Most of the empirical literature in this area tends to analyze labor allocation decisions of economic agents using cross-sectional data. But such methods implicitly assume that model parameters are stable (constant) across firms and over time. The use of cross-sectional methods is therefore...

In the past three decades, farm families have relied on government payments and off-farm income to reduce income risk and increase total household income. Studies have shown that, as income effect dominates, government payments tend to reduce off-farm labor of farm operators and spouses. But...

This paper examines delinquency, profitability, and outreach determinants of microfinance institutions’ (MFIs) performance in Russia, the Caucasus, and Central Asia. The estimation is done using the Seemingly Unrelated Regression (SUR) technique. The estimation results suggest that the...

America’s agricultural producers continue to age. According to the U.S. Census of Agriculture, the average age of farm operators increased from 55.3 in 2002 to 57.1 in 2007. During the same period, the Census shows a thirty percent decrease in the number of farmers under the age of 25. Young...

This research examined factors influencing farmer purchase of crop insurance and receipt of disaster assistance payments using survey data for more than 13,000 farms across 27 U.S. states. Using a bivariate probit model some main findings are as follows. The probability of participating in...

Antimicrobial drugs are frequently fed to hogs at sub-therapeutic levels to promote feed efficiency and growth. However, in response to concerns that sub-therapeutic antibiotics (STAs) are promoting the development of antimicrobial drug-resistant bacteria, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration...

This paper investigates the effect of land fragmentation on farm efficiency in Kosovo utilising agricultural household survey data. To recognise heterogeneity among agricultural production systems in Kosovo, we estimate the technology separately for different groups or “classes” of farms,...

Prices for prime farmland have increased significantly in recent years. But, is the dramatic increase the result of a speculative bubble or is it consistent with market fundamentals with increases driven by growing global demand and recent changes to U.S. agricultural and energy policies? This...