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on Agricultural Economics |
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Issue of 2016‒12‒11
forty-two papers chosen by |
| By: | Zanasi, Cesare; Rota, Cosimo; Severi, Claudia; Demadonna, Anna |
| Abstract: | The rapid expansion of Argentinian soy production, led by the increase in the international soy demand for food feed and biofuel production, deeply influenced the entire Argentinian society economy and environment. Genetically modified soy has become a strategic product for the Latin American country, strongly supporting the entire economy and the welfare state thanks to the income derived from soy production and export taxations. The influence of the GM soy production strongly modified in particular the economic, and social structure of the rural areas creating new supply chain agents and making the “contract agriculture” the dominant model. Among the many consequences of this rapid expansion of the soy supply it is increasingly argued that the Argentinian Food and nutrition security can be affected, in particular the access to cheap and good quality beef. The Argentinian ban on beef export reflects the attempt to support the internal supply of beef, thus guaranteeing a low price for the consumers. One of the main factors influencing the reduction of beef supply, however, is its substitution with the more profitable GM soy. The goal of this paper is to analyse the joint effects of the GM soy production in Argentina and of the change in the country price and income levels, on the Food and Nutrition Security for the Argentinian population, considering three different categories of food: vegetables, animal origin products and, within this category, beef. A Structural Equation Model (SEM) was adopted, where food consumption (calories from animal and vegetal origin food plus calories form beef) have been related to the food prices indexes, the income pro-capita and the expansion of soy cultivated areas. The statistical analysis showed that the present model of agricultural production, based on export- oriented GM soy production is affecting negatively food security, in particular the consumption of beef, one of the staple food in Argentinian diet. A substitution effect where beef is substituted with vegetable and other animal origin products emerged as a possible explanation of the results obtained in the three different models. Further study should better examine these substitution effects and how the overall diet composition changed in quality as well as quantity and how much the change in Food and nutrition security affected the different ranks of the Argentinean population. The present study represents a first, relatively simple approach to understanding the complex dynamics affecting the local as well as global consequences of a very fast and still growing expansion of the soy cultivation in Argentina. Considering its strategic role in the country present uncertain economic situation, further analysis should better focus on adopting more complex methods of analysis where the Argentinian institutional, economic and social context should be taken into consideration. |
| Keywords: | Agribusiness, |
| Date: | 2015–05 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:eaa144:206230&r=agr |
| By: | Tocco, Barbara; Davidova, Sophia; Bailey, Alastair |
| Abstract: | This paper examines the determinants of farm exit under the implementation of CAP payments in four selected EU countries (France, Hungary, Italy and Poland) during the period 2005-08. In particular, it studies whether the CAP contributes to job maintenance or accelerates labour shedding, taking into account the two ‘Pillars’ of the CAP, i.e. Pillar 1 and Pillar 2. The main results suggest that total CAP expenditure at the regional level reduce the out-farm migration of agricultural workers in the two New Member States, Hungary and Poland. Conversely, the non-significant results for the ‘old’ Member States may be interpreted as the result of opposing effects of coupled payments and rural development support. The diverse impact of CAP on the likelihood of leaving agriculture in the four countries reflects the heterogeneity in the EU, which does not allow a common and simple generalisation of the effect of the CAP on labour allocation. |
| Keywords: | Common Agricultural Policy, Farm Exit, European Union, Community/Rural/Urban Development, Environmental Economics and Policy, Labor and Human Capital, |
| Date: | 2016 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:eaa160:249757&r=agr |
| By: | Robert, Marion; Thomas, Alban; Bergez, Jacques Eric |
| Abstract: | Agricultural production systems are facing new challenges due to an ever changing global environment that is a source of risk and uncertainty. To adapt to these environmental changes, farmers must adjust their management strategies and remain competitive while also satisfying societal preferences for sustainable food systems. Representing and modeling farmers’ decision-making processes by including adaptation, when representing farmers’ practices ,is therefore an important challenge for the agricultural research community. Bio-economic and bio-decisional approaches have addressed adaptation at different planning horizons in the literature. We reviewed approximately 40 articles using bio-economic and bio-decisional models in which strategic and tactical decisions were considered dynamic adaptive and expectation-based processes. The main results of this literature survey are as follows: i) adaptability, flexibility and dynamic processes are common ways to characterize farmers’ decision-making, ii) adaptation can be a reactive or a proactive process depending on farmers’ flexibility and expectation capabilities, and iii) different modeling approaches are used to model decision stages in time and space, and some approaches can be combined to represent a sequential decision-making process. Focusing attention on short- and long-term adjustments in farming production plans, coupled with sequential and anticipatory approaches should lead to promising improvements for assisting decision makers. |
| Keywords: | farmers’ decision-making, bio-economic model, bio-decisional model, uncertainty, adaptation |
| Date: | 2016–11 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:tse:wpaper:31168&r=agr |
| By: | Davidova, Sophia; Hennessy, Thia; Thomson, Ken |
