Using a national survey, double hurdle models are estimated to examine the impact of farmers’ risk attitude on use of production and marketing contracts. Risk averse farmers are less likely to use contracts but risk attitude does not have any significant impact on the intensity at which...

For more than thirty years, studies about the effect of the exchange rate on exports have been conducted. However, few have considered the combined effect of the exchange rate on imported inputs into the agricultural system and the exports of final agricultural products those inputs produce. A...

We develop a model of honey bee foraging behavior that can be used to simulate crop yields as functions of honey bee densities. These yield functions help us understand the economic behavior of growers who rely on bees for pollination. One important simulation result for the case of almonds is...

This article assesses the political economy of the 2014 farm bill, which eliminated annual fixed direct payments but offers enhanced downside risk protection against low prices or declining revenue. The farm bill secured substantial bipartisan majorities in a politically contentious Congress....

In this paper, we show that relaxing credit constraints and increasing access to finance by lifting state-level restrictions on interstate bank expansions from the 1970s through the early 1990s benefited the U.S. agricultural industry by increasing farm sales and profits. In our empirical...

Animal waste from concentrated animal feeding operations (CAFOs) is a significant contributor to the nitrate contamination of groundwater. Some manures also contain heavy metals and salts that may build up either in cropland or groundwater. To find cost-effective policies for pollution reduction...

A farm’s physical investment is affected by its fundamental q and by its financial situation, with the later comprising both the firm’s liquidity and its possibility of facing capital market imperfections. This study determines the effects of government payments, depreciation, and inflation...