bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025_split huggingface dataset:
Ownership Structure in Agrifood Chains: The Marketing Cooperative
Authors: Hendrikse George , Bijman Jos 
Published: March 2003

AbstractGlobalization, technological developments, and consumer concerns press farmers and food producers to enhance product innovation and to seek more efficient production and distribution structures. These changes in agrifood markets shift the relative importance of the investments by different chain partners. It may therefore be necessary to change the allocation of ownership of essential assets to induce agents to make those investments that generate the chain optimum. This article analyzes the impact of ownership structure on investments in a three‐tier supply chain from an incomplete contracting perspective. Circumstances are determined in which a marketing cooperative is the unique first‐best ownership structure.
Interactivity and Soft Computing in Portfolio Management: Should Farmers Own Food and Agribusiness Stocks?
Authors: Duval Yann , Featherstone Allen M. 
Published: March 2003

AbstractThis article proposes a fully integrated and interactive elicitation‐optimization procedure for portfolio management. A soft computing approach based on fuzzy logic is developed as an alternative to the traditional mean variance model and compromise programming approach. The models are applied to farmers to examine whether they should buy publicly traded food and agribusiness firms stocks rather than invest in a broader market stock portfolio. Results suggest that investments in publicly traded food and agribusiness stocks allow farmers to capture additional benefits beyond those of simply diversifying in the broader market.
Forest Conservation in Costa Rica when Nonuse Benefits are Uncertain but Rising
Authors: Bulte Erwin , van Soest Daan P. , van Kooten G. Cornelis , Schipper Robert A. 
Published: March 2003

AbstractStochastic dynamic programming is used to investigate optimal holding of primary tropical forest in humid Costa Rica when future nonuse benefits of forest conservation are uncertain and increasing. The quasi‐option value of maintaining primary forests is included as a component of investment in natural capital. Although the impact of uncertainty on conservation incentives is substantial, our results indicate that a rising trend in future benefits and compensation by the international community for beneficial spillovers are more important factors in determining optimal holdings of forest stocks. Without compensatory payments, however, further deforestation may be warranted.
Parametric and Semiparametric Modeling of the Off‐Farm Labor Supply of Agrarian Households in Transition Bulgaria
Authors: Goodwin Barry K. , Holt Matthew T. 
Published: March 2003

AbstractThe reaction of labor marketsto economic reforms is an important indicator of the progress of transition. Because of diminished government support and the breakup of state and collective enterprises, labor market adjustments in the transition economies have been particularly severe in the agricultural sector. Thisarticle evaluatesthe off‐farm labor market for a sample of agrarian households in transition Bulgaria. We give particular attention to the distributional assumptions that underlie standard approaches to the evaluation of labor supply. A variety of specification tests are considered and support for standard maximum likelihood estimates which rely on normality as a maintained hypothesis is mixed. Alternative semiparametric (distribution‐free) estimators are also considered. The empirical results indicate that, five years after the initiation of the transition, off‐farm labor supply patterns for Bulgarian agricultural households are similar to what is commonly observed in developed market economies. Labor supply is positively affected by factors such as education and work experience which are hypothesized to increase off‐farm wages. Social benefit programs providing monetary or in‐kind support payments are shown to significantly decrease off‐farm work.
Female Participation and Labor Market Attachment in Rural Canada
Authors: Phimister Euan , Vera‐Toscano Esperanza , Weersink Alfons 
Published: March 2003

AbstractThis article explores the reasons for differences in female rural‐urban participation rates by estimating a dynamic model of participation allowing for unobserved heterogeneity and state dependence using Canadian panel data. The results suggest that overall observed differences in rural‐urban participation rates are primarily due to differences in observed socioeconomic characteristics. However, for women resident in low‐income households, there is evidence that the operation of rural labor markets effectively lowers their participation rates.
When Do Export Subsidies Have a Redistributional Role?
Authors: Holloway Garth 
Published: March 2003

