Agricultural and Resource Economics Commons^™

2011 Corn Pest Risk Survey Results, Scott Fausti, Jonathan Lundgren, Emmanuel Opoku

Economics Commentator

No abstract provided.

Behavioral Economics: A New Heavyweight In Washington?, Sean B. Cash, Christiane Schroeter

Christiane Schroeter

No abstract provided.

A Closer Look At The Relationship Between Superstitious Behaviors And Trait Anxiety, Brandy Futrell

Brandy Futrell

This study examines the relationship between superstitious behaviors and trait anxiety. Researchers randomly selected participants from college campuses for a 28-question survey measuring superstitiousness and the 20-question State-Trait-Anxiety-Inventory (STAI) to measure symptoms of anxiety. Results show a positive correlation between superstitious behaviors and an increase in anxiety symptoms. Significant gender differences were found; women scored higher on superstitiousness survey and the STAI-X2 test. Superstitious behaviors were a significant indicator for developing trait anxiety.

Looking At China’S Great Leap Forward From A Systems Perspective, Brandy Futrell

Brandy Futrell

China’s Great Leap Forward (GLF) campaign of 1958-1961 led by Mao Tse-Tung resulted in a horrendous famine that cost millions of lives. This paper examines the campaign from a systems perspective across the individual, group/societal, and regulatory levels. Looking at each level illustrates errors that explain how the GLF failed.

Toward Sustainability In Business, Industry And Community: Empathy Tempered Choices, Prabhakar Shrestha, Gary D. Lynne Prof

Prabhakar Shrestha

In today’s world of 24-hour news service on the internet, youtube, facebook, twitter, electronic newspapers, etc., there are many sources of information constantly seeking our attention, triggering our response and affecting our psyche. Where are such habits of tuning into internet services, mobile services, etc., leading us? Jeremy Rifkin in his new book, The Empathic Civilization talks about the dawn of a new Third Industrial Civilization. The main feature is the sharing of information among millions of people, which is shaping the spatial and temporal orientation of human civilization. This also leads to greater differentiation of skills, greater connectivity, extension …

Potential Economic Impact Of Drought On Rafting Activity, Prabhakar Shrestha, Karina Schoengold

Prabhakar Shrestha

As part of a research project with the National Drought Mitigation Center, we have been studying the impact of drought on the Colorado rafting industry. During our research we conducted personal interviews with seven outfitters operating in the Upper Arkansas River and Colorado Department of Natural Resources officials, represented by the Arkansas Headwaters Recreational Area (AHRA). The customer distribution for this river for the last twenty-year period is shown in Figure 1 (on next page). Compared to previous seasons, the 2002 season had a dramatic decrease in the total number of customers. This season was impacted due to several factors, …

Fairmount Greenway - A Community Initative, Leah H. Bamberger, Liliana Carvajal, Mary F. Dehais, Yuanfang Gong, John E. Hulsey, Eric C. Kells, Kimberley Klosterman, Pamela Jo Landi, Adam G. Monroy, Seth A. Morrow, Bryan O'Bara, Jie Su, Arianna Thompson, Owen M. White

Mary Dehais

This studio was based on the Fairmount Greenway that was developed through a series of public meetings with the neighborhood community and with consultants from the firm Crosby, Schlessinger and Smallridge (CSS). The Fairmount Greenway, while drawing its identity from the traditional greenway model is in fact a reinterpretation of an urban greenway. The greenway path follows along both primary and secondary city streets because of the lack of space along the rail right-of-way. The Fairmount Greenway begins at what will be a new station stop at New Market South Bay near Upham’s Corner in northern Dorchester. The greenway follows …

Monetary Factors And The U.S. Retail Food Price Level, Andrew L. Pulford

Master's Theses

The following study assesses whether an economic relationship exists between the money supply (i.e. M2), interest rates, and the exchange rate and the retail food price level in the United States. Data for the M2 classification of the United States money supply, the Effective Federals Funds (interest) Rate, and the United States Trade Weighted Exchange Index: Major Currencies for the period from January 1974 through December 2007 are evaluated as they relate to the United States Consumer Price Index for all Urban Consumers: Food for the same period. The statistical analysis involves an examination of the autocorrelation and partial …

Climate Change In Cyprus: Impacts And Adaptation Measures, Theodoros Zachariadis

Theodoros Zachariadis

No abstract provided.

Climate Change In Cyprus – Impacts And Adaptation Policies, Elpida Shoukri, Theodoros Zachariadis

Theodoros Zachariadis

This report provides a literature review of climate change facts and projections globally, for Europe, Mediterranean and Cyprus until the end of the 21st century. It focuses on climate change effects in Cyprus by sector and presents specific recommendations on the implementation of a proper adaptation strategy. The report is based on a review of the most important recent studies on climate change, including reports from international organizations as well as European and Mediterranean authorities and research institutions. The report has also benefited from information gathered through personal communication of the authors with public authorities, non-governmental organizations and researchers.

Don’T Forget The Supply Side Of Agricultural Land Markets, Bruce Johnson

Cornhusker Economics

In today's bullish agricultural land markets across the nation's heartland, it is easy to attribute the climb in values to strong demand on the part of buyers wanting to invest in land to capture good returns of recent years. While true, that may be only half the story underlying the land market dynamics. Just as "it takes two to tango," it takes the supply side of the market as well as demand to create the land market dance.

We have been following the market for many years, observing the amount of land being offered for sale in …

Nebraska Farmland Values Soar, Bruce Johnson

Cornhusker Economics

The 2012 UNL Nebraska Farm Real Estate Survey confirms what most people close to agriculture already knew – agricultural land values across the state have shot upward in recent months. Preliminary survey results show the state’s all-land average value as of February 1, 2012 to be at $2,410 per acre, 31 percent above the year-earlier level (Figure 1 and Table 1, on following pages). The annual gain, in both dollar amount and percentage, is the largest ever recorded in the 34-year history of the UNL land market survey series.