| Abstract: | The European Parliament’s Committee on Agriculture and Rural Development (COMAGRI) has recently drafted an own-initiative report “How Can the CAP Improve Job Creation in Rural Areas?” However, the creation or maintenance of jobs is not one of the CAP’s original (and still operational) objectives. Moreover, assessing the “success” or “failure” of the CAP in terms of job creation is a complex matter, particularly considering gross versus net job creation (including off-farm diversification by farm family members), or side-effects in the sense of job losses or gains in different sectors. How should agricultural economists address this topic, which is clearly of political importance but seems to require the reversal of long-term trends in EU agriculture? This paper suggests a number of questions, with a particular emphasis on the trade-off between employment and productivity, and the respective role of the two CAP Pillars. Some evidence from Ireland is presented to support the argument. |
| Keywords: | employment, EU, CAP, Labor and Human Capital, Political Economy, Public Economics, |
| Date: | 2016 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:eaa160:249794&r=agr |
| By: | Kaori Tembata (Graduate School of Economics, Kobe University); Kenji Takeuchi (Graduate School of Economics, Kobe University) |
| Abstract: | The management of common-pool resources requires collective action and cooperation, especially when resource users face extreme weather events. This study examines col- lective decision-making in water resource management during droughts. By focusing on the drought response by groups of water users in river basin communities in Japan, we investigate the determinants of collective decisions on water withdrawal restrictions. Our main finding suggests that water user groups are more willing to cooperate for water con- servation when other water user groups in a community also cooperate. Moreover, we examine the impact of climate variability on drought management. Our findings show that drought-related weather patterns lead to more stringent water restrictions, suggesting that climate change may pose a threat to the management of the water supply. |
| Keywords: | Common-pool resource, Collective decision-making, Cooperation, Drought, Water conservation, Japan |
| JEL: | D70 Q25 Q54 |
| Date: | 2016–12 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:koe:wpaper:1646&r=agr |
| By: | Guerrero Santiago; Juárez-Torres Miriam; Sámano Daniel; Kochen Federico; Puigvert Jonathan |
| Abstract: | We document the existence of asymmetric price transmission in Mexico for a wide variety of food and non-food products, in terms of magnitude and speed, for two segments of the supply chain: i) Producer (producer-wholesale) and ii) Consumer (wholesale-retail). We find that asymmetric price transmission is a common behavior in many of the good markets that we studied. However, there are important differences across stages of the supply chain: in the Producer segment, the analyzed food products exhibit larger asymmetries compared to non-food products, while we observe the opposite in the Consumer segment. The existence of these asymmetries may have important welfare effects on poor households, since they allocate a higher proportion of their expenditure for the acquisition of goods that present positive price asymmetries. |
| Keywords: | Price transmission;Positive price asymmetries;Food merchandises;Manufactured goods |
| JEL: | D43 L13 L11 C25 |
| Date: | 2016–10 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:bdm:wpaper:2016-18&r=agr |
| By: | Rizov, Marian; Davidova, Sophia; Bailey, Alastair |
| Abstract: | This study is concerned with assessing the contribution of the EU’s Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) to non-farm employment in the UK, through its direct and indirect effects on agriculture, up- and downstream industries, and the diversification of rural areas. We employ a micro approach, based on company data from FAME dataset combined with detailed subsidies data from DEFRA. We focus on employment in small and medium enterprises (SMEs) which are central for job creation. As a theoretical framework for our empirical firm employment function we employ a monopolistic competition model with delays in adjustment in prices, employment, and capacity. The generalised method of moments (GMM) is used to estimate the effect of CAP payments on both the level and growth of employment. Our estimation results suggest positive spillovers of CAP payments to non-farm employment. Although the magnitude of the effects is small, it is economically significant especially for the rural labour market. |
| Keywords: | Community/Rural/Urban Development, Labor and Human Capital, Political Economy, Public Economics, |
| Date: | 2016 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:eaa160:249793&r=agr |
| By: | Harrison Hong; Frank Weikai Li; Jiangmin Xu |
| Abstract: | We investigate whether stock markets efficiently price risks brought on or exacerbated by climate change. We focus on drought, the most damaging natural disaster for crops and food-company cash flows. We show that prolonged drought in a country, measured by the Palmer Drought Severity Index (PDSI) from climate studies, forecasts both declines in profitability ratios and poor stock returns for food companies in that country. A portfolio short food stocks of countries in drought and long those of countries not in drought generates a 9.2% annualized return from 1985 to 2015. This excess predictability is larger in countries having little history of droughts prior to the 1980s. Our findings support regulatory concerns of markets inexperienced with climate change underreacting to such risks. |
| JEL: | G0 G02 G12 Q0 Q5 Q54 |
| Date: | 2016–12 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:22890&r=agr |
| By: | Chmielewska, Barbara |
| Abstract: | Most rural, mainly farming, families, apart from agricultural holding income also gain income from paid employment, pensions and annuities and self-employment. The budget of the rural population is more and more dependent on the situation in the non-agricultural labour market and thus on the level of salaries in the national economy. Agriculture loses its dominant position in the rural labour market as a source of income. The amount of non-agricultural income, of both urban and rural residents, is reflected in the shaping of their demand for goods and services produced and offered by farmers’ holdings. In the post-accession period, the economic and social situation of the rural population improved. The overall level of income rose and the size and structure of meeting the needs improved. This took place thanks to positive changes in the labour market, such as, inter alia, growth of salaries in the national economy, higher employment rate, lower unemployment rate. An unfavourable trend, especially in social terms, is the persistence of the advantage of salaries offered to men when compared to women employed in the same positions. |
