Journal of Agricultural Economics最新文献

{"title":"Remote‐Sensing for Herbicide‐Free Agriculture: A Bio‐Economic and Policy Appraisal","authors":"Eileen Ziehmann, Robert Huber, Robert Finger","doi":"10.1111/1477-9552.70000","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1111/1477-9552.70000","url":null,"abstract":"Pesticide reduction is increasingly incentivised in European agriculture but may generate trade‐offs. For example, replacing herbicides with mechanical weed control methods is associated with higher costs and exacerbated soil compaction and erosion. We develop a bio‐economic modelling approach to explore the potential of remote sensing technologies to measure weed pressure levels to reduce mechanical weed control interventions in herbicide‐free production systems. The model is applied to Swiss winter wheat production and accounts for different remote sensing technologies, production systems, and cost scenarios for mechanical control. The model is further used to conduct ex‐ante policy analysis, that is, to assess how fuel taxation affects the viability of different technologies. Our results show that remote‐sensing technologies have the potential to reduce the number of mechanical control interventions, but that these benefits vary across production systems and cost structures. We further find that fuel taxation has a limited additional impact on technology benefits.","PeriodicalId":14994,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Agricultural Economics","volume":"14 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":3.4,"publicationDate":"2025-07-26","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144712292","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"The Announcement Volatility Risk Premium in Agricultural Markets: Evidence From USDA Report Releases","authors":"Xinyue He, Siyu Bian","doi":"10.1111/1477-9552.12647","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1111/1477-9552.12647","url":null,"abstract":"The release of major reports by the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) has been documented to induce significant price volatility in agricultural futures markets, yet its implication on the pricing of agricultural options is much less understood. This study develops an announcement jump model to disentangle the option‐implied volatility specifically associated with monthly World Agricultural Supply and Demand Estimates (WASDE) report releases. Using data for corn, soybeans and wheat, we find evidence that these options are overpriced primarily with respect to the realised volatility observed on announcement days rather than on normal trading days, suggesting the existence of an announcement volatility risk premium. A long straddle position, formed by the simultaneous purchase of a call and a put option and providing protection against large price movements in either direction, generates a significant loss of 3%–7% only on report release days. Furthermore, we show that this negative return is unlikely driven by exposure to other risks and is more pronounced when the experts' forecast dispersion is high, indicating that market participants pay to hedge extreme volatility induced by announcements in agricultural markets.","PeriodicalId":14994,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Agricultural Economics","volume":"13 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":3.4,"publicationDate":"2025-07-10","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144594001","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"The Unintended Consequences of Farm Insurance: A Causal Investigation of Income, Productivity and Input Dynamics","authors":"Luigi Biagini","doi":"10.1111/1477-9552.12640","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1111/1477-9552.12640","url":null,"abstract":"Agricultural insurance is a useful tool for managing risk, and many governments offer support to encourage farmers to participate. However, empirical analysis exploring the dynamic effects of participation in these schemes is limited. This study investigates the causal relationship between agricultural insurance participation and farm productivity, income and input usage over both the short and long terms. Using the Italian Farm Accountancy Data Network between 2018 and 2022, the study applies a difference‐in‐differences approach that allows assessment of the dynamic impact of insurance. The findings reveal that insurance participation has a persistent negative effect on farm income and productivity, particularly in the early years of participation. This decline suggests moral hazard behaviour, where insured farmers reduce entrepreneurial effort. However, no significant long‐term changes were observed in fertiliser or crop protection usage, while usage increased immediately after insurance adoption but decreased in subsequent years. The results of this study suggest that while insurance is designed to mitigate income volatility during adverse events, it does not necessarily improve profitability or productivity because of reduced production incentives and higher insurance premium costs. The study highlights the policy challenge of designing agricultural insurance schemes that can improve risk management