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Background: This study explored vaccination hesitancy, diabetes-specific COVID-19 vaccination concerns, and whether they predicted vaccination uptake in people with diabetes. Methods: Quantitative, cross-sectional, and predictive approaches were used. An online survey was conducted with people with diabetes attending four Australian health services, using convenience sampling (n = 842). The survey data collected included clinico-demographic characteristics, COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy, and attitudes around COVID-19 vaccine confidence and complacency. Clinico-demographic characteristics that predicted vaccination status, vaccine hesitancy, and vaccine-related attitudes were identified using regression analyses. Results: Most participants received at least one COVID-19 vaccine dose. Younger age and type 1 diabetes were associated with lower vaccination status, and they were partially mediated through higher vaccine hesitancy. Younger age and English as a dominant language were associated with higher negative attitudes towards speed of vaccine development. Conclusions: Despite an overall high vaccination rate, general and diabetes-specific COVID-19 vaccine concerns are a barrier to uptake for some people with diabetes, particularly in those who are younger or have type 1 diabetes. A detailed understanding of concerns for particular subgroups can help tailor information to increase vaccine acceptance, particularly in the context of requiring booster doses.

Media diversity within video lectures has been shown to have an effect on students who participate in both flipped classes as well as online courses. While some research claims that content delivered through multiple sources leads to more learning, contrasting research makes the claim that too much media hinders cognitive processing. The present study investigated the effects of varying levels of instructional media delivered to students (n=110) within a flipped scientific writing course to investigate the relationship between higher levels of media diversity and student performance. Results showed that more diversity led to lower levels of performance. It was also found that higher levels of media diversity correlated with higher levels of students’ scanning between different forms of media, possibly contributing to the lower levels of performance. The implications of these results provide insight into the optimal level of media diversity, and on student behavior that can affect learning.

BackgroundThe online market is getting popular today, and consumers' preferences about products are revealed differently in online and offline markets. Especially, fresh food purchasing online is very different from non-food products due to its unique features such as perishability, low cost and frequent purchases, low value-volume ratio, and highly relevance to safety and health. However, studies on online fresh food are rather few, and this study will fill the gap by investigating consumers' preferences for fresh food online purchasing.MethodsUsing unique data observed from online stores, we conduct a hedonic analysis of fresh produce online market using apple market in China, avoiding hypothetical bias. Propensity Score Matching is used to check the online promotion effects. The data are apples transactions from Jingdong JD e-commerce platform with sample size 8,200, observed across six weeks from 11/26/2018 to 12/31/2018. Variables used include prices, promotions, varieties, places of origin, fruit size, labeled as organic or green food, watercore label, and customer reviews for the products as well as for the venders.ResultsWe found place of origin, food safety and eco-certificates, and sensory features all influence apple prices which reflect consumer preferences. In addition to product features, store features such as former customers' review for the store, a video post of the product, and other latent product features through former customers' review for the product quality also influence consumers' preference reflected by price.ConclusionsIn additional to product intrinsic features, consumer show preferences and valuation for online market special features.

To address student concerns about full tuition rates while taking online courses during COVID-19, we conducted choice experiments at a representative U.S. land-grant university to elicit students’ willingness-to-pay for alternative course delivery modes. Results show that students demanded 30% and 7% tuition discounts for fully online and hybrid learning, respectively. A welfare analysis further reveals that 63% of the total welfare loss during Fall 2020–Spring 2022 was compensated for by the Higher Education Emergency Relief Fund (HEERF) funding. Based on our findings, we suggest measures to facilitate students’ learning experiences and emphasize the importance of leveraging government appropriations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Farmers- owned agricultural cooperatives should have the same interests with their farmer owners. However, the operating team of the cooperatives may have different interests. Under this situation, the terms of contract between farmers and cooperatives are important to both sides. Farmers' share of the cooperatives' profits specified in the contracts is an important issue in the long- term sustainability of rice processing and marketing in Korea. This paper discusses the behavior of farmers and their cooperatives in determining the optimal share of profits in their contracts. It also illustrates the impacts of the policy changes due to the Korea's accession to the WTO on the relative negotiation power between farmers and cooperatives. The results show that the Korean rice cooperatives have more negotiation power than farmers. They set the profit share to farmers based on their own profit maximization criteria, while taking farmers supply decision into consideration. Farmers only choose how much to supply. This relationship was seen changing after 2005, when the Korean government reduced and removed the price subsidy it provided to rice cooperatives before. As the cooperatives' margin goes down without the subsidy, farmers are pushed to bargain hard for their share of the margin to maintain their revenue.

Agricultural chemicals may have an adverse impact on environment and food safety. The demand prices of such chemicals reveal farmers' willingness to pay and their preferences. This article examines the determinants of the agricultural chemicals price in the export-oriented vegetable production area, Anqiu, Shandong Province, applying the Hedonic Price Model based on the spatial econometric technique to analyze the price. We find that the agricultural chemicals with a different shape and function have different equilibrium prices, and the chemical attributes of permeability, rainfastness, being a substitute of the highly poisonous chemical, having a zero residue, and the internal absorption can all influence the equilibrium prices remarkably. We also find that the prices of biological and non-pollution agricultural chemicals might not be higher than the ordinary agricultural chemicals with the same characteristics. These findings do not show a good sign to the new agricultural chemicals promotion and environmental protection, and should be brought to the government's attention.

