To many people, futures trading is a little understood and rather suspicious activity. The word most often associated with this trading is "speculation", the idea being that most of those involved in futures markets are gamblers in a high stakes game seeking profit at the expense of those...

The advancement of South America’s agro-pastoral frontier has been widely linked to losses in biodiversity and tropical forests, with particular impacts on the Brazilian cerrado, the Atlantic Forest, and the Amazon. Here I consider an important, yet largely overlooked, driver of South...

The Bean/Cowpea CRSP has been funding the Institut Sénégalais de Recherches Agricoles (ISRA) since 1982 with the goal of developing improved varieties of cowpea. Cowpea is well suited to Senegalese production zones, and is a relatively inexpensive protein source. It can be eaten as both green...

Smallholder farmers in many areas of the semiarid tropics are planting exotic tree species that provide alternative income sources, fuel, and building materials. While providing other benefits, these trees often occupy land that could produce annual food crops. This study uses a polyperiod,...

Over the past 20 years the agribusiness industry has been subject to a number of transformations and shocks that have altered its business environment and management practices. This thesis sets out to try to understand how the Michigan industry has changed in this period, and to understand if...

School feeding program as a social safety net has been popular in developing countries as an instrument for achieving the Millennium Development Goals. These programs are frequently targeted towards populations that are food insecure and reside in areas with high concentrations of families from...

Previous studies have identified regulatory preemption and differentiation as two main motives for participation in voluntary environmental programs (VEPs). This research examines the motivations of livestock farmers to participate in the Michigan Agricultural Environmental Assurance Program...

This paper looks at the experiences of agricultural input retailers in Malawi as a result of the Agricultural Input Subsidy Program. In particular, it focuses on the impact of excluding private sector retailers from participation in the subsidy program. Using a difference-in-difference approach...

Agricultural expansion has traditionally led colonization of the Amazonian rainforest. Recently, pioneer farmers in the forest margins around Pucallpa, Peru, have been changing their production decisions and altering the deforestation process. In response to a government policy to protect...

The history of starvation in the world is very tightly linked with the history of humanity. The problem of starvation was discussed in 1945 at the Worldwide Constitutional Conference of Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations. The main goal of the organization was and remains a...