| Keywords: | countryside, labour market, income, expenses, Community/Rural/Urban Development, Labor and Human Capital, |
| Date: | 2016 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:eaa160:249758&r=agr |
| By: | Carlucci, Domenico; Dedevitiis, Biagia; Nardone, Gianluca; Santeramo, Fabio Gaetano |
| Abstract: | Consumer expectations in relation to food quality present new business opportunities for EU aquaculture producers who are willing to differentiate their products. In particular, new convenience formats and certification labels are likely to influence consumer choices. This study uses the choice experiment method to investigate consumer preferences and willingness to pay for new convenient formats and certification labels for oysters. Cross-sectional data were collected through a web-based consumer survey carried out in Italy in 2015. The main result of the study is that certification labels are decisively more effective than new convenient preparation formats to differentiate high quality products. However, some heterogeneity was detected in consumer preferences. |
| Keywords: | Consumer, Convenience, Discrete Choice, Ecolabels, Fishery, Italy, LCM, Oyster RPLM, Seafood |
| JEL: | Q11 Q18 Q22 Q28 |
| Date: | 2016–12–05 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:75448&r=agr |
| By: | Loughrey, Jason; Hennessy, Thia |
| Abstract: | This paper uses farm-level data from Ireland to explore the impact of agricultural policies on the farm operators’ off-farm labour allocation decisions. The hypothesis that decoupled direct payments induce farmers to allocate more time to off-farm employment is tested. Despite earlier studies based Irish data finding evidence to support this hypothesis, the analysis presented here suggests that decoupled direct payments are significantly and negatively associated with both the probability and amount of time allocated to off-farm work. The potential relationship between farm income variability and off-farm employment decisions in the short and medium term for the case of Irish farm operators is also explored. The analysis identifies a positive association between farm income variability and off-farm employment in the medium term but no significant relationship in the short-term. This suggests that off-farm employment is part of a wider portfolio decision and the recent increases in farm income variability due to reforms of the Common Agricultural Policy, has induced farmers to work more off farm. |
| Keywords: | Off-farm labour supply, direct payments, farm income variability, probit model, Agribusiness, Agricultural and Food Policy, Agricultural Finance, Farm Management, Labor and Human Capital, Political Economy, Public Economics, Research Methods/ Statistical Methods, |
| Date: | 2016 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:eaa160:249796&r=agr |
| By: | Matyja, Małgorzata |
| Abstract: | The purpose of the paper is to analyze the differences between Polish agricultural production cooperatives and other farming entities in the context of the employment. The conclusions are made on the basics of the analysis of the “List of the 300 best agricultural enterprises” pre-pared by the Institute of Agricultural and Food Economics. The time range of this research covers the years 2009 – 2013. The main finding is that there are no clear, significant differences between agricultural pro-duction cooperatives and other farming entities in terms of employment. However, some of them are able to create a lot of workplaces. Moreover, they can increase the return on sales by increasing the level of employment and maintain existing jobs even in the time of the global crisis. |
| Keywords: | agricultural production cooperatives, farming entities, employment, profitability, Agribusiness, Farm Management, Industrial Organization, Labor and Human Capital, Production Economics, Productivity Analysis, |
| Date: | 2016 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:eaa160:249765&r=agr |
| By: | Bignebat, Céline; Bosc, Pierre-Marie; Perrier-Cornet, Philippe |
| Abstract: | The question of farm size has long been a concern in the agricultural economics literature. The observation of a long-lasting persistence of so-called small farms drew the attention of numerous researchers. The size of farms is often approximated by the farm area in hectares or the added value and gross margin. We propose to investigate the opportunity to use labour (family labour and hired, permanent and seasonal, wage labour) as an entry point for a typology of agricultural holdings, with an application on French data from the Census collected in 2000 and 2010. We show that two dynamics are at stake: an evolution towards off-farm labour for the smallest farms relying on family labour; a convergence towards a model based on hired wage labour for the largest family farms. |
| Keywords: | Agricultural labour, farm size, France, Agribusiness, Labor and Human Capital, |
| Date: | 2016 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:eaa160:249790&r=agr |
| By: | Nigatu, Getachew; Adjemian, Michael K. |
| Abstract: | The United States has historically played a dominant role in the global trade, and therefore price formation, of major food, feed and fiber commodities. As the share of agricultural commodities exports produced by the US has recently declined, international supply and demand fundamentals likely play a larger role in setting even domestic commodity prices. Using wavelet coherence methods, this article examine the relationship between U.S. and international prices for corn, soybeans, and cotton. Our results reveal that integration between the markets of major exporters and importers of these commodities evolves over time: short-run (around 20 trading days) relationships between domestic and international prices are, in many cases, not stable, and even the long-run relationships between many price pairs is subject to distinct structural breaks. As the two major agricultural commodity exporters of corn and soybeans, the US and Brazil exhibit integration in the form of consistently significant long-run price relationships. In contrast, we show that Chinese agricultural commodity prices share little or no distinguishable relationship with the U.S., even though China is one of the biggest importers of U.S. products. This is likely due to Chinese trade barriers and price support policies that, while insulating domestic prices from external shocks, kept its own prices substantially higher than other countries from 2009- 2016. |