Participation in federal crop insurance programs has been encouraged through premium subsidies. The current subsidy depends on contract features as well as coverage levels. This type of subsidy rule causes farmers to choose contract designs and coverages that are not efficient for managing risk, in order to capture subsidy. Farmers are found to be as well off with a flat subsidy that is up to 25% less than the value of the current regressive proportional subsidy.

Logit and ordered probit analyses were used to identify factors associated with reduced tillage adoption, continuous spring cropping, and the number of changes made in response to wind erosion. Contrary to previous results for water erosion control, simple perception of a wind erosion problem or membership in a particular socioeconomic category did not significantly explain adoption of wind erosion control practices, but participating in a targeted educational program did. This educational program: (a) highlighted the threats of wind erosion to human health and to soil productivity, and (b) described specific potentially profitable farming practices for solving the wind erosion problem.

Current country-based group crop insurance, i.e., Group Risk Plan (GRP), is not an effective risk-reducing tool in counties where natural conditions are different across the area. Using only the historical yield information, a statistical approach is developed to group farmers by their yield similarity rather than linking them based on their association with a particular county. The cases of Washington State wheat farms and Iowa corn farms are the focus of this investigation. Sub-county or cross-county zones (clusters) are identified, and each farm is classified into a cluster where individual farm identification remains unknown. To improve risk-management and cost effectiveness of the crop insurance instrument, we propose implementation of zone-based GRP as a substitute for county-based GRP, where homogeneous zones rather than county boundaries are used for indemnifying yield.

Purpose - The purpose of this paper is to explore Chinese food safety issues by analysing select incidents within he Chinese agricultural marketing system. Design/methodology/approach - A marketing utility framework is utilized to discuss some of the major food safety incidents in China and potential solutions are explored. Findings - The paper finds that food safety issues arise from problems of asymmetric information which leads to the profit seeking behaviour of agents distorting rather than enhancing the creation of one of the four types or marketing utility (time, form, place and possession). Additionally, structural causes found within the Chinese food marketing system have contributed to the food safety problems. Research limitations/implications - This is not an empirical research with numerical data. Originality/value - This study is one of the first to address Chinese food safety problems from an agricultural marketing utility perspective. Key anecdotes are used to support the claims made in this study. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The relationship between agricultural taxation and production efficiency has been thoroughly explored for many countries. Recently, China has taken various measures including the rural taxation reform (RTR) to promote grain production and to increase farmer incomes. In this study, we investigate whether the Chinese policy of abolishing rural taxation has improved farm households' incomes and affected their production decisions. Using household survey data obtained from three regions in China, we estimate the effect of the RTR on farmers' income. Results show that the RTR has significantly improved farmers' post-tax net income by 9.2% in Shandong, 16.9% in Shanxi and 16.8% in Zhejiang. These increments, mostly from farm income rather than from off-farm income, are much higher than the direct income increase from the tax savings. In addition, we examine the dynamic impact of farmers' net income, and find that the RTR has a sustained positive income effect in Shandong and Shanxi, whereas its positive effect in Zhejiang appears temporary. We also examine farmers' production responses to the RTR. Results show that farmers in the three regions respond in different ways: farmers in Shandong significantly increase their labour input, farmers in Zhejiang increase intermediate inputs, whereas Shanxi farmers augment their intermediate inputs and enlarge their crop acreage. It appears that the farmers' responses to the taxation reform vary due to the agronomic and economic factors in these three regions, suggesting that diverse post-RTR supplemental policies should be implemented in different regions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Migrant workers have become a major element of the labor force in Chinese cities, making important contributions to the economy while forming a socially disadvantaged group. Existing research on the relationship between the level of nutrition and health and income in China mainly focuses on farmers living in rural areas. Based on a Mincer equation and using a survey in Beijing, this paper examines the relationship between migrant workers' nutrition and health levels and their monthly incomes. We find that the nutrition intake and the body mass index have positive effects on income while duration of illness and daily working hours have negative effects. These conclusions imply that the Chinese Government should put more emphasis on improving migrant workers' well-being, including offering educational programs on nutrition and health, and enhancing medical insurance and the old-age insurance system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An expected utility maximisation model assesses risk management strategies for US non-irrigated crop producers under provisions of the 2002 Farm Bill. Results suggest that farm programme payments account for the primary value of all risk management portfolios analysed. Hedging is not used extensively unless counter cyclical payments and loan deficiency payment provisions are removed from government programmes, or expected market prices are high relative to the government target price. Under the current premium subsidy regime, optimum risk management portfolios consistently include revenue insurance with price replacement if available for the crop, followed by yield insurance. Hedging with futures plays a significant role only if the futures transaction cost is eliminated. A small diversification impact is observed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Risk theory tells us if an insurer can effectively pool a large number of individuals to reduce total risk, the insurer can then provide insurance by charging a premium close to the actuarially fair rate. However, a common belief exists that risk can be effectively pooled only when random loss is independent. Therefore crop insurance markets cannot survive without government subsidy because crop yields are not independent among growers. In this article, we take a spatial statistics approach to examine the effectiveness of risk pooling for crop insurance under correlation. We develop a method for evaluating the effectiveness of risk pooling under correlation and apply the method to three major crops in the United States: wheat, soybeans, and corn. The empirical study shows that yields for the three crops present zero or negative correlation when two counties are far apart, which complies with a weaker condition than independence, finite-range positive dependency. The results show that effective risk pooling is possible and reveal a high possibility of a private crop insurance market in the United States. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Unprecedented economic growth in China has created a new market potential for high-quality foods in the global food industry. This has led several studies to investigate consumer preferences for food safety and quality attributes in the retail market. However, there are limited studies related to the food service sector, specifically to combine these two concepts. Therefore, this study was conducted to investigate these preferences from the perspectives of both the customers and restaurant managers in relation to ducks in the Chinese food service sector. This involved estimating the willingness-to-pays for quality and safety attributes such as branding, premium quality, safety certification, and the biotech country of origin, including the United States, the European Union, and China using regression analysis. The empirical results showed that Chinese consumers and restaurant owners/managers have a similar preference for branded, high quality, and safe domestic products. However, their relative preferences for these attributes are not identical, as indicated by the consumers' highest preference for safety certification, while managers mostly focus on the quality. These findings are expected to provide more information on the market preferences for food produced in emerging Asian economies with special diet cultures and traditions.

