Local Ownership in Biofuels Production: A Strategy for Rural Development?

biofuels, local ownership, rural development, risk, investment, Community/Rural/Urban Development,

Information Transmission in Cattle Markets: A Case Study of the Chariton Valley Beef Alliance

The declining share of beef in total U.S. meat consumption has motivated industry-wide efforts to improve average beef quality through more effective coordination among the various market participants. Increased use of explicit grid pricing mechanisms over the last decade represents initial efforts at improved coordination. More recent efforts include animal-specific carcass data collection, with subsequent transmission to feeders and the relevant cow/calf operations, and improved source verification procedures aimed at (among other things) reducing the overall cost of medical treatment for live animals. None of these organizational innovations is costless, and indeed a number of significant barriers must be overcome before more widespread adoption of such practices takes place. This paper takes a detailed look at one organization’s attempts to overcome some of these barriers, and provides a qualitative assessment of this and other potential organizational responses.cattle and beef markets, information transmission, producer alliance, Livestock Production/Industries, Marketing,

Quality Management and Information Transmission in Cattle Markets: A Case Study of the Chariton Valley Beef Alliance

The declining share of beef in total U.S. meat consumption has motivated industry-ï¾­wide efforts to improve average beef quality through more effective coordination among the various market participants. Increased use of explicit "grid" pricing mechanisms over the last decade represents initial efforts at improved coordination. More recent efforts include animalï¾­specific carcass data collection, with subsequent transmission to feeders and the relevant cowï¾­calf operations, and improved "source verification" procedures aimed at (among other things) reducing the overall cost of medical treatment for live animals. None of these organizational innovations is costless; indeed, a number of significant barriers must be overcome before such practices can be adopted more widely. In this paper, we take a detailed look at one organization's attempts to overcome some of these barriers and provide an assessment of the costs and benefits of doing so. Keywords: cattle markets, information transmission, source verification.

Grader Bias in Cattle Markets? Evidence from Iowa

Participants in U.S. markets for live cattle increasingly rely on federal grading standards to price slaughtered animals. This change is due to the growing prominence of ﾓgridﾔ pricing mechanisms that specify explicit premiums and discounts contingent on an animal's graded quality class. Although there have been recent changes in the way cattle are priced, the technology for sorting animals into quality classes has changed very little: human graders visually inspect each slaughtered carcass and call a ﾓqualityﾔ and ﾓyieldﾔgrade in a matter of seconds as the carcass passes on a moving trolley. There is anecdotal evidence of systematic bias in these called grades across time and regions within U.S. markets, and this paper empirically examines whether such claim is supported in a sample of loads delivered to three different Iowa packing plants during the years 2000-02. Keywords: cattle markets, grader bias, quality measurement.

Overcoming Information Barriers in Cattle Marketing

Beef consumption has declined steadily over the last two decades, both in total quantity and as a share of U.S. meat consumption. Reductions in the price of pork and poultry and health concerns about the effects of red meat consumption account for much of this trend. However, relative improvements in the quality and consistency of pork and poultry products may also be a factor. Perhaps it is no coincidence that the beef industry has trailed pork and poultry in adopting methods for vertical coordination among the various production stages from farm to market. Contract arrangements and vertical linkages—alliances among producers, processors, and retailers—are common in pork and poultry production. Beef production, on the other hand, mainly is still coordinated through traditional market structures