without weakening productivity growth.","PeriodicalId":14994,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Agricultural Economics","volume":"3 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":3.4,"publicationDate":"2025-07-10","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144594000","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Stage‐Specific Effects of Extreme Temperatures on Rural Labour Reallocation in China","authors":"Le Yu, Xiaodong Du, Qinan Lu","doi":"10.1111/1477-9552.12642","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1111/1477-9552.12642","url":null,"abstract":"Mitigating agricultural losses caused by extreme temperatures presents a global challenge. Using household‐level data on corn farmers in northern China from 2009 to 2017, this paper examines how farmers mitigate welfare losses caused by extreme temperatures by reallocating labour from farm to off‐farm sectors, accounting for the heterogeneity across crop growth stages during which extreme heat occurs. We find that extreme temperatures increase the labour supply in migrant off‐farm employment during the initial stage of the growing season, shift labour from corn cultivation to local off‐farm employment during the mid‐season and do not significantly impact labour allocation in the final stage. These labour shifts are primarily driven by production risks associated with yield losses and harvest failures, which reduce agricultural returns. Heterogeneity analysis reveals that farm households engaged in part‐time farming and those with low dependency are more likely to use labour reallocation as an adaptation to extreme temperatures due to lower mobility frictions. Our back‐of‐the‐envelope welfare calculations indicate that labour reallocation from agriculture to off‐farm employment, induced by extreme heat, mitigates up to 60.29% of agricultural losses. Ignoring this labour reallocation may overestimate the effect of extreme temperatures on farmers' welfare losses.","PeriodicalId":14994,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Agricultural Economics","volume":"4 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":3.4,"publicationDate":"2025-07-07","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144568597","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Agricultural Productivity Convergence in Latin America: The Role of Research and Development, Knowledge Spillovers, and Education Spending","authors":"Michée A. Lachaud","doi":"10.1111/1477-9552.12643","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1111/1477-9552.12643","url":null,"abstract":"This study examines the evolution and drivers of agricultural productivity, measured as Total Factor Productivity (TFP), across 10 Latin American countries from 1981 to 2012. Earlier studies using traditional time series unit root and cointegration methods have assumed common short‐ and long‐run parameters and therefore tended to confirm convergence across countries. This study estimates TFP using a stochastic production frontier model, then tests for convergence using a Panel Error Correction Model that allows for differences between countries and includes variables influenced by policy: cumulative R&D investment (as a proxy for knowledge), trade in capital goods (to capture knowledge spillovers), and education spending (as a proxy for human capital). The study finds no evidence of absolute convergence, that is countries are not all heading toward the same productivity level. However, conditional convergence toward different steady states is observed for all countries except Guatemala. Although most countries are moving toward separate productivity levels, investment in R&D, trade openness, and improved education can both close productivity gaps and raise overall long‐run productivity. The findings suggest that targeted policies in these areas are essential to support productivity growth in lagging countries.","PeriodicalId":14994,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Agricultural Economics","volume":"25 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":3.4,"publicationDate":"2025-06-20","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144335146","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Woody Plant Encroachment, Grassland Loss, and Farm Subsidies","authors":"Maximilian Meyer, Sergei Schaub, Petyo Bonev","doi":"10.1111/1477-9552.12641","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1111/1477-9552.12641","url":null,"abstract":"The UN Decade on Ecosystem Restoration (2021–2030) aims to prevent the degradation of ecosystems, such as grasslands, which play a key role in the provision of biodiversity, forage, and cultural ecosystem services. However, woody plant encroachment increasingly causes the loss of grasslands, which provide forage, are biodiversity hotspots, and are of high cultural value. In this paper, we evaluate the effect of agricultural policies in the form of farm subsidies on halting the loss of grasslands due to woody plant encroachment. To this end, we assemble a novel panel dataset that connects the farm‐level census data of Swiss alpine summer farms and high‐resolution remotely sensed woody plant encroachment data. To deal with the