Agricultural Economics Commons^™

What Motivates The Choice To Custom Hire Pest Management Spraying Services?, Braeden Van Deye, Trey Malone

Department of Agricultural Economics Faculty Publications

BACKGROUND

This article presents a model of how farmers choose to custom hire for pest control. The decision-making process is illustrated through a discrete choice experiment conducted via a pilot survey of soybean growers in Michigan, Illinois, and Indiana. Farmers responded to a hypothetical pest infestation by choosing between custom operators, spraying on their own, or leaving the field to its fate.

RESULTS

Among farmers who choose to spray, the mean willingness to pay for marginal increases in timeliness (as defined as the chance of late spraying) ranges from 37 to 52 cents per acre. We also find that farmers …

Editorial: Sustainable Aquaculture Production For Improved Food Security, Kwasi Adu Obirikorang, Kwamena Quagrainie, Jemimah Etornam Kassah, Mathis Von Ahnen

Department of Agricultural Economics Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Strategies For Land-Grant Universities To Foster Public Trust, John D. Anderson, Trey Malone, Jay Akridge

Department of Agricultural Economics Faculty Publications

This review article explores the role of land-grant Extension amidst an escalating epistemic crisis, where misinformation and the contestation of knowledge severely impact public trust and policymaking. We delve into the historical mission of land-grant institutions to democratize education and extend knowledge through Cooperative Extension Services, highlighting their unique position to address contemporary challenges of information disorder and declining public confidence in higher education. Land-grant universities can reaffirm their relevance and leadership in disseminating reliable information by reasserting their foundational principles of unbiased, objective scholarship and deep engagement with diverse stakeholders. This reaffirmation comes at a critical time when societal …

A Call For Better Understanding Household Complexity In Environmental Social Science, Rebecca Nixon, Brooke Mcwherter, Anna Erwin, Jonathan Bauchet, Zhao Ma

Department of Agricultural Economics Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Documenting Food Insecure U.S. Children In The Wake Of The Pandemic, Courtney Bir, John Lai, Nicole Olynk Widmar

Department of Agricultural Economics Faculty Publications

Many households experienced significant negative economic impacts from job or work opportunity loss during the COVID-19 pandemic, including loss of income, loss of employer-provided health insurance, possible housing insecurity, and increases in food insecurity. Results from a sample of 929 U.S. households show that 53% of households with children reported some indications of food insecurity in 2020. The food security score divergences between households with and without children are stark, with food insecurity being worse among households with children. Food insecurity for households with children was exacerbated by pandemic-era disruptions; the societal costs of these food insecurity challenges are only …

Software Solutions In Agri-Food Supply Chains: A Current View For Sustainability Reporting, Ryan Loy, Logan L. Britton, Trey Malone

Department of Agricultural Economics Faculty Publications

Environmental impact reporting has become a lynchpin for global agri-food supply chain decision-making. This importance has become heightened as governing bodies such as the European Union pass traceability legislation in an effort to reduce Scope 3 emissions. Despite this heightened importance, few studies have explored the role of supply chain management software in achieving sustainability goals within the agribusiness sector. This article provides a current perspective on ongoing supply chain and logistics software issues that might restrict the effectiveness of sustainability reporting. We argue that agribusinesses may struggle to achieve sustainability targets effectively without proficiency in supply chain software. This …

Economic Contribution Of U.S. Aquaculture Farms, Ganesh Kumar, Shraddha Hegde, Jonathan Van Senten, Carole Engle, Noah Boldt, Matthew Parker, Kwamena Quagrainie, Benedict Posadas, Frank Asche, Madan Dey, Suja Aarattuthodi, Luke A. Roy, Russell Grice, Quentin Fong, Michael Schwarz

Department of Agricultural Economics Faculty Publications

Economics is the study of the allocation of scarce resources to meet human wants and needs and has a critical role to play in addressing challenges related to environmental sustainability, community resilience, and food security. In the context of aquaculture, the key to such a discussion is understanding the linkages of aquaculture farming businesses with other economic sectors and how policy decisions that affect aquaculture result in economic ripples throughout local, regional, and national economies. The only previous national estimates of the economic contributions of U.S. aquaculture are nearly 30 years old. The current study was based on comprehensive data …

A Regional Analysis Of Climate Change Effects On Global Snow Crab Fishery, Jingjing Tao, Kwamena Quagrainie, Kenneth A. Foster, Nicole Olynk Widmar

