Consumers have always been concerned about the quality, and particularly the safety, of the foods they eat. In recent years this concern has taken on additional prominence. Consumer focus on food safety has been sharpened by reports about new risks, such as that posed by "mad cow" disease, and about more familiar sources of risk, such as food borne pathogens, pesticides, and hormones. At the same time, some consumers are in creasingly interested in knowing more about how their food is produced and in selecting products based on production practices. Some of the questions consumers are asking in clude whether food is produced with the use of modern biotechnology, whether it is or ganically produced, how animals are treated in meat and egg production systems, and whether food is produced using traditional methods. Recent trends also show increased consumer demand for a variety of food products that are fresh, tasty, and available on a year-round basis. This has fostered increased global trade in food. For example, consumers in temperate climates such as North America are able to buy raspberries throughout the year, and Europeans can enjoy South American coffee. Trade in processed food products is actually increasing more rapidly than trade in agricultural commodities, further addressing the demand for variety among consumers.

The objective of these proceedings is to examine consumer demand for quality attributes (including food safety, biotechnology-free food, organic food, etc.) in the context of a global economy and expanding international trade and the role of both private firm strategies and public policy in facilitating consumer choice and free trade. Specific questions will be addressed in order to meet this objective. They begin with the two-way linkage between trade and consumer demand, and end with quality and regulation.

Through the process of globalization, the trade dependence and int- dependence of the developing countries have increased phenomenally than ever before. The characteristic of this late twentieth-century globalization process has been the new technological revolution that has led to a high rate of world exports of electronics and other high-technology products. This has marginalized most of the developing countries exporting largely the low quality and low value-addition manufacturing and primary products, barring a few exceptions like China, India and Mexico. The fruits of globalization have, therefore, been unevenly distributed so far across the developed and the developing countries. Moreover, whatever little growth in exports of medium technology products has been achieved by a few of them, is largely driven by outsourcing of low value-addition and low- stage of activities by the foreign multinationals. Outsourcing of software services, rather than development of software packages, in India and assembly line for automobiles in Mexico are the two glaring examples. These activities may have boosted the total exports of these countries, but they have failed to generate any feedback effect on the rest of the economy in terms of skill formation, increase in overall productivity level and product diversification.

Industrial Organization: Markets and Strategies provides an up-to-date account of modern industrial organization that blends theory with real-world applications. Written in a clear and accessible style, it acquaints the reader with the most important models for understanding strategies chosen by firms with market power and shows how such firms adapt to different market environments. It covers a wide range of topics including recent developments on product bundling, branding strategies, restrictions in vertical supply relationships, intellectual property protection, and two-sided markets, to name just a few. Models are presented in detail and the main results are summarized as lessons. Formal theory is complemented throughout by real-world cases that show students how it applies to actual organizational settings. The book is accompanied by a website containing a number of additional resources for lecturers and students, including exercises, answers to review questions, case material and slides.

First reference on food consumption and policy.

This book collects sixteen essays that provide clarification to issues pertinent to contemporary cooperatives. Twenty three internationally recognized scholars of agricultural cooperatives from a variety of disciplines such as industrial organization, finance, sociology, networks, and political theory contributed theoretical work and empirical observations from different countries.

This title offers an integrated account of strategic trade analysis, combined with empirical evidence and new results. It addresses the need to synthesize and integrate the new advances in a field that has become a key element of policy discussions.