| Keywords: | agricultural commodity price, cointegration, integration, price discovery, wavelet coherence analysis, Agribusiness, Agricultural and Food Policy, Demand and Price Analysis, |
| Date: | 2016–11 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:assa17:250119&r=agr |
| By: | von Fintel, Dieter (Stellenbosch University); Pienaar, Louw (Western Cape Department of Agriculture) |
| Abstract: | Cash transfers successfully alleviate poverty in many developing countries. South Africa is a case in point, implementing one of the largest unconditional cash transfer programmes internationally, and with substantial benefits to household well-being along multiple dimensions. Yet, grants discourage formal labour market attachment, creating dependencies on the fiscus. This study uses a fuzzy regression discontinuity design to establish that state-funded Old Age Pensions encourage non-market economic activity (in the form of small-scale farming), and improve the self-reported food security of rural households that farm, vis-à-vis those that do not. However, only non-farming households increase market food expenditure and consume more diverse diets from market-sourced foods: diet quality improves with greater spending, while food sufficiency remains unaffected. Farmers, on the other hand, do not change food spending patterns, but self-rated food sufficiency improves due to greater levels and diversity in home production. The role of small-scale farming is of broader interest in rural development, given the context of the 1913 and 1936 Land Acts that constrained this form of livelihood in former apartheid homelands. This paper's contribution is two-fold: grants are an effective channel to actively promote rural development through small-scale farming, and they improve food security by non-market mechanisms. |
| Keywords: | cash transfers, small-scale farming, food security, South Africa, Apartheid homelands, regression discontinuity design |
| JEL: | Q12 Q18 Q15 D13 C26 |
| Date: | 2016–11 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp10377&r=agr |
| By: | Soliwoda, Michal |
| Keywords: | Farm Management, Risk and Uncertainty, |
| Date: | 2016–10–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:eaa156:249991&r=agr |
| By: | Shen, Zhiwei |
| Keywords: | Farm Management, Risk and Uncertainty, |
| Date: | 2016–10–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:eaa156:249984&r=agr |
| By: | Niskanen, Olli |
| Keywords: | Farm Management, Risk and Uncertainty, |
| Date: | 2016–10–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:eaa156:249988&r=agr |
| By: | Rizov, Marian |
| Abstract: | Recent technological advances both on the farm and in the lab have made farming more independent form nature than ever before. Arguably, the new and accessible technologies are helping us to better understand and ‘manage’ nature and thus for first time in history farming is becoming as any other industry, susceptible to specialisation and economies of scale. This in turn, besides increased productivity, leads to fundamental organisational change away from family control towards corporate forms with associated implications for employment and rural livelihoods – new technology in farming replaces both ‘muscles and brains’. |
| Keywords: | Farming, technical change, industrial organization, Agribusiness, Agricultural and Food Policy, Industrial Organization, Labor and Human Capital, Production Economics, Research and Development/Tech Change/Emerging Technologies, |
| Date: | 2016–03–22 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:ulefwp:250134&r=agr |
| By: | Nurmet, Maire |
| Keywords: | Farm Management, Risk and Uncertainty, |
| Date: | 2016–09–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:eaa156:249989&r=agr |
| By: | Stern, David I. |
| Abstract: | The environmental Kuznets curve (EKC) has been the dominant approach among economists to modeling aggregate pollution emissions and ambient pollution concentrations over the last quarter century. Despite this, the EKC was criticized almost from the start and decomposition approaches have been more popular in other disciplines working on global climate change. More recently, convergence approaches to modeling emissions have become popular. This paper reviews the history of the EKC and alternative approaches. Applying an approach that synthesizes the EKC and convergence approaches, I show that convergence is important for explaining both pollution emissions and concentrations. On the other hand, while economic growth has had a monotonic positive effect on carbon and sulfur emissions, the EKC holds for concentrations of particulates. Negative time effects are important for sulfur emissions. The EKC seems to be most useful for modeling the ambient concentrations of pollutants it was originally applied to. |
| Keywords: | Air pollution, economic growth, environmental Kuznets curve, convergence, climate change, Environmental Economics and Policy, Q53, Q56, |
| Date: | 2015–12 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:ancewp:249519&r=agr |
| By: | Guzal-Dec, Danuta; Zwolińska-Ligaj, Magdalena |
| Abstract: | The aim of the study is to describe the role of the LEADER program in creating entrepreneurship and employment in the Lublin voivodship. In order to achieve this, the following hypothesis was used: local action groups (LAG) operating in rural areas of the Lublin Region contribute to the creation of social activity, but create insufficient jobs and entrepreneurial incentives. The study used document analysis and diagnostic surveys with an interview questionnaire addressed to representatives of the offices of all 22 LAGs from the studied region. The results revealed the small scale of projects aimed at the development of non-agricultural functions in rural areas, and an insufficient involvement in the implementation of projects in the bio-economy sector, which is the key smart specialization of the region. We conclude that the examined LAGs’ overall role in creating jobs should be assessed as average, but that they create an important local platform focused on stimulating social activity. |
