Weather insurance within the agricultural sector has been limited by the difficulty in defining the appropriate weather event and in pricing the product. We develop a new pricing method for weather insurance under situations where returns depend not only on the occurrence of the weather event,...

This article analyzes the female rural-urban wage gap in Canada using longitudinal data from the Survey of Labour and Income Dynamics 1993–96. We estimate a two-step wage equation accounting for unobserved heterogeneity and sample selection. The results indicate that a statistically and...

This article explores the reasons for differences in female rural-urban participation rates by estimating a dynamic model of participation allowing for unobserved heterogeneity and state dependence using Canadian panel data. The results suggest that overall observed differences in rural-urban...

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to examine the factors affecting the relative variability in farm and off-farm income for Canadian farm operators. Design/methodology/approach – Variability of farm and off-farm income is analyzed using a dataset of 17,000 farm operators from 2001 to...

A model is developed that shows the usefulness of dynamic optimization in deriving optimal equity recovery strategies for a cooperative lending institution. The objective is to minimize the cost of a member borrowing over time. An interest rate surcharge, above the cost of funds and operating...

Over the years, critics have argued that futures market prices have been either too low or too high. Speculators have often been the target for the wrath of those feeling the futures price does not properly reflect market fundamentals. Recently, the criticism has been vented toward a new type of...

The purpose of this paper is to discuss how farm-level modelers can best extend their research to address issues broader than just farm income. The paper describes how trade-off curves are a valuable tool for summarizing the missing information to policy makers on economic problems related to...

Anaerobic digester (AD) technology is a form of renewable energy with significant upside potential and little public resistance. However, previous studies have generally found ADs to be a poor investment for private firms without public assistance. The mixed results on the financial feasibility...