endogenous selection of claiming subsidies, we leverage an agricultural policy reform that abruptly and unevenly increased subsidies, allowing us to estimate the causal effect of subsidies at the farm level on woody plant encroachment. Our results show that an increase in subsidies causes a loss of 2% of grassland due to woody plant encroachment, which corresponds to an average loss of 4.7 ha of grassland per farm. Hence, our study highlights that the effect of subsidies can be complex and lead to unintended and not desired policy outcomes, which should be considered by policymakers.","PeriodicalId":14994,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Agricultural Economics","volume":"240 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":3.4,"publicationDate":"2025-06-19","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144328695","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Impact of Information Provision on Consumer Preference and Demand Within a Multitier Food Label System","authors":"Longzhong Shi, Xuan Chen, Wuyang Hu, Qi Jiang","doi":"10.1111/1477-9552.12637","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1111/1477-9552.12637","url":null,"abstract":"Current research on the impact of information provision predominantly pertains to binary food label systems, with limited discussion on multitier food label systems. We propose a parsimonious conceptual framework showing that information provision does not necessarily benefit the multitier labelled food market. The impact depends on how consumers misperceive the quality of labelled food and the extent to which information provision alleviates such misperception. We supplement our conceptual framework with an empirical investigation of China's eco‐labels. We find that information provision results in higher willingness to pay, market share and value of information for eco‐labelled aquatic products and a preference order aligning closely with the stringency of regulation on these eco‐labels. These findings, in conjunction with our theoretical framework, suggest an underestimation of the quality of eco‐labelled aquatic products. Our study provides policymakers and relevant stakeholders with a framework to identify the impact and conditions of information provision within a multitier food label system.","PeriodicalId":14994,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Agricultural Economics","volume":"11 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":3.4,"publicationDate":"2025-06-10","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144252357","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Environmental Regulations and Smallholder Farmers' Technical Efficiency: Empirical Evidence From Pastoral China","authors":"Mucong Xin, Shuhao Tan, Huanguang Qiu, Jianjun Tang","doi":"10.1111/1477-9552.12638","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1111/1477-9552.12638","url":null,"abstract":"Existing studies on the association between environmental regulations and competitiveness have largely been conducted at the country, industry and firm levels, with little attention paid to their impacts on the economic performance of small farming households. We fill this gap by examining China's grassland ecological compensation policy, an environmental regulation aimed at grassland protection that restricts small herder households' grazing activities. Our empirical analysis is based on a relatively large‐scale dataset of 570 herder households, and a stochastic frontier analysis is conducted to determine the technical efficiency of livestock production. The results show that the governmentally imposed grassland ecological compensation policy improves herder households' technical efficiencies, supporting the Porter Hypothesis, which suggests that environmental regulations trigger competitiveness. Further analysis shows that balance grazing, which is a less stringent regulation type, is effective in increasing technical efficiency, whereas grazing bans, which form a more stringent regulation type, fail to promote technical efficiency. This supports the narrow version of the Porter Hypothesis, which suggests that flexible environmental regulations have greater innovation effects than prescriptive ones. In addition, we find a positive and significant relationship between payment intensity and technical efficiency. Grassland plots covered by grazing ban and meeting ecological restoration standards should be converted to balance grazing to improve herders' technical efficiencies.","PeriodicalId":14994,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Agricultural Economics","volume":"25 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":3.4,"publicationDate":"2025-06-06","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144228638","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Foreword: The Role of Agricultural Trade in Countering the Effects of Extreme Weather","authors":"John T. Saunders","doi":"10.1111/1477-9552.12633","DOIUrl":"10.1111/1477-9552.12633","url":null,"abstract":"<p>The phenomenon of anthropogenic climate change is now well-established, with global temperatures in 2024 having already exceeded the Paris Agreement target ceiling of 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels (Copernicus <span>2025</span>) and extreme weather events (EWEs) an increasing occurrence. EWEs—including flooding, extreme heat, drought and wildfires—have profound implications for agriculture (Burke et al. <span>2015</span>; IPCC <span>2023</span>; Tebaldi and Lobell <span>2018</span>; Zhao et al. <span>2017</span>).