Today?s farmers are constantly affected by the fluctuating world market prices on grain and thereby the price risk that comes with the price fluctuations. The volatile prices of grain increase the price risk within the business, which in turn affects the Profitability of the business. The fluctuating prices together with the increased price risk within the farm business have opened up the market for hedging instruments. In this master thesis project, the aim is to identify the underlying end-values of 30 Swedish farmers? related to their choice of using hedging and the product; forward contract.

The heterosis effect and breed group effect of crossbreds between Swedish Holstein (SH) and Swedish Red (SRB) was estimated in this study. Observations on cows born between 1990 and 2012 were used to estimate the heterosis effect and breed group effect for several traits included in the Nordic breeding goals: production, fertility, udder health, calving performance, survival and other diseases. Breeding within the Holstein dairy breed has earlier been focused on increased milk production and conformation. This, combined with an intensive use of individual animals, has resulted in a radical increase of milk yield in the Holstein dairy cow population all over the world. However, this breeding strategy has resulted in increased inbreeding and several functional traits have impaired.

Latent heat storage is a way to store thermal energy when a phase change material undergoes a phase change. The advantage of latent heat storage is the capability to store more energy per mass unit than other heat storage methods. The most commonly used phase change in latent heat storage is the transition between solid and liquid. Phase change materials can be divided into organics, inorganics and eutectics.In the Nordic electricity market the price of electricity is set every hour by Nordpool spot, which leads to price fluctuations because of changes in demand. The main goal of this report is to create a latent heat storage system in a single-family home and investigate the possibility to save money by charging the latent heat storage system when the price of electricity is low, and discharge when the price is high.The thermodynamic model consisted of a ?tube-in-tube? heat exchanger with phase change material in the outer tube and water as the heat transfer fluid in the inner tube.

Intense competition among companies and luck or unavailability of certain resources in country of company?s origin force last to cross the borders, and start to hunt for new markets and cheaper inputs. However, by investing abroad the company is not only facing and dealing with cultural differences and new regulatory framework, but also becomes dependent on decisions and actions of different and to large extend unknown government. Moreover, the majority of the investments? flows are directed to developing countries, where power and capabilities of state authorities are considered to be more extensive than in countries of developed economies.

Approximately 60 million cubic meters of round wood are transported every year with trucks in Sweden and stand for 15 % of all truck transportation in the country. The big amount that is transported results in many haulage companies works in different parts of the country with different conditions to get a good flow on their transports. Today the transport pricing is very general and the payment consists of the unit round wood they are transporting and the distance of the transport. The purpose of this study were, from the freighter and the haulage company?s perspective, try to find ways to change the today applied transport pricing to more differentiated and compare them to historic payment of transportation.

The number of weaned piglets per sow and year is a good measurement of sow productivity since it is affected by the number of piglets born alive, the pre weaning mortality (i.e. mortality of live born piglets between birth and weaning) and the number of litters per sow and year. This measure is also closely connected to the number of piglets produced per year, which partly determines the Profitability of the piglet producer. During this study, eleven successful piglet-producing herds were visited. Eight of the producers were Swedish and three of the producers were Danish.

Sammanfattning Titel: Vilka faktorer påverkar val av kapitalstruktur? ? En kvantitativ studie avseende 226 bolag på Stockholmsbörsen. Nivå: C-uppsats inom ämnet företagsekonomi Författare: Anna Hansen och Robert Sandberg Handledare: Peter Lindberg Examinator: Stig Sörling Datum: 2015 ? maj Syfte: Syftet med studien är att undersöka vilka faktorer som påverkar val av kapitalstruktur i bolag på Stockholmsbörsen. Metod: Denna studie bygger på en kvantitativ metod med en deduktiv ansats. Baserat på tidigare forskning väljs ett antal variabler ut för att undersökas. Det insamlade materialet hämtas genom sekundärdatainsamling och exporteras sedan till Microsoft Excel där det sammanställs. En regressionsanalys genomförs i statistikprogrammet SPSS för att undersöka hur stor inverkan dessa variabler har på kapitalstrukturen. Resultat & slutsats: Resultaten visar ett negativt samband mellan skuldsättning och tillväxt samt ett svagt negativt samband mellan skuldsättning och lönsamhet.

