The purpose of the paper is to theoretically examine the welfare implications of public sector involvement in agricultural biotechnology R&D. The model assumes that firms (either a private duopoly consisting of a pair of for-profit firms or a mixed duopoly consisting of one for-profit firm and...

The relationship between price uncertainty and specific investment is examined in a dynamic model that integrates the theories of real options and investment holdup. Because of weak contract enforcement, bilateral firms cannot use a contract to govern their bilateral investment and exchange...

The welfare impacts of a conservation easement are examined in a real options model. The size of the easement payment to the landowner largely determines the efficiency of the easement outcome. An inefficiently small payment results in states where rejection of the easement by the landowner...

This paper fills the gap of modeling positive externality cases when private marginal cost is higher than social marginal cost. Within this unique type of divergence of marginal costs two cases are scrutinized: social marginal benefit being higher than private marginal benefit, and vice versa,...

The discovery of StarLink corn in U.S. food products caused considerable disruption in the corn markets in 2000 and 2001. We estimated two models on the impact of StarLink corn over the 2000/2001 marketing year. In the first model, to segregate the U.S. corn market, identity preservation costs...

In the classical development of economic equilibrium and efficiency, transaction costs are seldom considered. This study develops a micro- market model of an agricultural market based on quality differences. The study then develops a model of market structure based on the New Theory of the Firm....

The degree of vertical integration in the U.S. sugar industry between raw sugar processing and sugar refining cannot be explained using theories of vertical integration based on transaction costs (e.g. Williamson). We graphically decompose the economic rents accruing to each level in the...

The introduction of mandatory country of origin labeling in the agricultural sector promises to yield consumer benefits by providing additional information to consumers. However, these benefits will be partially offset by the cost of labeling paid by producers. This study derives the labeling...