The Texas Panhandle relies largely on the Ogallala Aquifer for access to water for irrigated agricultural production. With current pumping rates and slow recharge rates, the aquifer will at some point in the future no longer be an economically viable source of water for agriculture. The...

Selected Paper prepared for presentation at the Southern Agricultural Economics Association Annual Meeting, Orlando, FL, February 6-9, 2010

Soybean prices are determined by interaction between various factors. At an elevator, discount prices for unique characteristics can range from 0.02 cents per bushel to 7.71 cents per bushel of soybeans. This variation suggests that producers of soybeans need quality-characteristic specific...

This paper uses experimental methods to examine how individuals react to a set of voluntary incentives related to the conservation of a resource. The goal was to determine whether conservation over a critical area, such as a deep portion of an aquifer, could be encouraged, and whether...

Estimating non-market value on a site-by-site basis is a costly and time-consuming task. Benefits transfer is an alternative approach. We attempt to assess the bias and reliability of predicted value from the benefit transfer approach, using the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Services' National Survey...

Impacts of an export tax on growth in the cotton and yarn markets were examined. Results of a simulation show that the export tax on raw fiber decreased the rate of growth in the fiber sector by 80%, and also decreased growth in yarn production by 0.7%.