Cropland, particularly, showed pronounced value gains in every region of the …

The Economics Of Bunk Feeding Distillers Grains To Feeder Steers On Pasture, Matthew C. Stockton, Leslie Aaron Stalker

Cornhusker Economics

Growth of the ethanol industry in Nebraska and surrounding states has increased the availability of distillers co-products as feed for livestock. The increased availability of distillers grains with solubles (DGS) together with its high protein, energy and phosphorous content, make it a natural fit as a supplement in many grazing situations (2008 Nebraska Beef Report, pg. 25-27, 2009 Nebraska Beef Report, pg. 37-39). DGS generally comes in the form of a wet (WDGS) or dry (DDGS) product. How to feed this relatively new product to cattle in a pasture is an important economic question. Several recent studies …

The Increasing Use Of Unallocated Retained Earnings By Farmer Cooperatives, Jeffrey S. Royer

Cornhusker Economics

In the past, the primary source of equity capital in U.S. farmer cooperatives has been retained patronage refunds. Typically, a cooperative would allocate its net earnings to individual members on the basis of patronage and retain a share of those allocations to provide equity until eventually redeeming it in cash. Over time, however, unallocated retained earnings have become an increasingly important source of equity. In fact, in 2008, cooperatives kept a greater proportion of their net earnings as unallocated retained earnings than as retained patronage refunds, according to the most recent U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) financial profile of farmer …

The Political Economy Of Contract Farming In China’S Agrarian Transition, Qian Forrest Zhang

Qian Forrest ZHANG

How does rural China’s political economy determine the motivations and constraints that drive small farmers and agribusiness companies into contract farming and shape its practice and impact? This paper identifies three distinctive features of contract farming in China—varied impact on rural inequality, unstable contractual relations, and lack of competitiveness with other alternatives—and proposes tentative explanations with three features in rural China’s political economy: strong collective institutions, active state support for agriculture, and strong domestic markets. The recent turn in China’s agrarian transition toward vertical integration of agriculture with industries is, however, undermining these conditions and may move China toward more …

Development Of Land Rental Markets In Rural Zhejiang: Growth Of Off-Farm Jobs And Institution Building, Qian Forrest Zhang, Qingguo Ma, Xu Xu

Qian Forrest ZHANG

We employ survey data collected in 2001 in Zhejiang province to investigate patterns and determinants of land market development. Previous studies have noted the correlation between growth of off-farm jobs and rental-market development at the aggregate level, but failed empirically to demonstrate mechanisms at the disaggregate level. Our analyses find concrete evidence at the household level connecting developments in labour and land markets. Growth in off-farm jobs allow rural households to transfer labour out of farming and prompt them to relinquish land rights, generating a supply of land that drives rental activities. We also go beyond interactions between factor markets …

From Peasants To Farmers: Peasant Differentiation, Labor Regimes And Land-Rights Institutions In China’S Agrarian Transition, Qian Forrest Zhang, John Andrew Donaldson

Qian Forrest ZHANG

The development of factor markets has opened Chinese agriculture for the penetration of capitalism. This new round of rural transformation—China’s agrarian transition— raises the agrarian question in the Chinese context. This study investigates how capitalist forms and relations of production transform agricultural production and the peasantry class in rural China. The authors identify six forms of nonpeasant agricultural production, compare the labor regimes and direct producers’ socioeconomic statuses across these forms, and evaluate the role of China’s land-rights institution in shaping these forms. The empirical investigation presents three main findings: (1) Peasant differentiation : capitalist forms of agricultural production differentiate …

The Transformation Of Urban Vegetable Retail In China: Wet Markets, Supermarkets, And Informal Markets In Shanghai, Qian Forrest Zhang, Zi Pan

Qian Forrest ZHANG

The state-monopolised system of vegetable retail in socialist urban China has transformed into a market-based system run by profit-driven actors. Publicly owned wet markets not only declined in number after the state relegated its construction to market forces, but were also thoroughly privatised, becoming venues of capital accumulation for the market operators now controlling these properties. Self-employed migrant families replaced salaried state employees in the labour force. Governments’ increased control over urban public space reduced the room for informal markets, exacerbating the scarcity of vegetable retail space. Fragmentation in the production and wholesale systems restricted modern supermarkets’ ability to establish …

Consumer Attitudes And Labeling Regimes As Determinants Of The Market Success Of Food Nanotechnology, Amalia Yiannaka

Cornhusker Economics

In a recent poll conducted by the Institute of Food Technologists, when consumers were asked about their knowledge of nanotechnology and its applications to the food sector, two-thirds said they had heard ‘nothing at all’ about the technology (Food Safety News 2010). European polls tell a similar story; a 2010 Eurobarometer survey showed that, while public awareness of nanotechnology is gradually emerging, more than half of the respondents knew nothing about the technology, and could not tell whether it would have a positive or a negative impact on their lives (European Commission 2010).

According to the National Nanotechnology Initiative, nanotechnology …

Nebraska Leads The Way To Help Beginning Farmers And Ranchers, Dave Goeller

Cornhusker Economics

Nebraska continues to lead the nation with efforts to provide an incentive for owners of agricultural assets to rent those agricultural assets to beginning farmers and ranchers. The Nebraska Beginning Farmers Tax Credit program provides owners of Nebraska agricultural assets such as land, livestock, machinery, grain storage, livestock facilities or irrigation equipment a state income tax credit incentive to rent to a beginning farmer/rancher, rather than someone that is more established. Owners of Nebraska agricultural assets can earn a ten percent state income tax credit for providing a beginner a three-year cash lease, or a fifteen percent state income tax …