The Common Agricultural Policy and the Next EU Budget. Bertelsmann Stiftung Reflection Paper No.2: Preparing for the Multiannual Financial Framework after 2020. Paper prepared for Expert Workshop “CAP and the next MFF” Berlin, Federal Foreign Office, 30 March 2017

The Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) was set up in a time when (a) the memory about post-war food shortage was fresh, (b) Europe was a large net importer of agricultural products, (c) agricultural production was still highly labour-intensive, (d) food was a major item in a typical consumer basket and (e) significant shares of the work-force received their major income from the agricultural sector. The CAP objectives enshrined in Art. 39 TFEU (see box) clearly reflect this historical situation. When the Treaty of Rome was signed in 1957, it was understand-able that the standard of living of the agricultural workforce was a major issue and that “reasonable prices” for consumers were regarded as a matter of social stability

Meta Response Surface Design for General and Partial Equilibrium Models

Due to the complexity of general and partial equilibrium models, conventional sensitivity analysis, qualitative reviews or literature-based meta-analyses do not allow for detailed assessments of the role of individual parameters and policy shocks across different models. Therefore, the partial equilibrium model “GSIM” and a single country CGE are employed to generate synthetic scenarios based on randomly specified combinations of base data, elasticities and tariff changes selected from previously specified, plausible ranges. The synthetic meta-data has the advantage that the values of explanatory variables are measured exactly. This makes it possible to explore complex issues of functional form and interaction between variables in the estimation of the response surface of each model as well as for a joint response surface of both models. The results indicate that firstand second-order polynomials provide sufficient approximations of the model responses, and especially for the CGE model, interaction terms of elasticities with policy variables play an important role. Furthermore, simultaneous estimation of a response surface of scenarios from both models proves to be feasible and enables quantitative comparisons of different model output, e.g. welfare measures.General Equilibrium, Partial Equilibrium, Response Surface Design, Research Methods/ Statistical Methods,

The Welfare Effects of Greenhouse Gas Emissions in German Pork Production

Greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions are an externality of the pork production process. To respond to climate change concerns and reduce GHG emissions, internalizing this external effect using a market-based economic instrument would be economically efficient. We calculate the welfare effects of GHG emissions using a partial equilibrium model of the German pork market. Sensitivity analysis is used to investigate the impacts of emission prices and emission rates on the welfare effects of reducing GHG emissions. Potential overall welfare gains amount to roughly € 360,000 in the base setting and increase to roughly € 3 million when emission prices are tripled. This sensitivity highlights the need for more dependable estimates of key parameters such as emission prices and emission rates. However, even the largest estimates of these welfare gains are relatively small. By contrast, the distributional effects of internalizing GHG externalities in pork production for producers, consumers and the state are large in all scenarios. The large redistribution effects that follow from even a small pork price increase as a result of internalizing GHG emissions indicate that attempts to tie German pork production into such policies would be highly controversial but may create incentives to invest in technologies which mitigate GHG emissions.Welfare effects, greenhouse gas emissions, pork production, partial equilibrium model, Environmental Economics and Policy, Food Consumption/Nutrition/Food Safety, H23, Q18, Q54,

Semiparametric Evidence on the Nature of Price Transmission in Tanzanian Maize Markets

Maize is a major staple food in Sub-Saharan Africa. Monthly maize prices in Tanzania are analyzed since the country is an important maize producer and exporter in East Africa. We analyze price transmission between the five most important urban regions of Tanzania between 2000 and 2008 which correspond to major maize production or consumption areas. We propose a novel method for the analysis. The semiparametric vector error-correction model allows the partial impact of the past deviations from price equilibria on current price changes to be potentially nonlinear. The nonparametric estimates of these partial influences suggest that they can be adequately modeled by linear functions.cointegration, maize, nonlinear time series model, price transmission, semiparametric model, Tanzania., Crop Production/Industries, Marketing, C32, Q11, Q13,

International Synchronisation of the Pork Cycle

International Relations/Trade, Livestock Production/Industries,

Meta-Analysis of General and Partial Equilibrium Simulations of Doha Round Outcomes

