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Neill, Clinton L.; Holcomb, Rodney B.; Lusk, Jayson L.
doi: 10.1002/agr.21625pmid: N/A
In the past 40 years, federal and state policies have financially and philosophically supported the establishment of state‐branded food marketing programs in each state. The intention of the programs is to increase consumer demand for locally grown foods. However, the benefits of such programs are likely to be reduced when multiple states simultaneously market their own local foods. To investigate this issue, we conducted a survey of 6,900 consumers residing in an eight‐state contiguous region. We find that preferences are heterogeneous when neighboring state‐branded products are available, and some consumers will instead buy products from other states. The results suggest caution in estimating the policy impacts of state branding programs without considering how neighboring states react.
Turland, Madeline; Slade, Peter
doi: 10.1002/agr.21627pmid: N/A
This paper uses a hypothetical choice experiment to examine farmers' willingness to share their farm data with a big data platform. We found that, on average, 36% of farmers are willing to join such a platform. Participation is affected by the characteristics of both the platform and the farmer. The organization operating the big data platform is particularly important: farmers are most willing to share their data with university researchers and least willing to share their data with government. Not surprisingly, farmers with strong privacy preferences are less likely to join a big data platform. However, we found that relatively small financial and nonfinancial benefits significantly increased participation, even among farmers who stated strong privacy preferences. [EconLit classifications: Q12, Q16, Q18]
Oliveira, Paulo Ricardo S.; Silveira, Jose Maria F. J. da; Bullock, David S.
doi: 10.1002/agr.21622pmid: N/A
The nexus of innovation and trade is commonly analyzed in terms of technological gaps and market‐share gains for innovating countries. However, this relationship may not hold under certain circumstances – as in the case of genetically modified organisms. Based on a firm heterogeneity model, this study investigates the role of technological gaps and demand lags in the case of international trade in goods after the emergence of a ‘highly‐scrutinized’ or ‘distrusted’ technology. The demand lag may be understood as the difference between techniques employed by producers in exporting countries and levels of acceptance or compatibility in destination markets. Likewise, a technological gap is the difference between techniques employed by late‐movers and those used by leading countries. By means of a gravity equation, we empirically estimate these effects based on the bilateral trade of soybeans between 1995 and 2012. Results indicate that both technological gaps and demand lags reduce trade by similar magnitudes. Thus, producing countries should carefully weigh the negative effects of falling behind and of approving varieties not approved for importation in destination markets. [EconLit citations: F12, F51, O33]
Durborow, Samantha L.; Kim, Seon‐Woong; Henneberry, Shida R.; Brorsen, B. Wade
doi: 10.1002/agr.21603pmid: N/A
This study investigates price transmission in the US fresh vegetable market, considering four important vegetables: carrots, lettuce, onions, and potatoes. An asymmetric variable‐threshold autoregressive (AvTAR) model was used to estimate price relationships between 40 pairs of terminal market vegetable prices, whereas the parity bounds model (PBM) was used to estimate the probability of 22 shipping point to terminal market pairs behaving efficiently. The estimated AvTAR models suggest market integration is higher for more perishable produce. Results for the PBM indicate that 18.2% of the markets studied had more than a 10% probability of behaving inefficiently, indicating that while the majority of markets behaved efficiently, there is room for improvement. The estimated thresholds have been suggested as an estimate of transport costs, but estimated thresholds often differ substantially from actual transport costs.
doi: 10.1002/agr.21612pmid: N/A
The number of farmer cooperatives in the United States is declining, but empirical investigations of cooperative firm survival have been scarce. With demographic, financial, and strategic characteristics as possible explanations, we conduct survival analysis in relation to 950 U.S. farmers cooperatives for the 2005–2018 period. Following the results of our Cox proportional hazard regressions, we find (a) relatively young and old farmer cooperatives are more susceptible to exit; (b) the relationship of membership size to the survival rate of farmer cooperatives is U‐shaped; (c) farmer cooperatives with intangible asset portfolios have lower survival probabilities; and (d) the survival function of farmer cooperatives is not explained significantly by efficiency, leverage, or liquidity. Overall, we use our findings to inform recommendations in terms of cooperative firm behavior, in particular in relation to member heterogeneity and strategic orientation.
doi: 10.1002/agr.21629pmid: N/A
Despite the growth of exchange risk literature in the field of agricultural economics, little attention has been paid to firm‐level currency exposure in emerging countries. In this context, this paper investigates the exchange rate exposure faced by a unique data set of 66 Brazilian agricultural cooperatives from 2000 to 2015, and finds that around one‐third of the sampled firms exhibited significant exposure during this period, even after controlling for crises. The paper also documents that the proportion of exposed firms doubles during periods in which the local central bank intervenes more in the currency regime, lending support to the moral hazard hypothesis: when the exchange rate is less flexible, local companies tend to adopt unhedged positions in response to implicit government guarantees. Finally, firms with more debt, better asset management, lower inventory levels, and higher product differentiation tend to be less exposed to currency swings [EconLit Citations: F31, G15, G23].
Skevas, Theodoros; Grashuis, Jasper
doi: 10.1002/agr.21617pmid: N/A
To date, no study has investigated the role of spatial spillovers in the technical efficiency of farmer cooperatives. This study addresses this issue by employing a two‐stage approach, first measuring cooperatives' technical efficiency using a Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) model and secondly using a bootstrap truncated regression to identify the effect of spatial spillovers and cooperative firm‐level characteristics on technical efficiency. The empirical application focuses on grain marketing cooperatives in the Midwest region of the United States, and shows that spatial spillover effects influence the technical efficiency of neighboring cooperatives. Technical efficiency is also found to be influenced by several cooperative firm‐level characteristics including age, liquidity, differentiation, and membership size. [EconLit citations C21, Q13, R3].
doi: 10.1002/agr.21630pmid: N/A
The competitive yardstick role of marketing cooperatives refers to the fact that the presence of cooperatives drives the market towards competitiveness. We conduct an empirical study based on panel data from the hog industry in China to examine the existence of competitive yardstick effect of cooperatives. Data including information regarding hog producer cooperatives, farm gate prices of hogs, and other relevant factors in China's 21 provinces in the years 2009–2012 are used. Various methods, including ordinary least squares regression, random‐effect model, and fixed‐effect model, are adopted to predict the effect of cooperatives development on farm gate prices. The results confirm the role of hog producer cooperatives as the competitive yardstick of markets, that is, a positive effect of strength of cooperatives on the farm gate prices received by hog producers with various production sizes. [EconLit classifications: Q13, L16]
Lin, Junying; Zhang, Zhonggen; Liu, Ziming; Rommel, Jens
doi: 10.1002/agr.21620pmid: N/A
In mountainous areas, access to markets and transportation services is particularly important for farmers. Following government initiatives, agricultural cooperatives in China have begun to offer transportation services as part of their service portfolio. This study estimated the impact of cooperatives’ transportation services on tobacco farmers’ farm income. Using survey data from 337 households in Guizhou Province, China, a two‐step control function was used to correct for selection bias. Results showed that access to transportation services increased yearly farm income by up to 4,636 RMB Yuan. The possible reasons for this large increase are discussed and conclusions were drawn for rural development policy. [EconLit citations: Q13, L23]
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