This paper presents a case study of a major food service company within Australia that found itself faced with the above circumstances. A best practice program was developed to address the problem of increasing consumer complaints regarding beef meals. An audit of their wholesale suppliers...

Investment in agribusiness assets has grown significantly in recent years. The question of interest is whether including agribusiness assets in investment portfolios provide benefits. The effects of diversification by including agribusiness assets in two investment portfolios, a mixed asset...

In this paper, we report our results in measuring total factor productivity (TFP) growth in the New Zealand primary and downstream manufacturing sectors. Our results showed strong TFP growth in the agriculture sector during 1988-2006 (2.7 percent per year). Forestry and logging’s TFP grew...

The use of economic analysis to aid farm input investment decisions has been contentious because of observed flatness of economic response in the region of the optimum input. In this paper an application of a crop simulation model, to specify the production response, in conjunction with...

Aset of simulations were used to estimate the impact of improvements in cattle breeding efficiency and other management factors on gross margins in extensive pastoral systems in Western Australia. The simulations showed that gross margin was an increasing function of breeding rates, but age at...

Using a bio-economic model, H2OBeef, that includes traditionally considered parameters associated with running a beef feedlot but also incorporates aspects associated with water, changes that can alter water consumption and or price are examined. The results indicate that when water does not...

The size of the cost to the Australian beef industry of a potential loss of major beef export markets following an outbreak of foot and mouth disease (FMD) in Australia is important in determining appropriate precautions. The size of this cost is evaluated with a dynamic bioeconomic model of...

This study reports findings from a mail survey of Western Australian broadacre farmers participating in quality assurance (QA) accreditation. A 50 percent response rate generated a sample size of 78 usable replies. The average farm in the survey spent $13,470 gaining QA accreditation, upgrading...