Quantification of welfare changes due to trade liberalisation play a crucial role for political decision making. However, meaningful comparisons of simulation results from different sources are difficult. Often significant differences in simulated gains from liberalisation do not serve to increase confidence in quantitative assessments based on trade models. We employ a metaanalysis of applied trade simulations under the WTO Doha Round to identify model characteristics that influence the magnitude of simulation results, and to estimate the magnitude of this influence. Findings from our simple econometric model are plausible and show that each simulation experiment represents a complex interaction of experimental settings that may not easily be understood by and communicated to non-experts. Meta-analysis proves to be a useful tool for empirically assessing this complexity.Meta-analysis, CGE, Partial Equilibrium, Trade Liberalization, C00, C23, C68, F10, International Relations/Trade,

ASYMMETRIC PRICE TRANSMISSION IN THE ISRAELI CITRUS EXPORT SECTOR IN THE AFTERMATH OF LIBERALIZATION

The Israeli citrus export sector was liberalized in 1991 with the aim to increase citrus growers income and to improve overall efficiency of the international citrus marketing channel. However, the former government export monopolys activities were mainly taken over by four large companies accounting for over 90% of total Israeli citrus market exports. In addition, citrus exporters maintained the monopolys consignment system, substantially limiting transparency on how the grower price is determined. This lead the government to intervene in the newly liberalized market by implementing a minimum price agreement in the 1994/95 season to protect citrus growers against exporters abuse of market power. In this paper we analyze whether market power was exerted by exporting companies over citrus growers in the form of asymmetric price transmission. Our study is unique in that it investigates vertical price transmission across international borders, i.e. in the context of Israeli grapefruit exports to France. We explicitly account for possible changes in exporters pricing behaviour in the post-liberalization period. We apply an error correction model (ECM) to disaggregated firm-level Israeli grower price and French import price data. An ECM is estimated individually for each of the major exporting companies within a seemingly unrelated regression (SUR) framework. We find asymmetric price transmission in the first years after liberalisation, but symmetry in the second half of the 1990s. Our results indicate that growers losses due to asymmetry amounted to as much as 2.5% of their total revenues. Our results suggest that liberalization improved the efficiency of the Israeli citrus international marketing channel, but that this took time and was probably accelerated by government intervention.Crop Production/Industries, International Relations/Trade,

Asymmetric Price Transmission in the Israeli Citrus Export Sector in the Aftermath of Liberalization

The Israeli citrus export sector was liberalized in 1991 with the aim to increase citrus growers' income and to improve overall efficiency of the international citrus marketing channel. However, the former government export monopoly's activities were mainly taken over by four large companies accounting for over 90% of total Israeli citrus market exports. In addition, citrus exporters maintained the monopoly's consignment system, substantially limiting transparency on how the grower price is determined. This lead the government to intervene in the newly liberalized market by implementing a minimum price agreement in the 1994/95 season to protect citrus growers against exporters' abuse of market power. In this paper we analyze whether market power was exerted by exporting companies over citrus growers in the form of asymmetric price transmission. Our study is unique in that it investigates vertical price transmission across international borders, i.e. in the context of Israeli grapefruit exports to France. We explicitly account for possible changes in exporters' pricing behaviour in the post-liberalization period. We apply an error correction model (ECM) to disaggregated firm-level Israeli grower price and French import price data. An ECM is estimated individually for each of the major exporting companies within a seemingly unrelated regression (SUR) framework. We find asymmetric price transmission in the first years after liberalisation, but symmetry in the second half of the 1990s. Our results indicate that growers' losses due to asymmetry amounted to as much as 2.5% of their total revenues. Our results suggest that liberalization improved the efficiency of the Israeli citrus international marketing channel, but that this took time and was probably accelerated by government intervention.Demand and Price Analysis,

A Comparison of Threshold Cointegration and Markov-Switching Vector Error Correction Models in Price Transmission Analysis

We compare two regime-dependent econometric models for price transmission analysis, namely the threshold vector error correction model and Markov-switching vector error correction model. We first provide a detailed characterization of each of the models which is followed by a comprehensive comparison. We find that the assumptions regarding the nature of their regime-switching mechanisms are fundamentally different so that each model is suitable for a certain type of nonlinear price transmission. Furthermore, we conduct a Monte Carlo experiment in order to study the performance of the estimation techniques of both models for simulated data. We find that both models are adequate for studying price transmission since their characteristics match the underlying economic theory and allow hence for an easy interpretation. Nevertheless, the results of the corresponding estimation techniques do not reproduce the true parameters and are not robust against nuisance parameters. The comparison is supplemented by a review of empirical studies in price transmission analysis in which mostly the threshold vector error correction model is applied.price transmission, market integration, threshold vector error correction model, Markov-switching vector error correction model, comparison, nonlinear time series analysis, Agricultural Finance,