Department of Agricultural Economics Faculty Publications

The snow crab fishery faces increasing vulnerability to environmental factors, yet the literature on the relationship between climate change and snow crab harvest remains limited. This study estimates snow crab harvest functions using climate change indicators with unbalanced panel data of snow crab production from the eastern Bering Sea (Alaska), the southern Gulf of St. Lawrence (Canada), the Sea of Japan, and the Barents Sea (Norway-Russia). The relationship between snow crab biomass, stock, and catch is analyzed and the endogeneity of stock in the harvest function is also addressed using climate change indicators as instrumental variables (IVs). The results show …

Online Media Sentiment Analysis For Us Oysters, Taylor L. Bradford, Kwamena Quagrainie

Department of Agricultural Economics Faculty Publications

Sentiment analysis, a form of data analytics, utilises information from online discussions, reviews, and social media posts to assess consumer sentiments. This study utilised data collected from social media using online listening procedures to assess online sentiments on oysters from January 2019 through December 2022. The analysis utilises machine learning algorithms to extract consumer sentiments, opinions, and demands from online chatter from different online domains. The online sentiments are determined as positive, negative, or neutral based on their word choice, tone, and context. The information provided gives insights into perception, which is valuable information for oyster producers, seafood industry stakeholders, …

Biological Lags And Market Dynamics In Vertically Coordinated Food Supply Chains: Hpai Impacts On U.S. Egg Prices, James L. Mitchell, Jada M. Thompson, Trey Malone

Department of Agricultural Economics Faculty Publications

It is well known that livestock production involves long biological lags. Failure to account for these biological lags can result in the misspecification of supply chain relationships and adjustments to market shocks, which can have significant implications for policy decisions. An example is the 2022 Highly Pathogenic Avian Influenza (HPAI) event that caused high mortality rates in domestic poultry supply chains and reduced egg production. We use the 2022–2023 HPAI event to highlight the implications of misspecification of disease dynamics in agri-food systems. Specifically, we examine the impact of HPAI on U.S. egg prices in 2022–2023. To do this, we …

Net-Zero Transition In Ukraine: Implications For Sustainable Development Goal 7, Maksym Chepeliev, Oleksandr Diachuk, Roman Podolets, Andrii Semeniuk, Galyna Trypolska

Department of Agricultural Economics Faculty Publications

In this study, we use a TIMES-Ukraine energy system-wide model to explore net-zero transition in Ukraine. The assessment considers the potential implications of the ongoing war in the country and analyzes how the achievement of ambitious mitigation goals could impact the indicators related to the Sustainable Development Goal on energy, SDG7 (Ensure access to affordable, reliable, sustainable and modern energy). Results suggest that the net-zero transition would help improve several SDG7 indicators, including increased share of renewables in total final energy consumption, and increased energy affordability in the long run. However, in the medium run, increasing energy prices and rising …

Implications Of The Net Zero Transition Scenarios On Sdg Indicators: Linking Global Energy System, Cge And Atmospheric Source-Receptor Models, Maksym Chepeliev, George Giannakidis, Amit Kanudia, Dominique Van Der Mensbrugghe

Department of Agricultural Economics Faculty Publications

This study contributes to a better understanding of synergies and trade-offs between climate mitigation and sustainable development goals, covering 17 indicators across various SDGs. Our assessment employs a multi-model framework, which includes a global computable general equilibrium model (ENVISAGE), an energy system model (KINESYS) and an atmospheric source-receptor model (TM5-FASST). This combination of modeling tools allows us to provide a detailed representation of the energy-related SDG indicators while accounting for their interactions with climate mitigation and socio-economic dimensions. We find that out of 17 analyzed SDG indicators, seven experience co-benefits from implementing mitigation efforts (including improved environmental footprints, energy efficiency …

Effects Of Alternative Hermetic Bag Storage On Fermented And Dried Cocoa Bean (Theobroma Cacao L.), Kenneth Foster, Lina M. Suarez-Guzman, Diana C. Meza-Sepulveda, Dieudonne Baributsa, Carlos A. Zurita

Department of Agricultural Economics Faculty Publications

Cocoa beans, derived from the Cacao Tree (Theobroma cacao L.), are a cash crop among smallholder farmers in tropical regions. After harvest and processing, maintaining cocoa bean quality is critical to access lucrative markets. This paper examines the impact of hermetic storage on insect damage, mold, moisture content, and water activity of fermented and dried cocoa beans under farm conditions in collaboration with a farmer association of Belén de Umbría in Colombia. Three types of hermetic storage systems were assessed for a period of 12 months: Purdue Improved Crop Storage (PICS) bags, including both 2- and 3-layer variants, and Ecotact® …

