Fortified blended foods (FBFs) were introduced into the Food for Peace program (also known as US Public Law 480) in the 1960s. Minimal changes have since been made to their formulations. A Food Aid Quality Enhancement Project to assess the nutritional adequacy of FBFs for vulnerable populations was conducted, and the findings indicate that FBFs do not meet the nutritional needs of infants and young children between the ages of 6 and 24 months. Improvements are also needed for FBFs intended for school-aged children and adults. Two separate products would better meet the varying nutritional needs of diverse groups of beneficiaries. Proposed here is a two-step strategy for better addressing the needs of today's food aid beneficiaries: 1) improving FBFs for general distribution to households, schools, and emergency settings, with potential efficiencies gained in manufacturing and formulation to reduce costs; 2) developing new products for infants and young children, which would deliver the nutrient density required for growth and development.
We address the impact of financial flexibility on organizational performance in a not-for-profit (NFP) setting. Specifically, we examine the link between donor-imposed financial inflexibility and subsequent donations. Donors sometimes impose restrictions on NFP use of the donated resources. These restrictions arise because of donors' preferences regarding how the assets are used, or as a mechanism for donors to monitor the actions of NFP management. Restricted donations cause financial inflexibility and limit managerial discretion. We examine the costs and benefits of restricting managerial discretion and find a negative relation between future donations and high levels of donor restriction. Specifically, we empirically demonstrate that when restricted assets comprise a high percentage of total assets, additional increases in restricted assets are associated with an overall reduction in future donations.
In 2007, the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) eliminated the 20-F requirement to reconcile IFRS financial disclosures to U.S. GAAP. We find that this change in SEC regulation is associated with an overall decrease in the international asset allocation of U.S. institutional investors in European Union (E.U.) firms that are cross-listed on U.S. stock exchanges. We also find that U.S. mutual fund investors were more likely to invest in firms in countries with greater levels of investor protection and higher global visibility in the post-elimination period. A learning effect (measured as the length of time a firm is cross-listed on a U.S. stock exchange) is not, however, associated with U.S. institutional ownership. These results are robust to tests involving removal of OTC ADRs, firm-level controls, country controls, and financial controls resulting from the elimination of the 20-F reconciliation. Our results suggest that the increased information processing costs were not offset by information preparation cost savings. Our results indicate that the elimination of the 20-F reconciliation of IFRS to U.S. GAAP resulted in a loss of valuable information for U.S. institutional investors and thereby resulted in a divestment in cross-listed E.U. firms.
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