The energy crunch of the mid-seventies has adversely affected the greenhouse tomato industry in the North Central and Northeast regions. Traditionally, these two regions had been the main producers of greenhouse tomatoes in the U.S. where, because of the climatic restriction, greenhouse tomato production evolved to supply fresh tomatoes during winter and spring months. Since greenhouse producers in the north rely on fossil fuels for heating purposes, their production costs have escalated, thereby tending to price these tomatoes out of the market. In recent years many greenhouse tomato producers in the northern regions have either ceased production or switched into alternative enterprises. For instance, the Census of Agriculture reported 45 growers in Massachusetts in 1974, with covered areas of 535,842 square feet; by 1979, according to extension experts, the number declined to 25 and the area declined to between 150,000 and 200,000 square feet. The number of growers in New Jersey declined from 42 in the 1974 census to only 19 in 1979. Similar declines have occurred in New York and Pennsylvania.

This study investigates the effects on the U.S. cotton industry of textile trade liberalization using a multi-market equilibrium displacement model. The simulation results suggest that textile trade liberalization would induce small changes in the total demand for U.S. cotton but would affect considerably U.S. cotton demand structure, making U.S. cotton growers more dependent on world markets. The welfare analyses reveal that textile trade liberalization would result in a small welfare loss for U.S. cotton producers. As expected, textile trade liberalization also would lead to considerable substitution of imports for domestic production and substantial declines in prices of all textile products.

There exists no mechanism for federal agencies, national laboratories, industry, and academic institutions to set a national environmental research agenda. Moreover, funding for social science research is inadequate for providing a sound scientific basis for making environmental policy. Despite this lack of leadership, it is quite possible to define an environmental economic research agenda that could lead to improved policies for protecting and managing the environment. The present paper makes some recommendations from an insider's viewpoint.

Present land use control mechanisms are seen as inadequate for the preservation of open space, agricultural land, and other “uneconomic” uses of land. Many proposals have been cited as possible solutions to the problems created by present land use control mechanisms. The transfer of development rights (hereafter known as TDR's) is one such proposal. This mechanism for land use control can be of several forms. There are severe theoretical and practical problems, to be discussed, which a transfer of development rights program must overcome if it is to function in practical application.

Nearly level terrain, heavy soils, and impermeable subsoil horizons commonly cause poor drainage in Northern New York. Forty-five percent of the cropland in this region is classified as poorly drained (Lucey). The soils in this area dry slowly, consequently restricting the effective length of the growing season. Production of corn is marginal and the establishment of legume seedings is prevented by poor drainage. Poor drainage is only a single characteristic of a farm's soil resource, but it has multiple effects. Farm managers have adjusted to poor drainage by using grass hay crops as a forage base and by adopting other management practices which utilize land more extensively.

This paper explores how hedonic price analysis might be used to estimate the surplus benefits of local outdoor recreation when distance to the recreational site is captured in property values. The model is characterized by the endogenous choice of distance to a local recreational area by households in coastal property markets and by the capitalization of proximity in property values. Equilibrium occurs when the reduction in the cost of a property due to a marginal increase in distance to the recreational area equals the associated loss in recreational surplus resulting from increased travel costs. The theoretical model is applied in an exploratory analysis of the “demand” for distance to the nearest public beach from which total surplus benefits are estimated.

Crop yields which determine farm income deficiency payments have been frozen at 1981-1985 levels since 1986. Data from a longitudinal survey of Ohio farm operators are analyzed to evaluate whether updating payment yields will differentially affect farm operators. Results of the analysis imply that farm operators who operate larger farms, live in counties with higher yields, and have higher fertilizer and pesticide expenses per acre of corn will benefit more. In addition, low (high) existing payment yields are understated (overstated) relative to updated payment yields.

