On the Demand for Information Services: An Application to Lowbush Blueberry Producers in Eastern Canada
Bibliographic record
Abstract
Information needs have rapidly evolved in agricultural markets but little is known about how information is transmitted to agricultural producers. Producers must collect information to better manage their production, marketing and financial decisions. Using survey data obtained from a questionnaire distributed to lowbush blueberry producers in eastern Canada, we analyze how producers' individual characteristics impact their demand for different information services. Minimum distance estimation of the structural ordered probit equations indicates that: Confidence in the information service is a central determinant of the frequency at which a producer refers to a specific service. Producers' experience partially explains the demand for information obtained from agricultural newsletters and magazines, university publications, field days and workshops and crop specialists from the government. Blueberry acreage has not a strong impact on the demand of information. There exist few regional effects in the demand of information services. Our results strongly support the claim that confidence in an information service and the demand for the service itself are endogenously determined. Les besoins d'information ont vite évolué en agriculture, mais on sait peu de choses sur la manière dont l'information parvient aux producteurs. Ces derniers doivent se renseigner pour mieux gérer leur production, mettre leurs denrées en marché et prendre des décisions financières. Grêce aux données d'un sondage effectué auprès des producteurs de bleuets nains de l'Est du Canada, les auteurs ont analysé l'impact des paramètres personnels sur la demande de services d'information. L'estimation à distance minimale des équations à probits ordonnés structurellement indique : i) que la confiance dans le service d'information constitue le principal facteur déterminant la fréquence à laquelle les producteurs font appel à un service particulier, ii) que l'expérience du producteur explique en partie la demande pour l'information issue des gazettes et des magazines agricoles, des publications universitaires, des démonstrations et des ateliers ainsi que des agronomes du gouvernement, iii) que la superficie de bleuets cultivée n'a pas une grande incidence sur la demande d'information et iv) que la région agit peu sur la demande d'information. Les résultats de l'analyse étayent fortement l'allégation que la confiance dans un service d'information et la demande pour un tel service sont des facteurs endogènes.
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How this classification was reachedexpand
Full frame machine prediction
Teacher imitationNot calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. The Gemma side is a direct model label for every work in the frame, read from the title-only record. The Codex side is a classifier learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and calibrated to design-weighted sample rates; fields without enough sample support carry no Codex call. Candidate is the union of the two sides; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels.
Distilled classifier scores by category (both heads)
| Category | Codex | Gemma |
|---|---|---|
| Metaresearch | 0.001 | 0.004 |
| Meta-epidemiology (narrow) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Meta-epidemiology (broad) | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Bibliometrics | 0.002 | 0.007 |
| Science and technology studies | 0.003 | 0.001 |
| Scholarly communication | 0.002 | 0.001 |
| Open science | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Research integrity | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Insufficient payload (model declined to judge) | 0.007 | 0.000 |
Machine scores (provisional)
The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.
Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.
score_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from itClassification
machine, unvalidatedMachine predicted; a candidate call from one source (direct Gemma or distilled Codex), not a consensus.
How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".