Quantifying Demand And Willingness To Pay For Local Food Production, Mario Ortez, Taylor Thompson, Valerie Kilders, Nicole Olynk Widmar

Department of Agricultural Economics Faculty Publications

The location of production and processing has had an increasingly prominent role in discussions regarding food systems today. Acknowledging the increasing importance, we study consumer preferences for and perception of local products with a particular focus on how willingness to pay (WTP) for local origin indication differs across products, types of designations, and rurality of the individual's geographic location. Using data collected through an online survey, we focused on Indiana residents’ preferences for sweet corn and Barbecue (BBQ) sauce with the sample representing both rural and urban consumers across all twelve economic growth regions in the state. Results reveal significant …

Willingness-To-Pay For Rationed Goods: Bobcat Harvest Permits In Indiana, Nicholas A. Lancaster, Carson Reeling, John G. Lee, Richard T. Melstrom, Joe N. Caudell, Geriann Albers

Department of Agricultural Economics Faculty Publications

We use contingent valuation to estimate hunter and trapper willingness to pay (WTP) for a hypothetical bobcat harvest permit being considered in Indiana. Harvest permits would be rationed, with limits on aggregate and individual harvests. A model of permit demand shows that WTP may be subject to “congestion effects” which attenuate welfare gains from relaxing harvest limits. Intuitively, relaxing limits may directly change an individual’s expected harvest and, hence, WTP. Participation may subsequently change, with congestion offsetting welfare increases. These effects may lead to apparent scope insensitivity that may be endemic in the context of rationed goods.

Reducing Global Food Loss And Waste Could Improve Air Quality And Lower The Risk Of Premature Mortality, Alessandro Gatto, Maksym Chepeliev

Department of Agricultural Economics Faculty Publications

While the global food system substantially contributes to environmental degradation and climate change, significant amounts of lost or wasted foods along the food supply chain actively contribute to global air pollution and related health risks. In this study, we use an environmentally-extended input–output model to quantify air pollution embedded in global food loss and waste (FLW) and investigate how FLW reduction policies can mitigate air pollution linked to food consumption, decreasing associated premature mortality risks across global regions. While estimating a positive impact of FLW reduction policies on decreasing air pollution levels (from −1.5% of SO2 emissions to −10.2% of …

Changes In Adult Well-Being And Economic Inequalities: An Exploratory Observational Longitudinal Study (2002–2010) Of Micro-Level Trends Among Tsimane’, A Small-Scale Rural Society Of Indigenous People In The Bolivian Amazon, Ricardo Godoy, Jonathan Bauchet, Jere R. Behrman, Tomás Huanca, William R. Leonard, Victoria Reyes-García, Asher Rosinger, Susan Tanner, Eduardo A. Undurraga, Ariela Zycherman

Department of Agricultural Economics Faculty Publications

Knowing what happens over time to the lifeways of people in contemporary small-scale non-industrial societies of the rural Global South matters because it helps assess changes in the quality of life of underrepresented groups. It has been hard to answer the question because longitudinal information is rarely collected in such settings. A longitudinal dataset of nine years (2002–2010) from a horticultural-foraging society of Indigenous People in the Bolivian Amazon (Tsimane’) is used for an exploratory analysis of micro-level trends in indicators of well-being and economic inequalities. We selected 13 Tsimane’ villages (from ∼ 100) that varied in proximity to town …

Us Climate Policy Yields Water Quality Cobenefits In The Mississippi Basin And Gulf Of Mexico, Shan Zuidema, Jing Liu, Maksym Chepeliev, David R. Johnson, Uris Baldos, Steve Frolking, Christopher J. Kucharik, Wilfred M. Wollheim, Thomas Hertel

Department of Agricultural Economics Faculty Publications

We utilize a coupled economy–agroecology–hydrology modeling framework to capture the cascading impacts of climate change mitigation policy on agriculture and the resulting water quality cobenefits. We analyze a policy that assigns a range of United States government’s social cost of carbon estimates ($51, $76, and $152/ton of CO2-equivalents) to fossil fuel–based CO2 emissions. This policy raises energy costs and, importantly for agriculture, boosts the price of nitrogen fertilizer production. At the highest carbon price, US carbon emissions are reduced by about 50%, and nitrogen fertilizer prices rise by about 90%, leading to an approximate 15% reduction in fertilizer applications for …

Comparison Of Conservation Instruments Under Long-Run Yield Uncertainty And Farmer Risk Aversion, Meilin Ma, Carson Reeling, Megan N. Hughes, Shalamar Armstrong, Richard Roth

Department of Agricultural Economics Faculty Publications

Consumers and policymakers are increasingly concerned with environmental sustainability in food production. Yet rates of adoption of many conservation practices vary and are generally low. Existing instruments for practice adoption increase farmers’ expected net benefits from sustainable practices but do not manage associated risks which may be critical to risk-averse farmers. We build a model to characterize practice adoption by risk-averse farmers given practice-driven, long-run yield dynamics under various instruments, including price premiums, lump-sum subsidies and green insurance. We find rich scale and compositional effects that differ across instruments and that green insurance is significantly more cost-effective under plausible conditions.

