Replaced with revised version of paper 07/18/08.

The last three years have realized significant structural changes in the U.S. agricultural policy environment. These changes include nearly complete planting flexibility and the elimination of target-price-based income support for agricultural producers. Many have questioned the extent to which...

Recent empirical research and development in the cattle industry suggest several reasons to suspect structural change in economic relationships determining cattle prices. Standard forecasting models may ignore structural change and may produce biased and misleading forecasts. Vector...

In North Carolina, where soybeans and corn are the two primary crops, the recent increase in the demand for U.S. corn has triggered a shift of farm acreage from soybeans to corn, leading to a rapid rise in prices of both commodities. However, the rate of the price changes, as well as the price...

Replaced with revised version of paper 07/29/10.

The oilseed products complex is an important component of the U.S. agricultural sector. In 2000, almost 75 million acres were planted to soybeans, representing over 29 percent of total planted acreage, making soybeans second only to corn in terms of acreage (ERS/USDA, 2000). Soybean acreage has...

Fats and oils play a prominent role in U.S. dietary patterns. Recent concerns over the negative health consequences associated with fats and oils have led many to suspect structural change in demand conditions. We consider short run (monthly) demand relationships for edible fats and oils. In...

Grain prices have risen sharply since 2005 and 2006 affecting livestock markets by increasingfeed prices and leading to significant volatility shocks. The high price levels and magnitude ofsustained high volatilities has raised concerns for many sectors of the economy, in particularthose with...

This study investigates non-parametrically the optimizing behavior of a sample of 289 Kansas farms under profit-maximization and cost-minimization hypotheses. The study uses both deterministic and stochastic non-parametric tests. The deterministic results do not support strict adherence to...