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NEP: New Economics Papers
Agricultural Economics
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Edited by: Angelo Zago
http://ideas.repec.org/e/pza49.html
Universita degli Studi di Verona
Date: 2005-12-20
Papers: 14
This document is in the public domain, feel free to circulate it.
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In this issue we have:
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1. Consequences of Alternative Formulas for Agricultural Tariff
Cuts
Sebastien Jean; David Laborde; Will Martin
2. Estimation of the Contribution of Child Labour to the
Formation of Rural Incomes: An Application to Nepal
Federico Perali; Furio Rosati; Martina Menon
3. Developments in the Organization and Finance of Public
Agricultural Research in the United States, 1988-1999
Huffman, Wallace
4. Regulatory Choice between a Label and a Minimum-Quality
Standard, The
Marette, St?phan
5. Experimental Designs for Environmental Valuation with Choice-
Experiments: A Monte-Carlo Investigation
Silvia Ferrini; Riccardo Scarpa
6. Reconsidering the Environmental Kuznets Curve hypothesis: the
trade off between environment and welfare
Nicola Cantore
7. Identifying the effect of unobserved quality and experts'
reviews in the pricing of experience goods : empirical
application on Bordeaux wine
Dubois, P.; Nauges, C.
8. Organizational structure and the endogeneity of cost :
cooperatives, for-profit firms and the cost of procurement
Bontems, P.; Fulton, M.
9. Confirming the price effects of private labels development
Bontemps, C.; Orozco, V.; R?quillart, V.
10. Heterogeneity of preferences, limited commitment and
coalitions : empirical evidence on the limits to risk sharing
in rural Pakistan
Dubois, P.
11. Double informational asymmetry, signaling, and environmental
taxes
Manel Antelo
12. The Geographic Distribution of Disaster Damages across the
United States
Jeff Olson; Mark Skidmore
13. Two-part tariffs versus linear pricing between manufacturers
and retailers : empirical tests on differentiated products
markets
Bonnet, C.; Dubois, P.; Simioni, M.
14. Matchmakers in Wine Marketing Channels : The Case of French
Wine Brokers WINE BROKERS
Virginie Baritaux; Magali Aubert; Etienne Montaigne; Herv?
Remaud
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1. Consequences of Alternative Formulas for Agricultural Tariff
Cuts
Sebastien Jean
David Laborde
Will Martin
This paper assesses the impacts of alternative approaches to
liberalizing agricultural market access within the broad
guidelines provided by July 2004 Framework Agreement for the Doha
Development Agenda. Computations are carried out at the finest
level available on an internationally comparable basis, and take
into account non-ad valorem tariffs, tariff preferences and the
gap between bound and applied duties. Examination of different
tiered formulas shows that only formulas that bring about very
deep cuts in bound rates will have a substantial impact on
applied tariffs and hence on market access. Another key finding
is the extraordinary sensitivity of the results to self-selected
sensitive and special products.
Keywords: Doha development agenda; flexibility; sensitive
products; bound tariffs; applied tariffs; political
economy; agriculture; trade negotiations
JEL: D58 F13 P17 Q17
Date: 2005-09
URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cii:cepidt:2005-15&r=agr
2. Estimation of the Contribution of Child Labour to the
Formation of Rural Incomes: An Application to Nepal
Federico Perali
Furio Rosati
Martina Menon
This paper estimates the contribution of child labour to the
formation of household income in rural enterprises. The
contribution to household income from the employment of children
comes either from the employment on-farm at a shadow wage or off-
farm in the agricultural or other sectors. The paper uses a cost
function with household labour as a quasi-fixed factor in order
to estimate the shadow wage for each component of the household
labour force. The study also provides an estimate of contribution
of child labour to household income in the rural sector, both at
the household and national level. A set of simulation also
highlight the role that child labour plays in insuring household
subsistence and how it does affects income distribution.
Keywords: Child, Labour, Formation, Rural Incomes
JEL: D30 I2 J10
Date: 2004-06
URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wpc:wplist:wp10_05&r=agr
3. Developments in the Organization and Finance of Public
Agricultural Research in the United States, 1988-1999
Huffman, Wallace
This paper describes major external changes to the U.S. public
agricultural research system over 1988-1999; describes the
reactions of the public agricultural research system to the
external changes, specifying the innovations that have occurred
over the last decade; and draws conclusions about the present and
future performance of the U.S. research system. The decade of the
1990s brought slow growth to public agricultural research funding.
CSREES tried to stimulate greater interests in competitive grant
programs. The states have generally resisted this move. A major
asymmetry exists in the sharing of transactions costs associated
with external peer-reviewed competitive grant programs. This is
especially true when the average grant size is small and the
average award rate is low.