| Keywords: | LAGs, LDSs, social activity, multifunctional development, Community/Rural/Urban Development, Political Economy, Public Economics, |
| Date: | 2016 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:eaa160:249763&r=agr |
| By: | Paustian, Margit; Wellner, Marie; Theuvsen, Ludwig |
| Abstract: | Management requirements for crop farming are high and will rise in the future. Arable farms are challenged by volatile markets, growing administrative burdens, increasing operating costs and growing competition for land. Management skills have become much more important for farmers in recent years and this trend will continue in the future. There are numerous instruments like accounting software or crop field cards integrated in daily management practice, but there is a deficiency of a fully integrated management system to give an overview of all areas of the farming business. This gap can be closed by the management tool Balanced Scorecard (BSC) that provides an overview of all production and management activities on a farm. Therefore, with the aim to trans-fer the BSC concept to crop farming, German farmers and agricultural advisors were surveyed to get insights into the success factors and key performance indicators in the four BSC perspectives they consider most rele-vant for the operational success of arable farms. By the use of a cluster analysis, three different farm types were identified according to their visions and strategies. For the three farm types the key performance indica-tors that the respondents considered most relevant for farm performance were figured out. Implementation of the BSC to crop farming can result in a big benefit for management practice. The BSC focuses vision and long-term strategy with the main goal to ensure consistency of the farm and increase farm performance. |
| Keywords: | Balanced Scorecard, performance measurement, cluster analysis, crop farming, Agribusiness, |
| Date: | 2015–05 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:eaa144:206237&r=agr |
| By: | Qi, Danyi; Roe, Brian E. |
| Abstract: | Pressure mounts to address food waste, which deprives hungry people of needed nutrition, depletes resources used to produce food, and accounts for substantial greenhouse gas emissions during production, distribution and disposal. Composting, and other food waste recycling technologies that divert food waste from landfills, mitigate the environmental damages of food waste disposal and grow in popularity. We explore whether consumer knowledge that the environmental damage created by their food waste will be mitigated undermines personal food waste reduction behavior. Subjects in a dining situation are randomly assigned whether or not they receive information about the negative effects of landfilling food waste and whether they are told that uneaten food from the study will be composted or landfilled. We find that providing information about the negative effects of food waste in landfills significantly reduces both the propensity to create any food waste and the total amount of solid food waste created when compared to control subjects. However, if subjects are also informed that food waste from the study will be composted, the propensity to create food waste and the amount of solid food waste generated is similar to control situation which features neither a reduction nor a recycling policy. This suggests a crowding out effect or informational rebound effect in which promoting policies that mitigate the environmental damages of food waste may unintentionally undermine policies meant to encourage individual consumer food waste reduction. We discuss key policy implications as well as several limitations of our experimental setting and analysis. |
| Keywords: | Food waste, composting, rebound effects, supply chain, policy, economic experiments, crowd-out effect, single-action bias, Agricultural and Food Policy, Food Consumption/Nutrition/Food Safety, C90, Q18, Q53, |
| Date: | 2016–11 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:assa17:250114&r=agr |
| By: | Dalton, Graham E. |
| Abstract: | Aberdeenshire is a distinct peripheral part of Scotland. It is an important agricultural region with its own culture and export orientated farming systems. The arrival of the North Sea oil industry in the early 1970’s brought regional prosperity and high employment levels (until recently). Over the last 250 years switches in emphasis between state intervention and reliance on the markets have been important contributors to the contemporary agricultural situation. The CAP, over the same period of time as the oil industry, has influenced the number, roles and conditions of fewer agricultural workers in the county. This history attempts to set the research questions from this seminar into a more complete perspective. |
| Keywords: | historical perspective, structural perspective, production concentration, spare time farmers, Community/Rural/Urban Development, Labor and Human Capital, Political Economy, Production Economics, Public Economics, |
| Date: | 2016 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:eaa160:249762&r=agr |
| By: | Stefano Bosi; David Desmarchelier |
| Abstract: | In this paper, we study a competitive Ramsey model where a pollution externality, coming from production, impairs a renewable resource which affects the consumption demand. A proportional tax, levied on the production level, is introduced to finance public depollution expenditures. In the long run, two steady states may coexist, the one with a low resource level, the other with a high level. Interestingly, a higher green tax rate lowers the resource level of the low steady state, giving rise to a Green Paradox (Sinn, 2008). Moreover, the green tax may be welfareimproving at the high steady state but never at the low one. Therefore, at the latter, it is optimal to reduce the green tax rate as much as possible. Conversely, the optimal tax rate is positive when the economy experiences the high steady state. This rate is unique. In the short run, the two steady states may collide and disappear through a saddle-node bifurcation. Since consumption and natural resources are substitutable goods, a limit cycle may arise around the high stationary state. To the contrary, this kind of cycles never occur around the low steady state whatever the resource effect on consumption demand. Finally, focusing on the class of bifurcations of codimension two, we find a Bogdanov-Takens bifurcation. |
