“Profits to the Danes,for us – Hog stench?” The campaign against Danish swine CAFOs in rural Lithuania

The paper analyzes a grass-roots campaign to limit the expansion of Danish-owned industrial hog operator Saerimner in Lithuania. The industrialization of livestock production as well as local responses to the restructuring of meat production are interpreted within the broader context of the incorporation of peripheral regions into global agro-food markets. Unlike in Western Europe and North America where the industrialization of hog production is proceeded by the displacement of small hog producers, in Eastern Europe the expansion of multinational corporations is occurring by the buying up, retrofitting and modernizing of factory-farms inherited from the socialist-era. It is argued that the bitter environmental legacy of Soviet-era factory farming has shaped rural population responses to the new wave of multinational acquisitions in the region. Anti-corporate hog campaigning is analyzed within the context of growing activism among rural constituencies displaced from commercial agriculture. The importance of effective organization and leadership in grass-roots activism is emphasized as well as the growing role of non-farming interests is shaping the rural policies of the country.     

Rural grass-roots organizing in eastern Europe: the experience from Lithuania

This article examines rural grass-roots organizing in Lithuania.A conceptual scheme is proposed to differentiate among threetypes of activities prevalent in rural community building: theinitiation, voluntary communal activities, and not-for-profitcommunal activities. The model is applied to examine the establishmentof one of the most successful rural non-governmental organizations(NGOs) in Eastern Lithuania – the Community Centre ofBalninkai village (population 496). The strategies that wereused to initiate the Balninkai organization and to engage involuntary communal and not-for-profit activities are identified.Internal and external factors influencing successful organizingare addressed as well as the potential impact of European Unionmembership. While there are numerous obstacles facing ruralactivists in post-socialist Lithuania, there are also significantopportunities for community organizations to contribute to sustainedrural development in Lithuania.     

The Production of Knowledge and the Production of Commodities: The Case of Rapeseed Technoscience1

Abstract A crucial issue in the theory of technological change—the transformation of knowledge into commodities in agriculture—is examined through the role that technoscience played in the transformation of rapeseed (Brassica campestris and B. napus) from a minor crop used largely for marine lubricants into a major global competitor in edible oil markets. The study is based on a content analysis of the worldwide bibliography of rapeseed. A network approach is used to show that emergence and successful development of the rapeseed commodity subsector included three simultaneously occurring and interacting developments: production of new knowledge, modification of commodities, and extension of rapeseed production networks. Implications of the network approach for the analysis of agricultural development are discussed.     

A note on model selection using information criteria for general linear models estimated using REML

It is common practice to compare the fit of non‐nested models using the Akaike (AIC) or Bayesian (BIC) information criteria. The basis of these criteria is the log‐likelihood evaluated at the maximum likelihood estimates of the unknown parameters. For the general linear model (and the linear mixed model, which is a special case), estimation is usually carried out using residual or restricted maximum likelihood (REML). However, for models with different fixed effects, the residual likelihoods are not comparable and hence information criteria based on the residual likelihood cannot be used. For model selection, it is often suggested that the models are refitted using maximum likelihood to enable the criteria to be used. The first aim of this paper is to highlight that both the AIC and BIC can be used for the general linear model by using the full log‐likelihood evaluated at the REML estimates. The second aim is to provide a derivation of the criteria under REML estimation. This aim is achieved by noting that the full likelihood can be decomposed into a marginal (residual) and conditional likelihood and this decomposition then incorporates aspects of both the fixed effects and variance parameters. Using this decomposition, the appropriate information criteria for model selection of models which differ in their fixed effects specification can be derived. An example is presented to illustrate the results and code is available for analyses using the ASReml‐R package.     

Discourses on rurality in post-socialist news media: The case of Lithuania's leading daily “Lietuvos Rytas” (1991–2004)

The Soviet regime defined rurality as a collective-farm or kolkhoz-based society. Since the late 1980s such a state-imposed definition of rurality was rapidly unraveling under the tensions and conflicts produced by perestroika and post-socialist reforms. In the new politics of the rural, the role that the news media was playing in shaping public opinion on rural matters was of growing importance. The paper analyzes 3827 articles on rural issues published during the post-independence period (1991–2004) in the leading Lithuanian daily “Lietuvos Rytas” (LR). Two types of discourses in rural coverage are discerned. During the 1990s rural coverage in LR was reflective of conflicts and tensions between relatively prosperous urban classes which benefited from post-socialist reforms and pauperized rural population. Rurality was increasingly associated with the failure of “the moral modernization” of the rural population. Rural population was stigmatized as deficient in values and character, remaining in the grips of the Soviet mentality and state dependency and, therefore, unable to take advantage of opportunities created by the reforms. Since the early 2000s when economic situation in the country improved significantly and Lithuania started negotiations on European Union membership, rurality in LR coverage was gradually re-defined in EU terms as a socio-spacial entity shaped by regional, national, and local policies promoting multifunctionality of rural areas, well-being of rural communities, and active citizenship. Factors that influenced changes in rural discourses are analyzed. Impacts of changing discourses on rural identities, rural politics and policies are discussed.