On-Farm Adjustments to Relative Price Changes

What can be done on a dairy-hog farm to help maintain income if dairy prices drop more than hog prices - or if hog prices drop more than dairy prices? One way to maintain or improve income is to make on-farm adjustments to gear production to the changes in the relative prices

Competitive position of small dairy herds on north-central Iowa farms

The number of farms with dairy herds in north-central Iowa has decreased sharply over the last decade. Whereas the majority of farms previously had dairy herds, many fewer now have them. This report is concerned with the competitive position of dairying on farms which now have small herds of 8-14 cows. It explores adjustment opportunities and appraises the possibilities of improving net incomes on north-central Iowa farms where dairying is an enterprise but not the basis of farm organization and where milk is sold on a grade B basis. Alternative adjustments considered are: (1) transfer of resources now used in dairying to other enterprises, including the use of more fertilizer; (2) improvement of the production practices used in the dairy enterprise; and (3) a combination of the two types of adjustments. The analysis is applied to owner-operated and tenant- operated 160-acre and 240-acre farms with current and additional amounts of operating capital and labor. The income changes reflected by these transfers refer to prices listed in table 3. The transfer of resources now used for small grade B dairy herds to crop production, fertilization and hog production would increase net incomes significantly. This increase could be realized with the operating capital and labor already on these farms. The acreages of corn and soybeans and the use of fertilizer would be increased. The production of hogs would be increased from about 15 to 40 litters of spring and fall pigs. Where buildings and other facilities restrict hogs to 20 litters, however, the optimum farm plan is close to the present organization, except for the substitution of soybeans for part of the present acreage of oats and the use of higher rates of fertilizer on all crops. The dairy herd would be reduced to eight cows. Net income would be increased about 10 percent

Adjustments to meet changes in prices and to improve incomes on dairy farms in northeastern Iowa (An application of programming methods in deriving supply responses and imputed resource values)

Prices of dairy products, particularly those for butter, turned downward in 1952. Costs of producing these products have remained relatively high and are increasing for many farms. Consequently, net returns on midwestern dairy farms have declined. Farmers on dairy and dairy-hog farms are concerned about changes in farming which can be made to meet the unfavorable price-cost relationships. Major shifts from one enterprise to another often are difficult. They may mean additional expenditures, particularly if the farm is well adapted to a single enterprise. Minor changes and shifts between different enterprises, however, may call for only small new investments, if any. In addition, an individual farm operator often can better his income position by making adjustments which reduce the unit cost of production - changes which will enable him to produce more product with the same resources, if not the same amount of product with fewer resources

Electrospinning as a route to advanced carbon fibre materials for selected low-temperature electrochemical devices: a review

Electrospinning has been proven as a highly versatile fabrication method for producing nano-structured fibres with controllable morphology, of both the fibres themselves and the void structure of the mats. Additionally, it is possible to use heteroatom doped polymers or to include catalytic precursors in the electrospinning solution to control the surface properties of the fibres. These factors make it an ideal method for the production of electrodes and flow media for a variety of electrochemical devices, enabling reduction in mass transport and activation overpotentials and therefore increasing efficiency. Moreover, the use of biomass as a polymer source has recently gained attention for the ability to embed sustainable principles in the materials of electrochemical devices, complementing their ability to allow an increase in the use of renewable electricity via their application. In this review, the historical and recent developments of electrospun materials for application in redox flow batteries, fuel cells, metal air batteries and supercapacitors are thoroughly reviewed, including an overview of the electrospinning process and a guide to best practice. Finally, we provide an outlook for the emerging use of this process in the field of electrochemical energy devices with the hope that the combination of tailored microstructure, surface functionality and computer modelling will herald a new era of bespoke functional materials that can significantly improve the performance of the devices in which they are used