Many conservation programs under the 2002 Farm Act address resource concerns such as water quality and aquatic communities in streams. Analyzing two such programs, simulated changes in agricultural practices decreased field-edge sediment losses by 25–31% in two geophysically distinct Minnesota watersheds. However, while in-stream sediment concentrations and lethal fisheries events decreased significantly in one watershed, there was no discernable improvement for the fisheries in the other, despite potentially spending over $100,000 annually in conservation payments. These results highlight the importance of performance-based conservation payments targeted to genuine resource concerns in watersheds and the value of integrated bioeconomic modeling of conservation programs.

Cattle feed yards routinely track and collect data for individual calves throughout the feeding period. Using such operational data from nine U.S. feed yards for the years 2016–2019, we evaluated the scalability and economic viability of using machine learning classifier predicted mortality as a culling decision aid. The expected change in net return per head when using the classifier predictions as a culling aid as compared to the status quo culling protocol for calves having been pulled at least once for bovine respiratory disease was simulated. This simulated change in net return ranged from −$1.61 to $19.46/head. Average change in net return and standard deviation for the nine feed yards in this study was $6.31/head and $7.75/head, respectively.

We empirically test separation of ownership and control (SOC) and the interaction of SOC with farmer effort on farm success using data from the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Agricultural Resource Management Survey. We use a two-stage least-squares approach with instrumental variables that proxy for participation constraints in binding incentive contracts. We find that the interaction has a significantly positive effect on success for grain farms and an insignificant effect for livestock farms. The results are consistent with hypotheses by Allen and Lueck (1998), but our model predicts that farms with SOC are likely to be more successful than farms without SOC despite exogenous uncertainty and agency costs.

We investigate incumbent brands’ response to entry and increased competition in a large retail setting. We extend the nonprice competition and manufacturer stocking literatures by examining if incumbent brands increase quality, specifically increasing the number of varieties (product-line length), in response to entry of a new local brand in the ice cream market. We use the entry of a new, local, super-premium ice cream brand in a large supermarket chain as a quasi-natural experiment and empirically examine if incumbent ice cream brands increased the product-line length in stores carrying the new brand. Using Poisson difference-in-differences estimators, we find that incumbent brands increased the number of varieties offered by 0.9 (3 percent) after the new brand's entry, with most of the responses coming from super-premium ice cream, which increased the number of varieties offered by 2.9 (12 percent) product choices. These findings contribute new insights into quality changes, manufacturer stocking decisions, and nonprice competition associated with entry of a local brand into the food retail sector.

Cost-share contracts, offered through working lands programs, are instrumental in addressing environmental externalities from agriculture and generating ecosystem services. However, the persistent trend of noncompliance with cost-share contractual terms has become a problem for funding agencies and policymakers. This paper aims to study noncompliance issues within the US working lands programs using historical county-level panel data (1997–2019) from Louisiana. The results show that noncompliance is attributed more to cancellations than terminations due to flexible provisions within the cancellation option. The significant incentive effect of payment obligations reveals that revisiting payment rates could reduce contract noncompliance and mitigate moral hazard.

Without a doubt, climate change will be one of the most important environmental topics of the 1990s and will be high on the research agendas of many scientific disciplines in years ahead. While not yet universally accepted, it is now widely believed that anthropogenic emissions of carbon dioxide and other “greenhouse” gases have the potential to substantially warm climates worldwide. Although there is no consensus on the timing and magnitude of global warming, current climate models predict an average increase of 2.8°C to 5.2°C in the earth's temperature over the next century (Karl, Diaz, and Barnett). Changes in regional temperature and precipitation will likely accompany the global warming, but there is even less scientific agreement on the magnitude of these changes.

Previous studies indicate that “hesitation” and “skepticism” are important barriers to the development of renewable energy industries in the United States. We examine whether key pecuniary and nonpecuniary characteristics of bioenergy crops underlie the hesitation argument. Based on a stated choice experiment, we find that Midwestern producers appreciate certain crop attributes that are found in switchgrass, but not in conventional crops. We also find that producers would be willing to grow switchgrass-like crops for net margins between $222/acre/year and $247/acre/year in marginal counties. We argue that farmers’ hesitation and skepticism toward bioenergy crops can be overcome.

