Attracting Attention: Cheap Managerial Talk and Costly Market Monitoring

This chapter is concerned with cartel detection, through market monitoring, inspections, or well-designed leniency programs. It analyses three methods competition authorities regularly use to detect, and adduce evidence about, cartels. First, competition authorities can detect cartels by monitoring and screening markets. Second, competition authorities can conduct inspections at the business premises or private homes of cartel participants. Third, given the limitations of the first two methods, competition authorities can incentivize companies to report the cartels in which they may be involved by rewarding them for their cooperation. Pursuant to so-called leniency programmes, companies that choose to cooperate will, depending on the quality of the information provided and the time at which it is provided, benefit from full immunity from fines or significant fine reductions (partial immunity). Following in the footsteps of the US Department of Justice, the European Commission adopted a Leniency Notice in 1996, the application of which has allowed it to uncover a vast number of cartels.

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Consumer’s Willingness to Pay a Premium for Organic Fruits in China: A Double-Hurdle Analysis

International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health ◽

10.3390/ijerph16010126 ◽

2019 ◽

Vol 16 (1) ◽

pp. 126 ◽

Cited By ~ 6

Author(s):

Lijia Wang ◽

Jianhua Wang ◽

Xuexi Huo

Keyword(s):

Willingness To Pay ◽

Risk Attitudes ◽

Adequate Knowledge ◽

Market Monitoring ◽

Factors Influencing ◽

Positive Attitudes ◽

Double Hurdle ◽

Organic Label ◽

Socio Economic Variables

The aim of the paper was to assess how consumers evaluate organic labeled fruits and to what extent they are willing to pay a premium for fresh fruits with organic labels. A double-hurdle model is applied to data obtained by interviewing 407 fresh fruit consumers in nine Chinese cities. Willingness-to-pay a premium was modeled as a function of a series of demographic, socio-economic variables, plus fruit attributes, perceptions of fruit safety, and risk attitudes. Results indicate that the most important factors influencing willingness to pay a premium involved positive attitudes toward organic label, attention to fruit safety, the perception of importance of fruit attributes. Moreover, the more income consumers earn, the more likely they would be willing to pay a premium for organic fresh fruits. The recorded consumer interest in safety and quality of fresh fruits reveals that a promising market for organic fruits could be developed by an adequate knowledge on organic label and an effective market monitoring system.

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