Food hoarding is prevalent during the COVID-19 pandemic. To investigate the mechanism of urban consumers' food hoarding behaviors, we categorize hoarding motives into rational and irrational ones. Using random online survey samples from three cities in China, we employ the multivariate probit model to investigate the rational and irrational motives on food hoarding behavior. Our results confirmed the existence of both rational and irrational food hoarding, and also found factors attributing to the different buying behaviors. The amount of food at hand and the expectation on the infection possibility of COVID-19 are two major factors affecting rational hoarding. Bad mood and herd psychology are factors contributing to panic buying. This study provides an empirical evidence to support intervention policies aiming at mitigating panic buying behavior.

Since COVID-19 was first detected in China in 2019, governments around the world have imposed strict measures to curb the spread of the coronavirus, which substantially impacted people’s life. Consumers’ food consumption behavior has also changed accordingly with reduced grocery shopping frequency, replaced in-person grocery shopping with online shopping, and increased valuation on food. In this paper, we aim to investigate the change in Chinese consumers’ food consumption and their willingness to pay (WTP) for vegetables and meat, using a dataset with 1206 online samples collected between February and March 2020. Consumers’ WTP for vegetables and meat is estimated using a double-bounded dichotomous contingent valuation design, and factors affecting their WTPs are also investigated. Results show that consumers have a higher WTP for these food products during the pandemic, and their WTP is positively affected by their anticipated duration of the COVID-19, their online shopping shares, their direct exposure to infected patients, their gender, and their income. These results imply that the food industry shall try to develop online market channels as consumers are willing to share the costs, while lower-income consumers may not be able to meet their food needs with prices increased beyond their WTP and thus may call for the government’s support.

A major concern for international marketers is how products will be received by foreign consumers in other markets. This study uses choice modeling to assess Chinese consumer preferences for pork and evaluate the potential demand for U.S. pork in the cities of Guangzhou and Hong Kong. We find that differences in preferences for domestic versus imported pork can be explained, in part, by consumers' level of patriotism. Marketing pork with a food safety claim can increase market demand for U.S. products, and accounting for differences in nationalistic attitudes can aid marketing efforts.

This study provides an economics assessment of various food safety measures in China. A choice experiment approach is used to elicit Chinese consumer preferences for various food safety attributes using data from a 2008 urban consumer survey. An alternative welfare calculation is used to model aggregate market impacts of select food safety measures. Our results show that the largest welfare gains are found in the current government-run certification program. The implementation of a third-party certification system, a traceability network and a product label would generate significant value and would help reduce current system inefficiencies in China. This study builds on previous research and provides an alternative approach for calculating consumer valuation of safety and quality attributes that can be used to estimate aggregate economic and welfare impacts.

Facing increasing nonrenewable and environmental concerns with fossil power generation, renewable energy is being supported by government mechanisms. With the power generation cost of renewables generally higher than fossil fuels, determining the optimal level of these mechanisms requires an understanding of households’ prosocial behavior toward renewables. The issue is determining the magnitude households are willing to pay (WTP) for alternative renewables. Our hypothesis is this behavior varies by the type of renewable energy. As a test of this hypothesis, we apply a discrete choice experiment to measure households’ WTP. Results support our hypothesis with a positive WTP for solar energy, leading to a 62% reduction in solar subsidy, and a negative WTP for biomass and wind sources.