Employing A Transitivity Violation Detection Algorithm To Assess Best–Worst Scaling Designs, Courtney Bir, Nicole Olynk Widmar, Natalya Slipchenko, Addison Polcyn, Christopher A. Wolf

Department of Agricultural Economics Faculty Publications

When choosing a partial factorial design for best–worst scaling (BWS) or other discrete choice experiment, researchers are faced with design size choices. This work investigates differences between two case 1 (object) BWS choice experiment designs that varied in choice set size and number of questions. Using a random-parameter logit model, preference shares were determined and statistically compared between models. The number of transitivity violations occurring between the experimental designs was analyzed employing a newly developed directed graph algorithm. The relative importance consumers placed on dairy milk attributes differed between the designs studied. The design presenting fewer attributes per choice set …

The Geography Of Payment Activity On Paypal, Russell Hillberry, Kornel Mahlstein, Simon Schropp

Department of Agricultural Economics Faculty Publications

We use data from PayPal to study the geography of online payment activity. An empirical gravity model finds a distance elasticity of −0.58 for payment value, a result that is 40% lower than typically observed in conventional trade data. The firm-extensive margin is approximately half as sensitive to distance. The link between the scale of merchants' exports and transaction distance is considerably weaker than observed in conventional international trade data. Zipf's Law holds for PayPal merchants in some countries, but fails in smaller PayPal markets. Merchants' account ages only marginally affect the scale and average distance of their export sales.

Estimating A Model Of Forward-Looking Behavior With Discrete Choice Experiments: The Case Of Lifetime Hunting License Demand, Yusun Kim, Carson Reeling, Nicole Olynk Widmar, John G. Lee

Department of Agricultural Economics Faculty Publications

Sales of deer licenses, one of the most important revenue sources for wildlife management at the Indiana Department of Natural Resources (IDNR), have been declining for a decade. To increase its revenue, the IDNR is considering introducing a new lifetime deer license for sale. This license would allow hunters to harvest deer (and possibly other species) each year for the rest of their lives in exchange for a relatively large up-front fee. The forward-looking nature of the decision to buy a lifetime license means hunters' choice behavior is necessarily dynamic. Prior work estimates preferences for long-lived, durable goods using standard …

Global-To-Local-To-Global Interactions And Climate Change, Uris Baldos, Maksym Chepeliev, Brian Cultice, Matthew Huber, Sisi Meng, Alex C. Ruane, Shellye Suttles, Dominique Van Der Mensbrugghe

Department of Agricultural Economics Faculty Publications

Climate change by its very nature epitomizes the necessity and usefulness of the global-to-local-to-global (GLG) paradigm. It is a global problem with the potential to affect local communities and ecosystems. Accumulation of local impacts and responses to climate change feeds back to regional and global systems creating feedback loops. Understanding these complex impacts and interactions is key to developing more resilient adaptation measures and designing more efficient mitigation policies. To this date, however, GLG interactions have not yet been an integrative part of the decision-support toolkit. The typical approach either traces the impacts of global action on the local level …

The War In Ukraine, Food Security And The Role For Europe, Maksym Chepeliev, Maryla Maliszewska, Maria Filipa Seara E Pereira

Department of Agricultural Economics Faculty Publications

Food-security implications of the war in Ukraine are exacerbated by adverse weather events, spillover effects from the distortion of energy and fertiliser markets, and domestic policies that countries around the world have implemented in pursuit of food security. Estimates suggest that the cumulative effect of these channels in terms of restricting agricultural and food trade is in the order of over 10 times larger, and their cumulative effect on global food supply is on average three times more substantial than the direct agricultural supply disruptions in Ukraine. The latter, however, disproportionally impacts low-income countries that are particularly vulnerable to food …

Data On Data: An Analysis Of Data Usage And Analytics In The Agricultural Supply Chain, Lourival Carmo Monaco Neto, Brady Brewer, Allan Gray