AbstractIf an export subsidy is efficient, that is, has a surplus‐transfer role, then there exists an implicit function relating the optimal level of the subsidy to the income target in the agricultural sector. If an export subsidy is inefficient no such function exists. We show that dependence exists in large‐export equilibrium, not in small‐export equilibrium and show that these results remain robust to concerns about domestic tax distortions. The failure of previous work to produce this result stems from its neglect of the income constraint on producer surplus in the programming problem transferring surplus from consumers and taxpayers to farmers.
The Economics of Controlling Insect‐Transmitted Plant Diseases
Authors: Brown Cheryl , Lynch Lori , Zilberman David 
Published: March 2003

AbstractA framework is developed to analyze a spatially dependent economically significant pest problem emanating from a source and spreading via a carrier such as an insect. Transmission and/or source control to combat the pest or disease problem are explored. Alternative assumptions about the effectiveness of transmission control and the feasibility and costs, both social and private, of reduction of the pest population at the source are examined in an application of the model to controlling Pierce's disease in California wine grapes.
U.S. Farm Policy and the Volatility of Commodity Prices and Farm Revenues
Authors: Lence Sergio H. , Hayes Dermot J. 
Published: March 2003

AbstractA dynamic three‐commodity rational‐expectations storage model is used to compare the impact of the Federal Agricultural Improvement and Reform (FAIR) Act of 1996 with a free‐market policy, and with pre‐FAIR policies. Results suggest that FAIR did not lead to significant increases in long‐run price volatility or revenue volatility. The main impact of pre‐FAIR, relative to the free‐market regime, was to substitute government storage for private storage in a way that did little to support prices or to stabilize farm incomes. Results also indicate that U.S. grain market volatility in 1995–2000 was due to fundamental market forces and not to FAIR.
Optimal Commodity Promotion when Downstream Markets are Imperfectly Competitive
Authors: Zhang Mingxia , Sexton Richard J. 
Published: March 2003

AbstractWe investigate the optimal collection and expenditure of funds for agricultural commodity promotion in markets where the processing and distribution sectors may exhibit oligopoly and/or oligopsony power. The conditions that characterize optimal advertising intensity under perfect competition for funds generated from either per‐unit or lump‐sum taxes do not, in general, hold when marketing is imperfectly competitive. Simulation analyses show that imperfect competition always reduces farmers' optimal advertising expenditure and that an imperfectly competitive marketing sector may capture half or more of the benefits from the funds that are expended.
On Jumps and ARCH Effects in Natural Resource Prices: An Application to Pacific Northwest Stumpage Prices
Authors: Saphores Jean‐Daniel , Khalaf Lynda , Pelletier Denis 
Published: March 2003

AbstractContinuous‐time models of natural resource prices usually preclude the possibility of large changes (jumps) resulting from unexpected events. To test for the presence of jumps and/or ARCH effects, we combine bounds and the Monte Carlo test technique to obtain finite‐sample, level‐exact p‐values. We apply this methodology to stumpage prices from the Pacific Northwest and find evidence of jumps and ARCH effects. To assess the impact of neglecting jumps on the decision to harvest old‐growth timber, we develop an autonomous, infinite‐horizon stopping model for which we provide a new method of resolution. Our numerical results show the importance of modeling jumps explicitly.
Turnover in U.S. Agricultural Labor Markets
Authors: Tran Lien H. , Perloff Jeffrey M. 
Published: March 2003

AbstractAgricultural workers move in and out of agriculture frequently. Migration between types of jobs takes relatively little time. Legal female workers tend to stay out of the U.S. labor market longer once they stop being employed and their access to jobs outside of agriculture is more limited than that of their male counterparts. Predictions made when the 1986 Immigration Reform and Control Act was passed that granting people amnesty would induce most of them to leave agriculture were incorrect.
Characterizing the Distribution of Macronutrient Intake among U.S. Adults: A Quantile Regression Approach
Authors: Variyam Jayachandran N. , Blaylock James , Smallwood David 
Published: March 2003

