U.S. Department of Agriculture's Dairy Options Pilot Program promoted hedging by producers, and was a test case for similar programs in other agricultural industries. Rapidly shifting milk pricing policies impeded quantitative hedging evaluations while the program was active. Hedging appears...

U.S. Department of Agriculture's Dairy Options Pilot Program promoted hedging by producers, and was a test case for similar programs in other agricultural industries. Rapidly shifting milk pricing policies impeded quantitative hedging evaluations while the program was active. Hedging appears...

Identification of skill sets required of managers and supervisors in livestock production is necessary to guide selection, training, task assignment, and promotion. Management roles in livestock production differ from those in other industries, given the unique work environment and task...

Identification of skill sets required of managers and supervisors in livestock production is necessary to guide selection, training, task assignment, and promotion. Management roles in livestock production differ from those in other industries, given the unique work environment and task...

This research provides an efficiency evaluation of swine firms by specialization type providing estimates of technical, allocative, scale, and overall efficiency separately for farrow-to-finish, farrow-to-feeder, feeder-to-finish, farrow-to-weanling, and weanling-to-feeder operations. Results...

This research provides an efficiency evaluation of swine firms by specialization type providing estimates of technical, allocative, scale, and overall efficiency separately for farrow-to-finish, farrow-to-feeder, feeder-to-finish, farrow-to-weanling, and weanling-to-feeder operations. Results...

Dairy farm size differs considerably across the United States. We analyze patterns of dairy farm size to determine how differences in vertical integration and diversification relate to farm size. We find that diversification accounts for little size variation. For vertical integration, the...