Department of Agricultural Economics Faculty Publications

The amount of data being collected throughout the agricultural supply chain has increased in both volume and velocity. All signs indicate that this will only increase as data collection technologies become more cost effective and prevalent throughout the supply chain. Previous work in this area has focused on data collection at the farm level. Our study focuses on data that originates at five different stages of the agricultural supply chain off the farm and how these stages view their firm's data collection and analysis efforts. We find that there is heterogeneity in the data collection efforts and analysis across the …

Incentive Mechanisms To Exploit Intraseasonal Price Arbitrage Opportunities For Smallholder Farmers: Experimental Evidence From Malawi, Tabitha Nindi, Jacob Ricker-Gilbert, Jonathan Bauchet

Department of Agricultural Economics Faculty Publications

Seasonal commodity price fluctuations can potentially offer farmers arbitrage opportunities to increase their income. However, smallholder farmers in most of sub-Saharan Africa often do not exploit these opportunities to the fullest extent possible. To inform this issue, we conducted a randomized controlled trial among 1739 smallholder farmers in Malawi to estimate the impact of two key post-harvest constraints, lack of appropriate storage technology and commitment issues, on farmers' legume storage and sales decisions. The treated groups received (i) an improved storage technology in the form of two hermetic (airtight) bags, (ii) the same improved storage technology under the condition that …

Are U.S. Consumers Willing To Pay More By The Lake? An Analysis Of Preferences For Great Lakes Region Fish, April Athnos, Simone Valle De Souza, Kwamena Quagrainie, Chinonso Etumnu, William Knudson, Ronald E. Kinnunen, Paul Hitchens

Department of Agricultural Economics Faculty Publications

U.S. per capita seafood consumption is historically high due to population and income growth and consumer preference shifts toward healthy protein options. Despite this expansion, U.S. fisheries, especially those in the Great Lakes region, no longer fulfill domestic demand due to pressure on fish stocks and regulatory constraints. Instead, aquaculture and imports fill the gap. Rainbow trout, yellow perch, and walleye—three species historically produced in the North Central Region (NCR)—exemplify such trends. To expand marketing opportunities for NCR aquaculture producers, this study estimates willingness to pay (WTP) for these species and several search and credence fish attributes. We designed and …

Cutting Russia's Fossil Fuel Exports: Short-Term Economic Pain For Long-Term Environmental Gain, Maksym Chepeliev, Thomas Hertel, Dominique Van Der Mensbrugghe

Department of Agricultural Economics Faculty Publications

In response to the invasion of Ukraine, most OECD countries have announced punishing sanctions against Russia. In addition to targeting financial markets and service sectors, some countries have begun to impose restrictions on exports of Russia's fossil fuels. We analyse a scenario whereby most OECD countries put major restrictions on Russia's energy exports. The short-term implications are likely to be non-trivial for the EU – Russia's largest energy export destination. Households' real income could drop by 0.7 to 1.7 percent (relative to the reference case) with energy prices growing by as much as 11 percent. But in the longer run, …

The Researcher–Practitioner Symbiosis: Evolving Mutualisms From Parachutes, María Teresa Vargas, Máximo Garcia, Tito Vidaurre, Alex Carrasco, Natalia Araujo, Camille Medema, Nigel Asquith, Edwin Pynegar, Conrado Tobon, Yurani Manco, Zhao Ma, Jonathan Bauchet, Tara Grillos, Brooke Mcwherter

Department of Agricultural Economics Faculty Publications

Researchers and practitioners often exist symbiotically, but this relationship does not always benefit both parties. We here discuss a mutualistic research symbiosis that our organizations have developed over the last decade, the challenges which we have experienced as part of this process, and how our experiences may help others intending to develop such mutualisms. The defining characteristic of our model is that conservation implementers, not investigators, lead the research. This power balance has promoted synergies between researchers and practitioners and has resulted in one of the first ever Randomized Control Trials of a conservation intervention. We have shortened the distance …

Valuation Of Dry And Wet Aged Beef By U.S. Consumers, Mario Ortez, Nicole Olynk Widmar, Nathan M. Thompson, Yuan H. Brad Kim

Department of Agricultural Economics Faculty Publications

Aged-beef has historically been available in high-end establishments, but investigation into consumer preferences for aging is increasingly important as it has become more readily available. Consumer perceptions of and willingness-to-pay (WTP) for aged-beef under two methods dry-aging and wet-aging, were studied in a representative sample of n = 1,275 US residents alongside USDA quality grades. In general, US residents are not knowledgeable regarding aged-beef but have a positive direct-stated perception of the practice. Respondents self-reported familiarity with USDA grades Prime and Choice and perceived them as superior beef attributes. Half of respondents were randomly assigned to receive a low information …