Date: 2005-12-09
URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:isu:genres:12485&r=agr
4. Regulatory Choice between a Label and a Minimum-Quality
Standard, The
Marette, St?phan
This paper revisits the issue of the regulatory choice between a
mandatory label and a minimum-quality standard. When the cost of
regulation is relatively low, we show that the socially optimal
choice depends on the producers? cost structure for complying
with regulation and improving quality. Under a marginal cost for
improving quality, the mandatory labeling is sufficient for
reaching the socially optimal level of quality. Under a fixed
cost for improving quality, we show that each instrument or the
combination of both instruments may emerge at the equilibrium.
Keywords: cost of regulation, information, standard.
Date: 2005-12-12
URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:isu:genres:12486&r=agr
5. Experimental Designs for Environmental Valuation with Choice-
Experiments: A Monte-Carlo Investigation
Silvia Ferrini (University of Siena)
Riccardo Scarpa (University of Waikato.ac.nz)
We review the practice of experimental design in the
environmental economics literature concerned with choice
experiments. We then contrast this with advances in the field of
experimental design and present a comparison of statistical
efficiency across four different experimental designs evaluated
by Monte Carlo experiments. Two different situations are
envisaged. First, a correct a priori knowledge of the multinomial
logit specification used to derive the design and then an
incorrect one. The data generating process is based on estimates
from data of a real choice experiment with which preference for
rural landscape attributes were studied. Results indicate the D-
optimal designs are promising, especially those based on Bayesian
algorithms with informative prior. However, if good a priori
information is lacking, and if there is strong uncertainty about
the real data generating process - conditions which are quite
common in environmental valuation - then practitioners might be
better off with conventional fractional designs from linear
models. Under misspecification, a design of this type produces
less biased estimates than its competitors.
Keywords: logit experimental design; efficiency; Monte Carlo
choice experiments; non-market valuation
JEL: C13 C15 C25 C99 Q26
Date: 2005-12-13
URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wai:econwp:05/08&r=agr
6. Reconsidering the Environmental Kuznets Curve hypothesis: the
trade off between environment and welfare
Nicola Cantore (University of York and Universit? Cattolica
del Sacro Cuore, Milan)
Past climate change literature paid great attention to the
welfare analysis of international agreements that stabilize
emissions over time on the basis of the New Welfare Economics
approach claiming ?objective? measures of well-being and
excluding interpersonal comparisons. In this paper, by using non
New Welfare Economics approaches we show that the involvement of
developing countries is not a desirable policy option. The
implementation of a ?Kyoto for ever? scenario including only
developed regions could be recommended because improves both
environment and welfare also if it does not generate a turning
point in the relationship between income and pollution (PIR). The
Environmental Kuznets Curve hypothesis (EKC) implies that a bell
shaped PIR would induce policy-makers to pursue economic growth
in order to overcome the air pollution issue. This normative
prescription crucially focuses on the role played by the
existence of a turning point in a context where only two
sustainability dimensions are important: the economic and the
environmental one. Our analysis shows that when we introduce a
welfare analysis, policy implications based only on the turning
point existence and consequently on the Environmental Kuznets
Curve hypothesis could be misleading. In our study a ?win-
win? policy as the Kyoto Protocol is recommended because the
existence of a turning point could be heavily paid in terms of
welfare. However results are sensitive to the choice of the
welfare measure.
Keywords: Environmental Kuznets Curve, climate change, welfare,
income distribution.
JEL: H0 H3 I3
Date: 2005-12
URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:inq:inqwps:ecineq2005-13&
;r=agr
7. Identifying the effect of unobserved quality and experts'
reviews in the pricing of experience goods : empirical
application on Bordeaux wine
Dubois, P.
Nauges, C.
When an experience goods is being released on the market,
experts' opinions or grades are supposed to give information
about the quality of the good to future customers. However,
whether released experts' opinion affects price setting by itself
remains an empirical question that seems difficult to answer.
Actually, unobserved true quality of the good makes the experts'
grades (supposed to be correlated with this quality) necessarily
endogenous in any "hedonic" price equation for experience goods.
Using panel data on french Bordeaux wine gathering information on
prices, characteristics and wine tasters' grades, we propose a
structural empirical appoach ? la Levinsohn and Petrin (2003)
allowing to disentangle the informative value of grades on
quality from the sole direct effect of grandes on price. Our
empirical results show that wine tasters' grades affect
positively price setting of "en primeur" wine (that is, new
vintages that have not been tasted by consumers) as well as
unobserved wine quality. Finally, the identified wine quality is
shown to be correlated with weather conditions at the growing
season, an evidence consistent with Ashenfelter's findings about
the effect of weather on prices of mature wines. ...French
Abstract : Lorsqu'un bien d'exp?rience est d?livr? sur le
march?, l'opinion des experts est suppos?e donner de
l'information sur la qualit? du bien aux futurs consommateurs.