Successful broiler production in hot climates requires knowledge of how birds are affected by heat stress. It is important with access to water and good ventilation to facilitate coping with the heat. It may be useful to reduce the consumption of feed during the hottest hours of the days, which together with a few hours of extra light available could improve both productivity and animal welfare. The vision in birds is superior to that of humans and most other mammals. Continuous light and light with low intensity can cause eye injuries, affect the eye development in young chicken negatively, as well as provide increased incidence of foot pad lesions. Access to light affects the production but also the welfare of birds.

The past and ongoing structural change in Swedish agriculture has led to an increasing number of large-scale farms. The biological factors associated with large-scale farming operations may cause increasing variability, risk and reduced yields due to sub-optimal timing and management of field operations. The theory of economies of scale suggests that largescale production may benefit from lower costs due to scale efficiencies. Thus, large-scale farms may face cost reductions in terms of long term inputs factors, e.g. agricultural machinery.

Stump wood was used between 1850 and 1950 for production of tar and as firewood. In the 1950s the use decreased because of the introduction of the cheap fossil oil. In the 1970s stump wood became an interesting issue again as a raw material for the pulp industry. Stump lifting has today become a possible source for bioenergy. The objectives with this study were to investigate the productivity of stump lifting and stump extraction, and to analyse the economy.

Samhället har under de senaste decennierna börjat ställa mer krav på att företag ska implementera hållbarhetsarbete i sin dagliga verksamhet. Det finns dock företag som väljer att bortse från dessa förväntningar då de anser att hållbarhetsarbete har en negativ inverkan på lönsamheten i form av ökade kostnader, till exempel genom omstruktureringar och utbildningar. De företag som inte har valt att arbeta hållbart är de företag som inte har en långsiktig syn på hållbarhetsarbete och inte heller kunskap om de fördelar som det kan leda till, både för företaget i sig, miljön och samhället i stort. En undersökning har visat att flera börsnoterade bolag i Sverige fortfarande har mycket att arbeta med inom hållbarhetsområdet. Däremot ökar medvetenheten kring att företag kan medverka till en mer hållbar utveckling.Den forskningsfråga som då blir aktuell är hur börsnoterade bolag i Sverige förenar lönsamhet och hållbarhet med fokus på miljöansvar.

Problem: Kvinnor har länge varit underrepresenterade i styrelsesammansättningar runt om i världen. Sverige är ett land som främjar likvärdighet och anses därför vara ett av världens mest jämställda länder. Andelen kvinnor i svenska styrelser har ökat under de senaste årtiondena, men trots detta är de svenska bolagsstyrelserna inte jämställda. Ibland används argumenten att fler kvinnor i styrelsen ökar lönsamheten och effektiviteten i bolaget i syfte att öka kvinnoandelen. Till följd av detta har det internationellt genomförts många studier för att undersöka om bolag med heterogena styrelser har bättre lönsamhet än bolag med homogena styrelser.

Most of today?s concrete structures that are built on site are mainly constructed in a traditional fashion with a lot of artisanal operations. One step towards industrializing the in-situ construction of concrete is to use prefabricated reinforcement. Through this method there can be a lot of savings when each bar doesn?t have to be placed and fixed separately on site.

The district heating load is seasonally dependent, with a low load during periods of high ambient temperature. Thermal energy storage (TES) has the potential to shift heating loads from winter to summer, thus reducing cost and environmental impact of District Heat production. In this study, a concept of high temperature borehole thermal energy storage (HT-BTES) together with a pellet heating plant for temperature boost, is presented and evaluated by its technical limitations, its ability to supply heat, its function within the district heating system, as well as its environmental impact and economic viability in Gothenburg, Sweden, a city with access to high quantities of waste heat.The concept has proven potentially environmentally friendly and potentially profitable if its design is balanced to achieve a good enough supply temperature from the HT-BTES. The size of the heat storage, the distance between boreholes and low borehole thermal resistance are key parameters to achieve high temperature. Profitability increases if a location with lower temperature demand, as well as risk of future shortage of supply, can be met.

The commercial real estate market makes up a large part of Sweden's property portfolio, as well as other open, free markets in the real estate market it is regulated by supply and demand. There are several factors that affect the supply and demand in the commercial real estate market, for instance the price, type of real estate and the condition of the real estate. In order to achieve success in the commercial real estate market it requires that real estate agents have a certain expertise and flexibility in their thinking to adapt commercial real estates to supply and demand. Active investors on the commercial real estate market are for instance private real estate agents, their knowledge and experience will help increase the value of commercial real estate in the long run. In order to provide the market flexibility in its real estate portfolio, vacancy is a factor that can be used.