AbstractSince the risk of dietary inadequacy or excess is greater at the tails of the nutrient intake distributions than at the mean, marginal effects of explanatory variables estimated at the conditional mean using ordinary least squares may be of limited value in characterizing these distributions. Quantile regression is effective in this situation since it can estimate conditional functions at any part of the distribution. Quantile regression results suggest that age, education, and income have a larger influence at intake levels where the risk of excess is greater compared with intake levels where the risk of excess is lower.
Competition, Externalities, and Input Substituting Technologies
Authors: Hennessy David A. 
Published: March 2003

AbstractThe period 1997–2000 saw a rapid global consolidation of crop seed companies. The emerging companies are applying genetic engineering to exploit complementarities and substitutabilities between seed and other crop inputs. This article develops a model of competing technologies where one substitutes for a conventional input. A monopolist may cross‐subsidize a technology that substitutes for an input in order to price discriminate between user types. In duopoly, a socially excessive or insufficient share of acres may be subject to an input substituting technology. Welfare improving regulations are identified in the case where a technology substitutes for an externality generating input.
Patent Rights and Trade: Analysis of Biological Products, Medicinals and Botanicals, and Pharmaceuticals
Authors: Smith Pamela J. 
Published: March 2003

AbstractThis article analyzes the effects of foreign patent rights on U.S. bilateral exports. The empirical analysis covers three highly disaggregated drug industries over three decades. We estimate bilateral trade equations for each industry using cross‐country data on the strength of national patent rights. The findings show that strong foreign patent rights enhance the market power of U.S. drug exporters across countries with weak imitative abilities. Alternatively, strong foreign patent rights stimulate the market expansion of U.S. drug exports across countries with strong imitative abilities. These effects are larger in magnitude during the 1980–90s relative to the 1970s.
Assessing a Policy Grab Bag: Federal Water Policy Reform
Authors: Weinberg Marca 
Published: March 2003

AbstractThis article examines the economic impacts of policy alternatives for addressing allocative inefficiencies among agricultural, urban, and environmental uses of federal water. The Central Valley Project Improvement Act, composed of multiple incentive‐based and command‐and‐control policies, forms the context for this analysis. Estimated multi‐output agricultural revenue functions and urban water demand functions are incorporated into a nonlinear programming model designed to predict changes in water use, returns to agriculture, and urban consumer surplus. Results suggest that analysis that does not explicitly model policy instruments implemented at sub‐optimal levels and, as part of a package of reforms, could over‐ or underestimate the costs, benefits, and effectiveness of each policy instrument.
Resource Management under Production and Output Price Uncertainty: Implications for Environmental Policy
Authors: Isik Murat 
Published: March 2003

AbstractVarious environmental policies have been proposed to control agricultural runoff of nutrients and pesticides. The impacts of these policies on input use are complicated because of the various sources of uncertainty farmers face and the precise nature of farmers' risk attitude. A risk‐averse farmer's response to changed profit, input, and output taxes under output price and production uncertainty is examined. The impact of these policies on input use depends on the form of production uncertainty, risk‐input relationships, risk attitudes, and degrees of output price and production uncertainty. These results have implications for the design and implementation of environmental and other production‐related policies.
Optimal Storage by Crop Producers
Authors: Fackler Paul L. , Livingston Michael J. 
Published: March 2003

AbstractWhen post‐harvest marketing strategies are restricted by disallowing speculative purchases, sales out of storage becomes an irreversible decision and the dynamic marketing problem becomes analogous to the optimal exercise of a financial option. The optimal marketing strategy is to hold at low prices and to sell at high prices with a cutoff price function marking the boundary between low and high prices. A method for estimating the cut‐off price function is developed and applied to Illinois soybean prices. The decision rule is demonstrated to result in substantial gains from storage.
Local versus Global Separability in Agricultural Household Models: The Factor Price Equalization Effect of Land Transfer Rights
Authors: Carter Michael R. , Yao Yang 
Published: March 2003

