Suchergebnisse

Summary This paper aims to analyze urban consumer preferences for Albanian honey, focusing on key product attributes such as origin, type, location and price, using a conjoint choice experiment and latent class approach. Origin and location-landscape were found to be the most important factors for most surveyed consumers. Albanian consumers prefer honey produced in mountainous forests and on pastures. Moreover, multi-flower honey is preferred compared to chestnuts honey. These results can be used to producers' advantage when local branding and well-perceived certification (e.g., producer associations' brands) would be applied in order to increase the consumer awareness and strengthen the intrinsic features of the product especially for small producers. Labeling should be clear and emphasize the origin as well as the natural landscape where beehives are kept. Furthermore, in its regionalization economic development policy, the government may consider supporting honey produced from the mountainous areas.

AbstractResearch on gender equality for several decades has observed gender roles as related to decisions, asset availability, and bargaining power. Literature examining the influence of intra‐family bargaining power and rights on farm structures is scarce. This article builds on the feminisation thesis for exploring how feminisation in agriculture has been changing women's agency in family farms. It analyses the effect of farming decision‐making in farm structures in Albania, a post‐communist transition country undergoing rural depopulation and migration. Based on data collected from structured farm surveys, an instrumental variable regression is used for exploring the relationship between women's farming decision power and production structures. The analysis finds a positive influence of women's decision‐making power on farms oriented to orchards, and a negative influence on farms oriented to forage (livestock‐oriented farms) and farms with uncultivated (abandoned) land. Women's farming decision‐making power is highly influenced by their education, perception of land rights equality, and access to advisory services. The article provides evidence for interventions including institutional support to strengthen land rights, empowering women farmers through training, awareness campaigns, and advocacy activities.

The role of the village headman and council of elders is very important in many societies. The focus of this article is to analyse the evolution and the role of the (informal) intermediary institutions and actors in the context of changing society's patterns and political landscape transformations. This article focuses on Albania and Kosovo, where village self-governing mechanisms played a crucial role in avoiding (often deadly) social conflicts during the post-communism transition. The article relies on in-depth interviews with involved actors at the local level, using the framework of evolutionary governance theory. The study shows that the role of the council of elders and village headman has been strong and important in times of weak central and local governance, while it weakened in times of strong politicization and increasingly patronizing role of the central government, thus not allowing for a right balance between legitimate community representation and accountability toward upper levels of governance.

The competitive grants schemes, a financing mechanism established for achieving social welfare as well as balanced and efficient territorial development, would have to be applied through a transparent and objective competition process. However, political influence of the ruling party and informal networks with central government decision-makers may influence access to competitive grants. This paper explores the extent to which the political affiliation and the personal informal connections/networks of the Municipalities and Communes leaders influence the allocation of competitive grants in Albania. The study is based on their perceptions and attitudes collected through the application of qualitative research instruments. We used a semi-structured survey that targeted local government leaders in Albania during the year 2013–14. Research shows that local government leaders are more likely to access grants from the central government if both belong to the same political party/coalition, follow personal informal connections/networks, and can use strong (political and/or bribing) lobbying with high-level decision makers.

This paper analyzes the determinant factors of tobacco consumption in Albania, which is one of the countries with the highest smoking prevalence in Europe. To empirically estimate the elasticity of cigarettes demand in Albania, the paper uses the Living Standard Measurement Survey (LSMS) applying Deaton's (1988) demand model. This paper estimates an Almost Ideal Demand System (AIDS), which allows disentangling quality choice from exogenous price variations using unit values from cigarette consumption. Following Deaton's model, the results suggest that the demand for tobacco is inelastic, with a price elasticity of −0.57. The price elasticity appears to be within the range of elasticity estimates frequently reported for low- and middle-income countries. The results suggest that total expenditure, household size, male-to-female ratio, and adult ratio are important determinants of tobacco demand in Albania. The increase in the tobacco price, which has been mainly driven by increased excises, has demonstrated a significant impact on reducing tobacco consumption. Consequently, the Albanian government may engage in gradual increases in excise taxes given the inelastic tobacco demand.

AbstractWe analyze the effects of opportunistic and partisan politics on the licensing of construction activities, which in turn determines the level of housing supply. In line with Political Business Cycle theory, we hypothesize that the municipal incumbent may manipulate the supply of construction permits before (general and local) elections in order to boost economic activity and voter satisfaction, or to accommodate special‐interest groups. Our findings, based on time‐series data from post‐socialist Tirana (Albania), are consistent with opportunistic and partisan incentives' creating cycle effects in the licensing of construction permits. However, we find that the direction of opportunistic election cycles depends critically on the interaction between the municipal incumbent and the central‐level government. Our paper raises important questions about the effects of transition politics on spatial development in post‐socialist cities.