Assessing the costs of ozone pollution in India for wheat producers, consumers, and government food welfare policies.

We assess wheat yield losses occurring due to ozone pollution in India and its economic burden on producers, consumers, and the government. Applying an ozone flux-based risk assessment, we show that ambient ozone levels caused a mean 14.18% reduction in wheat yields during 2008 to 2012. Furthermore, irrigated wheat was particularly sensitive to ozone-induced yield losses, indicating that ozone pollution could undermine climate-change adaptation efforts through irrigation expansion. Applying an economic model, we examine the effects of a counterfactual, "pollution-free" scenario on yield losses, wheat prices, consumer and producer welfare, and government costs. We explore three policy scenarios in which the government support farmers at observed levels of either procurement prices (fixed-price), procurement quantities (fixed-procurement), or procurement expenditure (fixed-expenditure). In pollution-free conditions, the fixed-price scenario absorbs the fall in prices, thus increasing producer welfare by USD 2.7 billion, but total welfare decreases by USD 0.24 billion as government costs increase (USD 2.9 billion). In the fixed-procurement and fixed-expenditure scenarios, ozone mitigation allows wheat prices to fall by 38.19 to 42.96%. The producers lose by USD 5.10 to 6.01 billion, but the gains to consumers and governments (USD 8.7 to 10.2 billion) outweigh these losses. These findings show that the government and consumers primarily bear the costs of ozone pollution. For pollution mitigation to optimally benefit wheat production and maximize social welfare, new approaches to support producers other than fixed-price grain procurement may be required. We also emphasize the need to consider air pollution in programs to improve agricultural resilience to climate change.

Masculine gender role stress and self-stigma of seeking help: The moderating roles of self-compassion and self-coldness.

Many college men express stigma of seeking psychological help, possibly due to masculine gender role socialization proscribing help seeking. However, not every man who buys into restrictive masculine roles expresses self-stigma of seeking help, suggesting the presence of potential moderating variables. The present study examined self-compassion and self-coldness as potential moderating variables on the associations between men's masculine gender role stress and self-stigma of seeking help. College men (N = 777) were recruited via e-mail to participate in a brief online survey. Structural equation modeling revealed that masculine gender role stress was positively associated with self-stigma and self-coldness but was negatively associated with self-compassion. Both self-compassion and self-coldness were significant moderators. Men with low levels of self-compassion evidenced the strongest positive associations between masculine gender role stress and self-stigma, whereas men with low (but not high) self-coldness evidenced positive associations with self-stigma. These findings highlight differences between self-compassion and self-coldness and suggest that high levels of self-compassion may be a protective factor in reducing the associations between rigid masculinities and men's stigma of seeking help. By contrast, men with extremely negative and critical self-views may be likely to report stigma of seeking help regardless of their endorsement of rigid masculinities. Intervention and prevention implications include helping men enhance their self-compassion. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2019 APA, all rights reserved).