| Keywords: | nature, logistic dynamics, Ramsey model, depollution, saddle-node bifurcation, Hopf bifurcation, Bogdanov-Takens bifurcation. |
| JEL: | E32 O44 |
| Date: | 2016 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ulp:sbbeta:2016-53&r=agr |
| By: | Gallier, Carlo; Langbein, Jörg; Vance, Colin |
| Abstract: | We conduct a framed field experiment in Indonesian fishing communities, with an eye towards evaluating the potential of Territorial Use Rights for Fisheries (TURFs) to preserve coral reef fisheries. Conducted in three culturally distinctive sites, the study assembles groups of five fishers who participate in a common-pool resource game. We implement the game with randomly assigned treatments in all sites to explore whether the extraction decision varies according to three recommended non-binding extraction levels originating from (1) a democratic process, (2) a group leader or (3) an external source that recommends a socially optimal extraction level. In one of the sites - that having the highest levels of ethnic and religious diversity - we find that democratic decision-making as well as information originating from outside the community promotes the cooperative behavior that underpins TURFs, a result that is robust to regressions controlling for individual and community attributes. |
| Keywords: | Framed field experiment,commons dilemmas,coral reefs,self-governance |
| JEL: | C93 H43 L31 Q32 |
| Date: | 2016 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:rwirep:651&r=agr |
| By: | Bonnet, Céline; Bouamra-Mechemache, Zohra; Klein, Gordon; Richards, Timothy |
| Abstract: | Retailers often stock items that are only slightly di¤erentiated from others??di¤er- ent sizes of a popular brand, or di¤erent ?avors in a common product line for instance. We argue that this practice is a form of strategic obfuscation, intended to raise con- sumer search costs, and margins on non-comparable products. We test our hypothesis using examples from several product categories in German and French retail scanner data. We ?nd that, after controlling for other explanations for how margins can vary with package size, we cannot rule out strategic obfuscation as a feature of our retail sales data. |
| Keywords: | differentiation, price discrimination, retail pricing, search model, strategic obfuscation |
| JEL: | D43 L13 M31 |
| Date: | 2016–11 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:tse:wpaper:31198&r=agr |
| By: | Czyżewski, Bazyli; Poczta-Wajda, Agnieszka |
| Abstract: | The average incomes in the agricultural sector are still much lower than the average wages in non-agricultural sectors in the most of the European MS, which is not in line with one of the CAP initial objectives of “ensuring fair standard of living for the agricultural community”. The main aim of this paper is to verify, whether the membership in the EU and utilization of the CAP founds help to reduce relative income gap of farmers. The second aim is to analyse which factors influence this income gap and how. In our study we exploit EAA data from 27 EU MS for the period 1995-2015 and estimate three panel data regression models for all MS, “old” MS and “new” MS. Our results prove that the social goals of the CAP support are not being achieved in the EU-15, however they are achieved under the SAPS in the EU-12. |
| Keywords: | agricultural labour factor, relative income gap, real productivity change, price scissors, Cochrane’s treadmill theorem, Agribusiness, Agricultural Finance, Community/Rural/Urban Development, Consumer/Household Economics, Financial Economics, Labor and Human Capital, Productivity Analysis, |
| Date: | 2016 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:eaa160:249759&r=agr |
| By: | Mohana Mondal (Joint Director, National Institute of Labour Economics Research and Development (NILERD), NITI Aayog, Govt. of India.); Zareena Begum Irfan (Madras School of Economics); Sunder Ramaswamy (Madras School of Economics) |
| Abstract: | Carbon taxes have been frequently advocated as a cost-effective instrument for reducing emissions. However, in the practice of environmental policies, only few countries have implemented taxes based on the carbon content of the energy products. Current circumstances of climate science may permit a reconsideration of direction for existing policy efforts related to global warming issues. This paper presents a plan that provides an achievable path toward a global policy on Green House Gas (GHG) emissions. At the heart of it is a small carbon tax (actually a GHG tax). The proceeds of that tax are to be used strategically to provide stable, long term support of a broad based research and development effort focused on energy sources, energy use, and emission mitigation. Hence, the aim of framing a concept note is to compare the carbon taxation system across nations. The scenario prevailing in different countries is examined and addressed for the Indian structure. Carbon taxes with regard to their competitiveness, distributional and environmental impacts. The evidence shows that carbon taxes may be an interesting policy option and that their main negative impacts may be compensated through the design of the tax and the use of the generated fiscal revenues. |
| Keywords: | Pollution, Pollution Control, Carbon tax, India, Environmental Impact, GHG tax, Air Pollution, Ecotax, Environmental Regulation Classification-JEL: O330, O380, Q520, Q530, Q560, Q580 |
| Date: | 2016–03 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:mad:wpaper:2016-141&r=agr |
| By: | Heinola, Katriina |
| Keywords: | Farm Management, Risk and Uncertainty, |
| Date: | 2016–10–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:eaa156:249985&r=agr |
| By: | Kailash Chandra Pradhan (Madras School of Economics); Shrabani Mukherjee (Joint Director at NILERD, NITI Aayog, Govt. of India); Shrabani Mukherjee (Madras School of Economics) |
| Abstract: | Economic mobility is a significant consequence of income inequality and growth. In this paper, we have used a unique ARIS/ REDS surveys data set for rural India spanning 3 decades to determine the reasons and magnitude of income mobility. The triggers that have been identified include land ownership, affirmative actions and occupation. There exists wide income diversity among education level, family size, land ownership and different caste groups. The income mobility continues to be low. Further, the land reforms and advantages from affirmative actions have not made significant impact on the income mobility over the periods. |