AbstractCommonly employed global tests for separability between production and consumption decisions are theoretically inappropriate when the market failures creating non‐separabilities differentially constrain some, but not all households. Simulated maximum likelihood estimates using Chinese panel data reject the restrictions implied by a global separability test in favor of regime‐specific or local separability tests. The estimates also show that a global approach to separability obscures the significant effect that less‐encumbered land transfer rights would have on shadow factor price equalization across households and allocative efficiency. The findings on transfer rights suggest a resolution to the debate in China on further property rights reform.
Developing Countries and the Gains from Regionalism: Links between Trade and Farm Policy Reforms in Mexico
Authors: Burfisher Mary E. , Robinson Sherman , Thierfelder Karen 
Published: March 2003

AbstractWe use a multi‐country computable general equilibrium (CGE) model with agricultural policy details to simulate the effects of North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). We find that Mexico gains from NAFTA only when it also removes domestic distortions in agriculture. In that case, agriculture can generate allocative efficiency gains large enough to offset the terms of trade losses that arise because Mexico has higher initial tariffs than its NAFTA partners. When an RTA forces a developing country to reform its domestic distortions that are linked to trade restrictions, it becomes a building block toward multilateralism.
Language‐Related Differences in a Contingent Valuation Study: English Versus Spanish
Authors: Loomis John B. , Bair Lucas S. , González‐Cabán Armando 
Published: March 2003

AbstractTo test the similarity of English‐ and Spanish‐speaking households responses to a contingent valuation survey, phone interviews were conducted in both languages regarding two forest fire prevention programs. While there were similar response rates, there were significant differences in the most frequent reasons given for refusing to pay. In the pooled logit model, the language intercept and bid interaction variables were insignificant in both programs. The likelihood ratio test of separate logit equations showed no statistical difference between English‐ and Spanish‐speaking households responses to either program. Mean benefits reported by Spanish‐speaking households were about one‐third lower than English‐speaking households, although the difference is not statistically significant.
Bequest Intentions of Forest Landowners: Theory and Empirical Evidence
Authors: Amacher Gregory S. , Koskela Erkki , Ollikainen Markku , Conway M. Christine 
Published: March 2003

AbstractThis article studies in an overlapping generations forest economy the conditions under which money and/or timber bequests occur across generations, assuming the usual case of one‐sided altruism. We assume nonindustrial landowners have preferences for consumption and for amenities from unharvested forest stock. Within this framework, we examine conditions under which landowners choose to leave timber or money bequests, and we show how taxation is important to these conditions. Empirical evidence from bequests decisions for a cross‐section sample of nonindustrial landowners in Virginia is then used to investigate the hypotheses suggested by the model with regard to the motive to leave bequests. The results are broadly consistent with the theoretical findings.
The Importance of Financial Leverage and Risk Aversion in Risk‐Management Strategy Selection
Authors: Gloy Brent A. , Baker Timothy G. 
Published: March 2003

AbstractThe problem of choice among risk‐management strategies is addressed with the stochastic dominance with a risk‐free asset (SDRA) criteria. The SDRA criteria consider all possible combinations of the strategies and financial leverage. This allows for strategies with less business risk, less expected return, and greater leverage to dominate strategies with greater business risk and greater expected return. Results show that the inclusion of the risk‐free asset significantly improves the discriminatory power of the ordinary stochastic dominance criteria for the case of risk‐management strategies.
The Effect of Age on the Probability of Participation in Wildlife‐Related Activities: A Birth Year Cohort Study
Authors: Spence Michelle 
Published: March 2003

