An Economic Analysis of Agriculture and Industry in the Skane Region

Stroemqvist, U. (1983). An Economic Analysis of Agriculture and Industry in the Skane Region. IIASA Collaborative Paper. IIASA, Laxenburg, Austria: CP-83-015

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Abstract

In 1979 the Regional Development Group at IIASA became engaged in a case study of economic and demographic development, land-use and related problems in the region of southwestern Skane in Sweden. The case study is the third in a series of attempts made by the group to apply systems analytic methods to regional planning problems in regions with different economic structures, resource endowments and organizational settings.

The research in the Skane study was done in collaboration with the Intermunicipal Association of Southwest Skane, as a part of their ongoing work in physical and public transport planning for the metropolitan region of Malmo, and its neighboring municipalities. The research was partly sponsored by the Swedish Council for Building Research.

In the study an integrated package of models has been used. The models have been developed within the Regional Development Group in cooperation with a group of Swedish researchers and planners. In that package, separate models have been developed for interregional economic and demographic problems, and the intraregional land-use problems.

The current collaborative paper represents one of this central background materials for the study. Since the Skane region is specialized in agricultural production as well as in food and chemical industry production, a quite detailed analysis of the structure and prospects of those industries is needed to provide a solid foundation for the comprehensive economic and land-use modeling. That analysis must also embrace the alternative industrial development options. Thus the paper contains an economic analysis of agriculture and industry as a whole in the Skane region.

Ulf Stromqvist has structured his economic analysis in a novel way. Rather than building the analysis on average data, the author stresses strongly the importance of tracing out the distribution of production units along a profitability scale. The dynamics of these industrial profitability patterns are at the core of the analysis. Utilizing a general method for identifying and describing structural invariances of production systems, this analysis with its considerable originality, is an important part of the southwest Skane case study. It also has a substantial independent interest.

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