| Keywords: | Income Mobility, Measurement Error, Poverty and Welfare Analysis, Rural IndiaClassification-JEL: D31, I 32, D73, O12 |
| Date: | 2015–06 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:mad:wpaper:2015-109&r=agr |
| By: | Campus, Daniela (University of Florence); Giannelli, Gianna Claudia (University of Florence) |
| Abstract: | Dramatic spikes in food prices, like those observed over the last years, represent a real threat to food security in developing countries with severe consequences for many aspects of human life. Price instability can also affect the intra-household allocation of time, thus changing the labour supply of women, who traditionally play the role of 'shock absorbers'. This paper explores the nature of time poverty by examining how changes in the prices of the two major staples consumed, matooke and cassava, have affected the paid and unpaid labour time allocation in Ugandan households. We exploit the panel nature of the Uganda National Household Survey by adopting a Tobit-hybrid model. Our results show that gender differentials in the intra-household allocation of labour actually occur in correspondence with changes in food prices. We find that, overall, women work significantly more, since the additional hours women work in the labour market are not counterbalanced by a relevant reduction in their other labour activities. For men, we do not find any significant effect of price changes on hours of work. |
| Keywords: | food prices, labour supply, gender, Uganda |
| JEL: | J16 J22 J43 Q11 |
| Date: | 2016–11 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp10376&r=agr |
| By: | Kalchev, Georgi |
| Abstract: | This paper carries out an empirical test of the Environmental Kuznets Curve hypothesis with Bulgarian data on pollution and GDP per capita for the years 1970-2008. The existence of such a curve is confirmed in most cases. |
| Keywords: | Environmental Kuznest Curve,pollution |
| Date: | 2016 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:esconf:148324&r=agr |
| By: | Anna Bartczak (Faculty of Economic Sciences, University of Warsaw; Warsaw Ecological Economics Center); Susan Chilton (Newcastle University Business School); Mikołaj Czajkowski (Faculty of Economic Sciences, University of Warsaw); Jürgen Meyerhoff (Institute for Landscape and Environmental Planning, Technische Universität Berlin) |
| Abstract: | We examine how the direction of price changes affects the value people place on avoiding renewable energy externalities in Poland. Additionally, we investigate the influence of individuals’ financial loss aversion and financial risk preferences on this valuation. In our study we conduct a choice experiment survey in which respondents’ choices indicate the value they place on avoiding wind, solar, and biomass externalities. We combine this survey with a financial lottery choice task that elicits the respondents’ risk preferences and degree of loss aversion. In the choice experiment we use both increases and decreases in electricity bills to depict the uncertain effect of new sources of energy generation on the current price level. This design allows us to investigate if obtained values are independent of the payment mechanism. In the analyzed context, our results indicate that marginal utility of money seems to be lower with a rebate on the energy bill than with a surcharge. Moreover, financial risk preferences affect people’s choices in a case of a surcharge, while loss aversion for money affects them in the case of a rebate. We find that the more loss averse people are with regard to money, the more they require compensation before they accept externalities from renewable electricity production. In contrast, the more risk seeking people are in a financial domain, the less cost sensitive they are and the more willing they are to pay for proposed changes in renewable electricity generation. |
| Keywords: | choice experiment, externalities of renewable energy, loss aversion, lottery experiment, marginal utility of money, risk preferences |
| JEL: | D81 Q20 Q42 Q49 Q51 |
| Date: | 2016 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:war:wpaper:2016-36&r=agr |
| By: | Donnellan, Trevor; Hanrahan, Kevin |
| Abstract: | The economic importance of agriculture and food production in EU Member States is in decline, yet the KBBE promises a better future for the agri-food and related sectors. Taking a high level approach, this exploratory paper uses official data to examine the development of output, gross value added and employment in the agri-food sector over the last decade. At the Member State level, the relationship between the agri-food sector’s primary and processing sectors is examined. Comparing the performance of different Member States shows that substantially different agri-food economic developments are evident over the last decade. Solid explanations for the observed differences in the experiences of the Member States extend beyond the scope of the paper. Consequently, the tentative conclusion is that fundamental differences in the composition of primary agriculture between the Member States of the EU may mean that some Member States stand to benefit to a greater degree from the KBBE than do others. |
| Keywords: | Agriculture, Food Industry, Employment, Value Added, CAP, EU, Agribusiness, Agricultural Finance, International Development, Labor and Human Capital, Public Economics, |
| Date: | 2016 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:eaa160:249764&r=agr |
| By: | Stranieri, S.; Baldi, L. |
| Abstract: | Shelf-life estimation has become increasingly important due to the growing consumer interest in fresh and safe food products and the European policy indications to consider it as a key issue for the sustainable management of food waste within the supply chains. To date, no legislation on the shelf life date of the most of food products exists. Several studies demonstrate that logistic management and the technology available in the fresh-cut sector would allow to extend the shelf life date of products without compromising their intrinsic quality attributes and to achieve a more sustainable production by a strong reduction of unsold stock. The aim of the study was to segment consumers on the basis of their attitude towards the extension of the shelf life date in the fresh-cut salad sector. On the basis of the clusters found, the paper discusses if the information concerning such technology is a useful tool to inform consumers on product characteristics or if it entails a risk of information overload. |
