CONSTRAINTS TO INCREASING LIVESTOCK PRODUCTION IN LESS DEVELOPED COUNTRIES: A LITERATURE REVIEW

Livestock Production/Industries,

EVALUATING PRIVATELY FUNDED PUBLIC RESEARCH: AN EXAMPLE WITH POULTRY AND EGGS

A procedure is described for evaluating poultry and egg research projects. A peer review questionnaire and benefit-cost analysis are utilized incorporating elasticities from an econometric model for poultry and eggs. Production, cost, and price changes are used to calculate changes in producer surplus and net economic surplus for a set of privately funded publicly conducted research projects.Public Economics,

Pesticide Use and IPM Adoption: Does IPM Reduce Pesticide Use in the United States?

In 2001, the United States General Accounting Office issued a report entitled “Management Improvements Needed to Further Promote Integrated Pest Management.” This report documents that overall agricultural pesticide usage increased from 1992 to 2000 while the use of the most toxic levels of pesticides have decreased. The USDA suggests that these changes in pesticide use could have been caused by integrated pest management (IPM) adoption. However, the GAO maintains that there is not enough evidence to support this claim. This paper contributes to this debate by estimating the relationship between pesticide use and IPM practices adopted for number of commodities across the nation from 1996 to 2005. The paper exploits an aggregated data set that combines surveys from different crops and different years, but it also examines specific surveys conducted on cotton and corn crops to better control for other factors that could affect pesticide use. The paper applies multiple definitions of IPM and uses different spatial variables to control for environmental effects that affect pesticide use. Although some specific strategies such as GM adoption decreased the amount of active ingredients sprayed on cotton and corn, the results suggest that on average the adoption of IPM strategies lead to slightly increased pesticide spending and pounds of active ingredient sprayed per acre. This result is confirmed in both the analysis on the aggregated data as well as the analysis of the cotton and corn data. The results also suggest that fixed environmental factors explain a significant amount of chemical spending and pesticide use in the United States. The significance of these factors demonstrates the importance of research and programs that aid farmers in making intelligent pesticide use decisions at the local level.Pesticide Use, Integrated Pest Management, Corn Production, Cotton Production, Agricultural and Food Policy, Environmental Economics and Policy,

Policy for plenty: measuring the benefits of policy-oriented social science research

This paper suggests practical methods for assessing policy research programs, both ex post and ex ante. Measuring the benefits of policy research is difficult: the path of causation between research and policy change is nearly always uncertain; multiple factors influence any particular policy change; policies are diverse in nature as are their intended and actual effects; and some effects of policy research are not priced in the market. Many of the benefits of changes in policy stem from the reduced cost of welfare-improving institutional change. Economic surplus analysis can be used to assess such changes. In some cases, Bayesian decision theory may be helpful in evaluating policy research, although it is usually difficult to obtain estimates of the probability distributions a decisionmaker has before the research becomes available. Subjective estimates of parameters and some measure of their degree of uncertainty, are likely to be needed for an economic surplus model. The paper suggests a set of steps for policy research evaluation. It is applied to two cases: an evaluation of pesticide policy research in Brazil, and an evaluation of policies affecting deforestation in Indonesia.Pesticides., Indonesia., Deforestation Brazil., Development projects., Impact assessment,

THE EFFECTS OF SECTORAL AND ECONOMY-WIDE POLICIES ON TOBACCO PRODUCTION IN THE DOMINICAN REPUBLIC

This study analyses the effects of specific agricultural and exchange rate policies on tobacco production in the Dominican Republic. Direct protection resulting from output and input subsidies and taxes was positive on average from 1966 to 1988, but total protection was negative when exchange rate policies are considered. Tobacco policies were quite volatile and resulted in increasing production in the 1970s but decreasing production in the 1980s. Overall, tobacco production was 4.8 percent less than it would have been had there been no policy interventions. Several reasons are provided for the policies.Dominican Republic, Nominal rate of protection, Tobacco policies, Agricultural and Food Policy, Production Economics,

AGRICULTURAL DEVELOPMENT PLANNING FOR AN AMERICAN INDIAN RESERVATION: THE CASE OF THE SISSETON-WAHPETON SIOUX TRIBE

Agricultural and Food Policy,

MEASURING THE RETURNS TO AGRICULTURAL EXPERIMENT STATION RESEARCH EXPENDITURES FOR CORN, WHEAT AND SOYBEANS

Research and Development/Tech Change/Emerging Technologies,

Potential Effects of Transgenic Rice on Farm Households' Nutritional Status in Bangladesh

The spread of agricultural biotechnology in developing countries has grown rapidly in recent years. Several transgenic products are under development with potential to address a variety of adverse production conditions. These products have raised hope that yield and quality improvements in rice will accelerate and help in the battle against under-nutrition, especially in areas of prevalent under-nutrition in Asia. A farm household model is developed and estimated to project ex ante effects of introducing transgenic rice on farm households¡¯ nutritional status in Bangladesh. Assuming the yield effects of transgenic rice are similar to that of previous high yield varieties, the model estimates the profit effect of introducing transgenic rice. The profit effect is then translated into effects on farmers¡¯ consumption decisions. The results indicate that the total profit elasticity with respect to the percentage of rice area in high yield variety is 0.08. The calorie elasticity with respect to the percentage of rice area in HYV ranges from 0.062 in non-poor to 0.074 in poor households, and the protein elasticity ranges from 0.075 in non-poor to 0.084 in poor. Therefore, the results indicate that transgenic rice is likely to play a significant role in improving farm households¡¯ nutritional status in terms of total calorie/protein intake.Food Security and Poverty,