</p><p>There has been extensive research on how agriculture will need to adapt to climate change (e.g., Huang and Sim <span>2020</span>), and how policies can facilitate that process, notably by building resilience (Lipper et al. <span>2018</span>; Wreford et al. <span>2010</span>). At the same time, agriculture will likely account for an increasing share of global emissions as other sectors decarbonise, and greater efforts will be needed to reduce sectoral emissions. The latter issue has been explored in recent papers in this journal (Kreft et al. <span>2023</span>; Sørenson et al. <span>2025</span>).</p><p>The impacts of EWEs have been a focus of analysis (e.g., Bezner Kerr et al. <span>2022</span>; Fabri et al. <span>2024</span>; Rosenzweig et al. <span>2001</span>), but the international spill-over effects across markets have received comparatively little attention. Each of the four studies in this <i>Special Focus</i> uses partial equilibrium (PE) modelling to explore how the impacts of extreme weather shocks reverberate across markets. These models are combined with a range of approaches, including stochastic draws based on historic weather variation; Superposed Epoch Analysis; a Combined Stress Index; and a fixed-effects regression analysis on the relationship between weather and overlapping growing periods, to identify and simulate the effects of foreseeable “worst case” scenarios.</p><p>The strength of PE models is that they can capture critical interactions within the agricultural economy with a relatively high degree of disaggregation, a strength which for some inquiries outweighs the weakness of treating other sectors exogenously (a weakness addressed by general equilibrium analysis, e.g., Gouël and Laborde <span>2021</span>). PE models are particularly useful for agricultural policy analysis, for example in assessing how producers and consumers respond to market shocks, and identifying policies that can be used to counter undesired impacts (such as high prices for consumers or suppressed farm incomes).</p><p>Each of the PE models used in this Special Focus has been developed by researchers representing some of the most notable institutions engaged in analysing agricultural policy and markets—the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD); China Agricultural University (CAU) and the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI); the European Commission's Joint Research Centre (JRC) and the Food","PeriodicalId":14994,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Agricultural Economics","volume":"76 2","pages":"239-240"},"PeriodicalIF":3.4,"publicationDate":"2025-06-05","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1111/1477-9552.12633","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144228560","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"The Impact of Extreme Weather Events on Global Soybean Markets and China's Imports","authors":"Xinran Hu,&nbsp;Yumei Zhang,&nbsp;Shenggen Fan,&nbsp;Kevin Z. Chen,&nbsp;Qi Wu","doi":"10.1111/1477-9552.12632","DOIUrl":"10.1111/1477-9552.12632","url":null,"abstract":"<div>\u0000 \u0000 <p>China imports 65% of the globally traded soybeans to meet the demand for vegetable oil and animal feed, accounting for about 85% of the country's total consumption. Extreme weather events (EWEs) significantly disrupt the global soybean market, with impacts transmitted to China. Using Superposed Epoch Analysis (SEA) and a global agricultural partial equilibrium model, this research examines the effects of EWEs on global soybean production, trade, and China's soybean-related sectors. The findings indicate that single-country EWEs have modest impacts, but simultaneous EWEs in multiple countries lead to global soybean production declines of 8.8%–17.1%, resulting in world price increases of 9.5%–33.2% and a decrease in China's imports by 1.5%–20.7%. Soybean oil and meal prices in China would increase by 0.8%–16.7%, and meat prices would rise by 0.1%–3.9%. Consequently, consumer spending on soybeans and meat may increase by 10.7–174.1 billion yuan. China's soybean stocks play a crucial role in mitigating the impacts of EWEs. Releasing stocks can limit soybean price hikes by up to 8.3% and meat price hikes by up to 1%, potentially lowering consumer spending on soybeans and meat by up to 37.4 billion yuan. Several measures are proposed to mitigate the impacts of EWEs and enhance resilience, including international cooperation for stabilising production, improving domestic stock and demand management, and building production capacity.</p>\u0000 </div>","PeriodicalId":14994,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Agricultural Economics","volume":"76 2","pages":"251-267"},"PeriodicalIF":3.4,"publicationDate":"2025-06-05","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144252358","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}