| Keywords: | shelf life date extension, fresh-cut sald, consumer, cluster analysis, Agribusiness, |
| Date: | 2015–05 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:eaa144:206215&r=agr |
| By: | K.S. Kavi Kumar (Madras School of Economics); Lavanya Ravikanth (Madras School of Economics); Lavanya Ravikanth (Madras School of Economics) |
| Abstract: | Fish is an important source of food and livelihood for people. Owing to their proximity to the sea, coastal communities have long depended on this resource to meet their nutritional needs. Does this, however, still hold true today? This paper analyses the fish consumption patterns of rural and urban populations in coastal States and Union Territories (UTs) in India, and how these have changed over time. The analysis is based on unit record data on fish consumption obtained from National Sample Surveys conducted in 1983 and 2009-10. Distributional aspects of fish consumption both within and across coastal States/UTs, and over time are assessed. The results suggest that despite an increase in fish production over time, people living close to the coast in almost all States and UTs report a decline in consumption. Among other things, the paper explores the role of trade in explaining the wedge between production and consumption. |
| Keywords: | Fish consumption; Nutritional intake; Distributional issuesClassification-JEL: D10; D60; R10 |
| Date: | 2015–06 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:mad:wpaper:2015-110&r=agr |
| By: | Janzen, Joseph P.; Adjemian, Michael K. |
| Abstract: | The United States may be losing its leadership role in the world wheat market. Rising trading volume in foreign futures markets and shifting shares of world trade are suggested as evidence of this shift, but neither necessitates that futures markets in the United States are any less important for wheat price discovery. This paper applies market microstructure methods including the Yan and Zivot (2010) information leadership share to estimate the proportion of price discovery occurring in wheat futures markets in Chicago, Minneapolis, and Paris. We find that United States markets still dominate wheat price discovery, although the share of price discovery for the Paris market jumped noticeably in 2010 coinciding with major supply shocks in Russia and Ukraine. |
| Keywords: | wheat, price discovery, futures, market microstructure, information share, Agribusiness, Agricultural Finance, Crop Production/Industries, International Relations/Trade, Q11, G13, |
| Date: | 2016–11 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:assa17:250112&r=agr |
| By: | Zareena B. Irfan (Madras School of Economics); Mohana Mondal (Madras School of Economics) |
| Abstract: | Water footprint is a multidimensional indicator, showing water consumption volumes by source and by type of pollution; all components of a total water footprint are specified geographically and temporally. The issue of water scarcity in India is getting serious day-by-day. Water scarcity is fast becoming urban India's number one woe, with government's own data revealing that residents in 22 out of 32 major cities have to deal with daily shortages. In this paper the authors have calculated the water footprint in Indian dairy industry to assess the water intensity. |
| Keywords: | Water Scarcity, Water Footprint, Dairy Industry, India Classification-JEL: P28, Q29, Q56, Q57 |
| Date: | 2015–09 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:mad:wpaper:2015-123&r=agr |
| By: | Thomson, Kenneth |
| Abstract: | Health and safety have long been recognised officially as issues in EU agricultural occupation, but pose specific problems of definition, measurement and policy action. About 500 people per year die while working in EU agriculture, forestry and fishing, and there are about 150,000 non-fatal accidents at such work, as well as work-related physical and mental health problems. Incidence rates are generally higher than in other sectors. Moreover, on-farm accidents happen to a very wide range of ages, from the very young to the relatively old. There is no clear pattern of incidence rates across EU Member States, for a number of possible reasons. Policy action can take a number of forms, but must take into account changes in farming technology, and the need to reach a wide range of potential casualties. |
| Keywords: | agriculture, occupation, health, safety, accidents, Health Economics and Policy, Labor and Human Capital, |
| Date: | 2016 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:eaa160:249792&r=agr |
| By: | Chenarides, Lauren; Jaenicke, Edward C. |
| Abstract: | While food access is an increasingly studied component of research related to diet and health, consumer behavior and store choice have been relatively overlooked in understanding the dietary health-food access relationship. Especially in areas with high poverty rates, where the proportion of low-access and low-income population persists over time, consumers are faced with shopping at non-traditional stores, which may augment the negative welfare impacts of residing in these areas. Using IRI's Consumer Network Panel, IRI's InfoScan, and Nielsen's TDLinx store characteristics data, this paper develops a structural model of store choice that frames Pinkse, Slade, and Brett's (2002) distance metric (DM) method inside a demand system to model what behaviors drive consumers' store choice decisions, highlighting underserved communities. While the DM method has been used previously to model brand choice, this paper is the first to use it to investigate store choice. Because the store-choice model is based on demand for store attributes (such as relative prices, product assortment measures, store services, and distance between stores), it reveals consumer preferences for store types and provides insight into policy prescriptions that attempt to improve food access. |
| Keywords: | Consumer/Household Economics, Food Consumption/Nutrition/Food Safety, |
| Date: | 2016–11 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:assa17:250118&r=agr |