The present study examines technical efficiency patterns in Ukraine’s crop sector for 1991-1996. The economic and policy environment in Ukraine has changed since reform began in 1991. Many policy changes have exerted offsetting economic pressures on efficiency. Enterprise privatization...

Forward pricing behavior of random samples of Indiana, Nebraska, and Mississippi crop producers was analyzed using Heckman’s two-step limited information maximum likelihood estimation procedure. Producers who forward priced during the 1995-1998 period generally expected to forward price...

Risk management education has been a focus of U.S. farm policy since 1996. In support of significant ongoing United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) educational efforts, this study examines agricultural producers’ educational needs and interests. Data obtained through a survey of...

We study the relationship between the off-farm labor decision and the limited-resource farmers’ and spouses’ off-farm experience, education, and sources of income. We found that farmers’ and spouses’ off-farm experience and wages are significant factors in explaining...

Revenue variability at different levels of aggregation has been the focus of several proposals to reform U.S. commodity programs with the 2007 farm bill. In this paper, we estimate revenue variabilityyear-to-year deviations from expected revenuefor corn, soybeans, and cotton at four levels of...

The term "cheap food policy" has frequently been used as a descriptor for U.S. commodity programs by those who contend these payments to farmers ultimately result in lower food costs for consumers. More recently, farm policy has been criticized for contributing to the obesity problem in the U.S....

This research investigates optimal price risk management strategies for fed cattle producers engaged in grid pricing. Stochastic simulation is used to determine optimal hedge ratios for fed cattle priced on a live weight basis or on a series of grids that vary in terms of premium/discount...

For multiple peril crop insurance, the U.S. Department of Agriculture'Â’s Risk Management Agency estimates the premium rate for a base coverage level and then uses multiplicative adjustment factors to recover rates at other coverage levels. Given this methodology, accurate estimation of the...