AbstractTo aid in the planning and marketing of wildlife recreation, a logit regression model was used to assess the effect of age on the probability of participation in waterfowl hunting and wildlife viewing. The results indicate that the probability of participating in waterfowl hunting decreases with age and birth year, while the probability of participating in wildlife viewing increases up to a point and then decreases as an individual ages and increases with birth year. Clearly, models employing age and birth year must be utilized to plan for future services and also to direct marketing efforts to gain participants.
Strengthening Intellectual Property Rights in Asia: Implications for Australia
Authors: Maskus Keith 
Published: March 2003

Asian developing economies are both the greatest target of pressure for stronger intellectual property rights (IPRs) and the region of most significant change. These countries have enacted numerous improvements in their laws. I discuss how higher standards might affect economic activity in East Asia and Australia and the importance of adopting mechanisms for ensuring that they promote effective competition.Stronger standards in the region could affect the Australian economy in a number of ways. More rapid Asian growth should increase the demand for Australian exports, perhaps by as much as $350 million per year. Further, Australian consumers could gain from imports of higher‐quality Asian products. Australian firms also have an emerging comparative advantage in supplying technologies, designs, and services to Asian partners.However, there may be some costs as well, including higher regional prices of protected products and additional competition for inward foreign direct investment. Thus, Australia would be advised to improve its attractiveness as a location for investors. Australia also has an interest in maintaining effective competition in its own market as IPRs are strengthened regionally. Australia could take a leading role in countering attempts by the United States and Europe to erect excessively protectionist new standards.
Forecast Errors and Efficiency in the US Electricity Futures Market
Authors: Avsar S. Gulay , Goss Barry A. 
Published: March 2003

In March 1996 the US introduced electricity futures contracts which provided for delivery at the California/Oregon border (COB) and Palo Verde switchyard. These were followed in July 1998 by contracts which provided for delivery of electrical energy into the Cinergy and Entergy systems, and in March 1999 by a contract for the Pennsylvania/New Jersey/Maryland (PJM) area. This paper employs the forecast error approach to study the informational efficiency of these markets (the model prediction and event studies approaches are not feasible). COB and Palo Verde spot and futures prices are stationary, while Cinergy spot and futures prices are I(1) and cointegrated (Entergy and PJM data were not utilised due to insufficient observations). All forecast errors, therefore, are stationary. Estimation is by instrumental variables in the presence of a lagged dependent variable and overlapping observations. For the period 1996 (04) to 1999 (12), with COB and Palo Verde data, the efficient markets hypothesis (EMH) is rejected. This outcome is confirmed by cointegration of the COB and Palo Verde futures prices. A significant M‐GARCH term in the forecast error relationship for both contracts supports the view that a time‐varying risk premium was present. A significant negative relationship between forecast errors and volume for the COB contract suggests that agents were still learning the true model driving this market, and that Stein’s ‘Bayesian error’ was non‐zero.For the period 1998 (07) to 1999 (12), with COB, Palo Verde and Cinergy data, the EMH cannot be rejected. Finally, an attempt is made to relate this study to the recent electricity crisis in California.
Taxation Reform: Some Economic Issues
Authors: Freebairn John 
Published: March 2003

The Australian system of Commonwealth and State taxes is in need of comprehensive reform. It fails the criteria of neutrality, horizontal equity and simplicity, it is not as progressive as often thought, and the future revenue base is declining. Many of the problems stem from the absence of comprehensive tax bases as applied to income, expenditure and assets, and related choice options are subjected to very different effective tax burdens. Important choice options facing different effective tax rates include: work and leisure; consumption and saving; different saving and investment options; form of labour remuneration; different ways of production; the mix of goods and services produced and consumed; and, domestic or overseas location.A comprehensive income tax base is required, especially as applied to the taxation of capital income. The options of a nominal income, real income or expenditure base are explored.It is argued that reform of indirect taxes proceed along two lines. The general revenue raising purpose leads to a comprehensive base of final consumption expenditure at a single rate. Then, additional specific taxes for user pays purposes, for example for roads, and for externalities, for example tobacco, set at the supply cost or net externality would be applied.There are conflicting arguments for and against changing the tax mix away from income to expenditure.