We explicitly measure corn acreage response to the biofuels boom from 2006 to 2010. Specifically, we use newly available micro-scale planting data over time to test whether corn cultivation intensifies in proportion to the proximity of ethanol processors. We control for the endogeneity of plant...

This article quantifies the effect of the 2006 food-borne illness spinach outbreak on harvested acreage for the fresh spinach market. In September 2006, fresh spinach contaminated with E. coli O157:H7 caused hundreds of consumer illnesses across the U.S. and a few deaths. The outbreak was...

Agricultural support payments that cause no or minimal production distortions are exempt from World Trade Organization restrictions. If and how much decoupled payments, such as direct payments in the U.S., affect agricultural production remains an open empirical question with implications for...

This article focuses on the demand system of French farmers concerning pesticides uses. We estimate the demand elasticities of herbicides, insecticides and fungicides with respect to pesticide expenditure, and considering crop differentiation. Then we compare two indexes that are used in...

This paper examines the spatial externalities of conventional and organic pest control methods to determine if, and how, the two types affect each other. These interactions make the problem more complicated than the usual analysis of a single externality. The numerical simulation model includes...

For more than thirty years, studies about the effect of the exchange rate on exports have been conducted. However, few have considered the combined effect of the exchange rate on imported inputs into the agricultural system and the exports of final agricultural products those inputs produce. A...

Transgenic plants producing insecticidal protein derived from Bacillus thuringiensis (Bt) have been widely adopted since their commercial introduction in 1996. The widespread adoption of such plants has reduced use of conventional insecticides while attaining yield gains, thus providing...

Transgenic plants producing insecticidal protein derived from Bacillus thuringiensis (Bt) have been widely adopted since their commercial introduction in 1996. In 2009, 25 countries planted 134 million ha of transgenic crops. The widespread adoption of such plants has reduced use of conventional...

Many economists and others are interested in the phenomenon of rising alcohol content of wine and its potential causes. Has the alcohol content of wine risen—and if so, by how much, where, and when? What roles have been played by climate change and other environmental factors compared with...

There have long been concerns that federal crop insurance subsidies may significantly impact land use decisions. It is well known that classical insurance market information asymmetry problems can lead to a social excess of risky land entering crop production. Our conceptual model shows that the...