This study uses a unique firm-level dataset to examine how falling trade costs from 1993-2001 affected entry, exit, productivity, and exporting in the Korean manufacturing sector. We verify many of the predictions of recent heterogeneous-firm models of international trade. For example, falling...

Despite recent traces of economic growth, Ethiopia remains one of the poorest countries in the world. Though about 80% of its population is engaged in agriculture, agricultural productivity remains low and extremely vulnerable to climatic conditions. The adoption and use of modern technologies...

Brazil now is the largest coffee, sugar, and fruit juice producer, second-largest soybean and beef producer, and third-largest corn and broiler producer. It has overtaken the U.S. in poultry exports, nearly matches the U.S. in soybean exports, and dominates global trade in frozen orange juice....

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Internet use has grown rapidly over the last 15 years and so has its integration into the rural economy. Connecting to the Internet via high-speed technology such as DSL lines, cable, satellite, and wireless networks increases bandwidth and makes the Internet much more useful to businesses,...

Livestock Gross Margin insurance for dairy cattle (LGM-Dairy) is a risk management tool that can be used to insure a lower bound on a dairy producer’s gross margin. In this paper we (1) review the basic structure of LGM-Dairy (2) examine the sensitivity of Gross Margin Guarantee (GMG) and...

This study examines soybean grower adoption of the Roundup Ready® (RR) weed management program with and without a residual herbicide application, and grower concerns regarding weed resistance to herbicides using telephone survey data from of 357 growers in 2007. It also estimates the pecuniary...

This study examined adoption of ten best management practices (BMPs) to control weed resistance to herbicides. Using data from a survey of 1,205 U.S. cotton, corn, and soybean growers, count data models were estimated to explain the total number of practices frequently adopted. Ordered probit...

A farm’s physical investment is affected by its fundamental q and by its financial situation, with the later comprising both the firm’s liquidity and its possibility of facing capital market imperfections. This study determines the effects of government payments, depreciation, and inflation...

This paper tries to justify the observation of different return patterns in the upstream and downstream sectors of US beef production. It builds a dynamic rational expectation model separating the cow-calf and feeding sector with the former sector being the residual claimer. The model shows that...