an incentive of financial in...

A weakening dependence on rain-fed agriculture has been a hallmark of the economic transformation of countries throughout history. Rural citizens in developing countries today , however, remain highly exposed to fluctuations in the weather. This exposure affects the incomes these citizens earn and the prices of the foods they eat. Recent work has documented the significant mortality and morbidi...

Two purified-protein derivative (PPD) tuberculin skin test (TST) antigen solutions are approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA): Tubersol (Sanofi Pasteur Limited) and Aplisol (JHP Pharmaceuticals, LLC). Tubersol was out of production in late 2012 through April 2013. Shortages of Aplisol have resulted from increased demand as practitioners have sought a substitute for Tubersol. Tu...

Tubersol, a product of Sanofi Pasteur Limited, is in short supply nationwide until at least the end of May 2013. Tubersol is one of two purified-protein derivative (PPD) tuberculin products licensed by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). The manufacturer has notified CDC that 50-dose vials of Tubersol will remain unavailable until the end of May 2013 and that supplies of 10-dose vials are s...