WHAT SHOULD BE THE ROLE OF RESOURCE STEWARDSHIP IN FUTURE FARM POLICY?

Agricultural and Food Policy, Resource /Energy Economics and Policy,

THE PROMISE AND PERIL OF TECHNICAL SERVICE PROVIDERS

Agribusiness,

'Retired' Sensitive Cropland: Here Today, Gone Tomorrow?

Falling commodity prices have renewed farmers' interest in expanding the Conservation Reserve Program, or CRP, which protects environmentally sensitive land by paying farmers "rent" to take it out of crop production. CRP has long been the cornerstone of federal conservation policy, but its benefits are fleeting. Once the rental contracts expire, farmers go back to planting crops and the benefits are lost. Long-term or permanent conservation easements would do a much better job of mitigating the negative environmental impacts of American agriculture.That's the finding of a new EWG report that shows how conservation easement programs are better for the environment and are better investments for taxpayers than CRP. Traditional row-crop agriculture is increasingly causing environmental and public health problems. Threats to public health through contaminated drinking water, poor air quality and toxic algal blooms are widespread and costly, and fish and wildlife habitats and populations face ongoing risks.Although CRP provides conservation benefits that help alleviate these threats, the benefits are lost as soon as the contract expires and land is brought back into crop production. Between 2007 and 2014, 15.8 million acres dropped out of the CRP program and were not re-enrolled. These 10-year contracts cost taxpayers an estimated $7.3 billion to rent. At the same time, only 6.7 million "new" acres were enrolled in CRP, for a net loss of more than 9 million acres.Programs that focus on long-term or permanent easements already exist. The Conservation Reserve Enhancement Program works with states to target high-priority objectives, including conservation easements. The Wetland Reserve Easement option in the Agricultural Conservation Easement Program enrolls acres in easements to restore, protect and enhance wetlands.Instead of expanding CRP, more funding in the 2018 Farm Bill should go to both of these highly effective programs. That would be a better deal for taxpayers, the environment and public health.

Is Federal Crop Insurance Policy Leading to Another Dust Bowl?

As the southern Great Plains get hotter and drier, is federal policy that encourages farmers not to adapt to climate change leading to another Dust Bowl?That's the troubling question raised by a new EWG report that shows how a provision in the federal crop insurance program provides a strong financial incentive for growers to plant the same crops in the same way, year in and year out, regardless of changing climate conditions. What's worse, this program is focused on the same southern Great Plains counties hit hardest by the Dust Bowl of the 1930s, the worst man-made environmental disaster in American history.The federal crop insurance program guarantees farmers' earnings from their crops won't fall below a percentage of their usual income. The percentage is set based on a multi-year average of a farmer's actual crop yields. Averaging good and bad years grounds the program in reality.But a provision called the Actual Production History Yield Exclusion – snuck into the 2014 Farm Bill during conference negotiations – allows growers to drop bad years from their average crop yield calculations. The government simply pretends these bad years didn't happen. In some cases, more than 15 bad years can be thrown out when calculating the average yield, resulting in artificially inflated insurance payouts.It makes sense for crop insurance to give growers a break if they're occasionally hit by one or two bad years, but keeping growers on a treadmill of failed crops and insurance payouts is foolish. Helping farmers adapt to the new weather conditions would be considerably better, and was exactly what helped growers survive the Dust Bowl and return to productivity.The southern Great Plains are getting hotter and drier. Drought has been common over the last 10 years and forecasts show the number of days above 100 degrees quadrupling by 2050. Implementing conservation practices to adapt to changing climate conditions is vital for growers who want to stay in business.Some, but not enough, growers are already adopting conservation techniques in this region. Savings from ending the misguided yield exclusion policy could be used to help more growers change the way they farm to face the challenges posed by a changing climate

A REGIONAL BAN OF ALACHLOR AND ATRAZINE IN SOUTHEASTERN MINNESOTA: THE ECONOMIC AND ENVIRONMENTAL EFFECTS

Crop Production/Industries, Environmental Economics and Policy,

PUBLIC ACQUISITION OF RIGHTS TO USE FARM CHEMICALS: POSSIBLE COSTS AND IMPACTS

Crop Production/Industries,

Flights-to-Quality: The Effects of Market Volatility on Short Term U.S. Treasury Yields

Flights-to-quality are the sudden, and sometimes irrational, rebalancing of investment portfolios to include more liquid and safer investments during times of uncertainty, high market volatility, or other unusual stock market environments. While previous research has explained flights-to-quality in terms of liquidity needs and credit risk premiums, this paper examines the significant statistical relationship between the VIX Index of implied market volatility and yields on U.S. Treasury bills. I found that the VIX Index explains a significant portion of U.S. Treasury yield variability and that the models become more significant and accurate as the maturity of the Treasuries increases. In terms of mispricing, the one month U.S. Treasury exhibited the largest deviation from the theoretical yield – more than 50%. Also, as the Treasuries’ maturities increased, the degree of mispricing decreased; this parallels the tendency to see a steepening yield curve during times of higher implied volatility

Multiple domestications of asian rice

In their recent Correspondence about our study showingthat there were three origins of Asian rice2, Huang and Han suggest that the methodology that we used to infer multiple domestications was flawed as it did not take account of the strong genetic bottleneck in japonica

Enablers and Constraints in Achieving Integration in a Teacher Preparation Program

There is broad consensus that effective teacher preparation programs should enable pre-service teachers to integrate learning experiences at university and school. However, as noted in many reviews and studies, achieving this integration remains a significant challenge. In this study we aimed to identify factors that influence developmental coherence in pre-service teachers’ learning in the first eight weeks of a one-year preparation program, entailing university-based and school-based experiences. The pre-service teachers were expected to integrate learning in both contexts as preparation for their first five-week practicum. Our study aimed to identify their judgements of the value of various components of the course in preparing for this teaching experience, as well as factors affecting their sense of learning integration. We found that their responses, while mainly positive about their program in terms of practicum preparation, reflected diverse needs and expectations. We conclude by outlining various implications for further effective integration of learning across both contexts