Over the last decade, commodity prices have registered substantial booms and busts marked by extreme volatility. Wheat in particular, one of the main non-oil commodities, has registered a roller-coaster in price levels which seems to be inconsistent with supply and demand fundamentals. To...

The agricultural sector is a central part of the Fiji Islands economy. Policies to alleviate poverty and stimulate economic growth need to be based on a sound understanding of the local agricultural systems involved. This understanding needs to extend to the responsiveness of production to price...

In a production process with a labor and a nonlabor input we show that the principals profits increase when she controls the nonlabor input. Furthermore output increases since the principal can allocate capital to help mitigate her information costs. However this mitigation of information costs...

In this paper we examine the effects of media coverage of commodity prices increases and decreases on the price of the commodity and how media coverage in other commodities affects prices. We provide evidence of the relationship between media coverage and its intensity to the price level of...

In this paper we assess the effects of the dramatic rise in agricultural commodity prices during 2007-2008 on income dynamics and poverty among rural households in Bangladesh. We use data from a nationally representative longitudinal survey of rural households in Bangladesh collected in four...

Until the world financial crisis struck, commodity and food prices seemed to be on an inexorable uptrend. The increases caused widespread concern about the effects of higher food prices on poverty. These concerns are relevant to the poor people everywhere but are especially relevant to poor...

In Queensland, at least 93 bodies exist to represent the interests of, and provide other services for, their farmer members, and their industries. The bodies vary greatly in: focus, roles and activities, priorities, resources, size, affiliations with other bodies, etc. Results from a survey of...

Seven different remaining value functions for tractors and harvesters were estimated using data from advertised prices for used farm equipment. The generalised Box-Cox model was used to nest six of the seven functions. The more complex Box- Cox function explained the data better, but simpler...

Understanding how producers make decisions to allot acreage among crops and how decisions about land use are affected by changes in prices and their volatility is fundamental for predicting the supply of staple crops and, hence, assessing the global food supply situation. The innovations of the...