The theoretical proposition that profitable speculation is pricestabilizing is not subject to direct empirical testing in the context of commodity futures markets. The reasons for this are twofold: (1) if all commodity futures trading is viewed as speculation, then this is a zero-sum game which...

In this paper we study the trade creation effects of the EU preferential trade agreements (PTAs) in the agriculture and food sectors for a large sample of developing countries in the period 1990-2006. We build upon the existing literature on trade with heterogeneous firms, by investigating the...

This paper presents new experimental evidence on the role of price information in agricultural markets. For this purpose, I set up a Randomized Control Trial (RCT) in the central highlands of Peru. A group of farmers in randomly selected villages got access to detailed price information for the...

The risk balancing literature suggests that business risk management (BRM) programs may, through risk balancing (offsetting adjustments between business risk and financial risk), lead farmers to take on more financial risk than they would take otherwise, which, in turn, increases the risk of...

In this article we specify a model of millet prices in the three West African countries of Burkina Faso, Mali, and Niger. Using data obtained from USAID’s Famine Early Warning Systems Network (FEWS NET) we present a unique regional cereal price forecasting model that takes advantage of the...

The impact of violent conflict on the state of the economy has been studied extensively since the two recent decades. In most studies the state of the economy is operationalized by stock market indices of the respective countries. In this paper we suggest investigating the impact of violent...