Despite massive off-farm migration and relatively prosperous agricultural years, estimates of returns to factors of production indicate that labor earnings in agriculture remain low. This is primarily caused by farm factor market characteristics and the resulting tendency of any increase in farm income to be capitalized into land values.

Data collected from a sample of New York banks were used to assess factors expected to influence the profitability of the various loan programs of commercial banks. Loan loss and loan service costs were lower for farm loans than for either installment or commercial loans. Although not required to maintain compensating balances, farmer time and demand deposits represented 23 percent of outstanding loan balances. The high rate of turnover on farm mortgage loans resulted in an average loan repayment period of 6.2 years, only 40 percent of the original financing period. Lower farm loan costs indicate that banks could charge 3/4 percent lower interest on farm loans than commercial loans.

This paper examines the adaptation of dasymetric mapping methodologies to agricultural data, including their testing and transposition, in order to recover the underlying statistical surface (i.e., an approximation of the real distribution of data). A methodology based on the ideas of Gallego and Peedell (2001) and on the binary method is proposed. It has several steps: (i) the exclusion of target zones for which no observations exist (binary method), (ii) the application of an iterative process to define the most precise densities for data distribution, and (iii) the stratification/definition of sub-units with homogenous characteristics if the results of the previous step are not satisfactory, and the subsequent application of step two.

The methodology was applied in the Alentejo region of Portugal, using data from the 1999 Agricultural Census. Several counties are used as source zones. The aim was to generate a distribution of agro-forestry occupations as close as possible to reality. Two lines of analysis were followed: (i) application of the methodology simultaneously to all counties (definition of regional densities), and (ii) application of the methodology separately to the different subareas with similar characteristics (definition of sub-regional densities). For an easy application of the methodology, a computer tool was created, which allowed the easy optimization, validation, and exportation of the data into a Geographic Information System (GIS).

The results were validated using several error indicators at the county level, as well as in a sample of parishes. We show that the second variant of the methodology yielded more precise results, and is superior for the types of data available. This method yielded maps in which the distribution of the most relevant agro-forestry occupations is closest to reality.

In October 1976, President Ford signed into law PL 94–566 (the “Unemployment Compensation Amendments of 1976,” henceforth the law), which among other items extends unemployment insurance (UI) coverage to agricultural workers in establishments employing 10 or more workers for 20 weeks or more or with a high quarter payroll of at least $20,000, (henceforth the ‘10 in 20 or $20,000’ provision).

Public programs of agricultural preservation continue to be of interest in many states of the urbanized Northeast. Farmers themselves, of course, have always been concerned with this issue, and in recent years they have found effective allies among public planners, for whom the agricultural sector has become a chief source of scenic and cultural amenities as well as insurance against unforeseen disruptions in future supplies of food and fiber. Programs of use-value assessment have been enacted by almost all of the northeastern states, as well as by those in many other parts of the country. Partly as a result of the fact that the effectiveness of this approach has been in doubt, attention in some states is turning to programs in which the development rights are purchased from agricultural land in order to alleviate development pressure on these areas. New Jersey has recently undertaken a program of development rights purchase, Massachusetts is currently shaping legislation for such a program, and many other states have shown interest.

Potato chips are believed to have been first made in this country about the middle of the last century, and for many years were prepared only in the home kitchen. Commercial production did not develop to any great extent until improved peeling and frying methods became available. In 1939 the U. S. chip industry is estimated to have used only 2.1 million hundredweight of potatoes. Chip production increased rapidly during and immediately following World War II, and annual use of potatoes for chipping grew to 29.0 million hundredweight in 1950. Quantity of potatoes used for chipping reached a peak for the crop year ending June 30, 1972, of 35.1 million hundredweight but dropped about .5 million hundredweight the following year due to the smaller 1972 crop. Use of potatoes for chip production in 1972 amounted to about 11 per cent of the crop and 17 pounds per person. Potato chip markets were first developed in the Northcentral and Northeastern States and processing plants were established close to these major markets.