Famers get rid of the disadvantaged by collective negotiation

Abstract

[[abstract]]作為人類最基礎的生產活動，農業經歷了數千年的發展，人均生產力已經獲得顯著的提升，雖然農業產值占整體經濟的比例不斷下降，但其地位依然受到世界各國的重視。而台灣雖然在農業生物技術領域相當發達，但農民平均所得水準仍然有很大的進步空間，因此如何改善農民處境為本研究的主題。 台灣的農民結構主要由耕地面積不到1公頃的小農所組成，在缺乏通路與市場資訊的狀態下，農民面對中間商收購農作物時普遍缺乏議價能力。理論上若能有效團結農民形成團體，匯集農作物對外銷售，除可提高經濟規模降低成本外，也能有效改善對中間商的議價能力並提高農民的所得水準。 本研究應用Rubinstein（1982）的賽局模型至農民與中間商議價的談判過程，藉以模擬兩者在不同的情境條件下產生的談判結果。同時假設農民與中間商在完全競爭市場及獨買市場時所得之結果，與Rubinstein模型做一比較。結果發現：在比較完全競爭市場及獨買市場，不論是農民的利潤或是市場總貿易利得，完全競爭市場均高於獨買市場；但將完全競爭市場與Rubinstein模型比較，不論農民福利或中間商貿易利得則呈現不確定的結果。 The Taiwan’s farmer structure is mainly composed of small farmers with less than one hectare of arable land. In the absence of market channel and information, farmers generally lack bargaining power when facing middlemen to purchase crops. Though the agriculture in Taiwan is quite developed in the field of agricultural biotechnology, there is still a lot of room for improvement in the average income level of farmers. In addition, the farmers now are facing huge challenges more than ever due to low production efficiency and low market competition compared to the international agricultural markets. To conquer the difficulties above mentioned, the general perspective is the necessity of uniting individual farmers effectively to form groups and pool crops. In this research, some workable and effective tool is proposed to strengthen the function and organization of the agricultural cooperatives: collective negotiation. This research applies Rubinstein's（1982）game model to the negotiation process between farmers and middlemen. The results prove that in the comparison of the perfect competition market and the monopsony market, the Rubinstein model can win at most either in farmers’ profit or the total market trade gains. In other words, collective negotiation can increase economic scale and reducing transaction costs, and it can also effectively improve farmers' bargaining power and increase farmers' income levels. The economic analysis in this research can help farmers to understand what they can realistically accomplish when they join a cooperative. Also, the economic conditions, such as equilibrium price, equilibrium quantity, and welfare effect, have been clarified which may favor the success of collective negotiation