Cependant, savoir si l'opinion des experts affecte la formation
des prix par elle-m?me reste une question empirique difficile ?
r?pondre. En effet, la vraie qualit? inobserv?e du bien rend
l'opinion des experts n?cessairement endog?ne dans une
?quation de prix h?donique pour des biens d'exp?rience. En
utilisant un panel de donn?es sur les vins de Bordeaux, les
auteurs proposent une approche structurelle permettant de
s?parer la valeur de l'information sur la qualit? donn?e par
les experts de l'effet de la vraie qualit?.
Keywords: EXPERIENCE GOOD; EXPERTS' GRADES; QUALITY; WINE;
IDENTIFICATION; STRUCTURAL ECONOMETRICS ; ECONOMETRIE;
EXPERT; QUALITE DES PRODUITS; VIN DE BORDEAUX; PANEL ;
BIEN D'EXPERIENCE
JEL: D82 L15 Q11 C5
Date: 2005
URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:rea:inrawp:200504&r=agr
8. Organizational structure and the endogeneity of cost :
cooperatives, for-profit firms and the cost of procurement
Bontems, P.
Fulton, M.
In this paper, we show formally that cooperatives can possess an
informational--and hence cost--advantage compared to For Profit
Firms (FPFs). Hence the standard practice of modeling the
cooperative and the FPF as having identical cost structures
appears to be theoretically unsound. The cooperative cost--and
hence production efficiency--advantage is directly linked to the
goal alignment between the cooperative and its members, and is
influenced by the extent of income redistribution betwen members
and the degree of rent seeking that takes place in the
organization. When there is no aversion to income inequality, the
members produce at their first best levels. However, as aversion
to inequality rises, the production profile of the members
converges to the production profile generated when the members
face an FPF. Regarding rent seeking if the more (less) efficient
members are able to get their profits valued more, total output
is increased (devreased). As a consequence, consumers may benefit
from the lobbying that occurs inside a cooperative where the
powerful members are the most efficient agents. ...French
Abstract : Les auteurs montrent formellement dans cet article que
les coop?ratives peuvent r?soudre des probl?mes d'agences
internes ? moindre co?t que les firmes poss?d?es par des
investisseurs ext?rieurs. L'hypoth?se standard consistant ?
retenir les m?mes structures de co?ts pour les deux types
d'organisation appara?t alors comme ?tant infond?e d'un point
de vue th?orique. L'avantage de la forme coop?rative en terme
d'efficience r?side dans le plus grand degr? de congruence
entre le manager et les membres. Cet avantage est ?galement
influenc? par l'?tendue de la redistribution entre membres
op?r?e au sein de la coop?rative et la distribution des
pouvoirs au sein de la structure. La production de premier rand
est obtenue lorsqu'il y a absence d'aversion pour l'in?galit?
au sein de la coop?rative. Si le degr? d'aversion pour
l'in?galit? augmente alors le profil de production converge
vers celui optimal au sein d'une firme poss?d?e par des
investisseurs ext?rieurs. En ce qui concerne l'effet de la
distribution du pouvoir politique, si les membres les plus (moins)
efficaces sont ? m?me d'obtenur une plus grande valorisation
collective de leur revenu, alors la production globale est accrue
diminu?e). Ainsi, les consommateurs peuvent b?n?ficier du
lobbying interne ? la coop?rative lorsque les membres les plus
puissants et donc les plus susceptibles d'influencer les
d?cisions sont aussi les plus efficients du point de vue de la
production.
Keywords: ADVERSE SELECTION; COOPERATIVES; FOR-PROFIT FIRMS ;
THEORIE DE LA FIRME; ORGANISATION; ORGANISATION DE
L'ENTREPRISE; COOPERATIVE
JEL: D82 L31 Q1
Date: 2005
URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:rea:inrawp:200507&r=agr
9. Confirming the price effects of private labels development
Bontemps, C.
Orozco, V.
R?quillart, V.
We study the price response of national brands to the
development of private labels. We use monthly data from a
consumer survey reporting their purchases for 218 food products.
We show that when private labels have a significant effect on
national brands prices (144 cases over 218), that is positive (
89%). We also show that the increase in the prices of national
brand products is explained by a strategy of product
differentiation. Finally, price reaction of national brands
differs with the type of private labels they are facing. This
paper confirms, on a larger number of products, previous
empirical results. ...French Abstract : Les auteurs ?tudient la
r?ponse en prix des producteurs de marques nationales au
d?veloppement des marques de distributeurs. Ils utilisent des
donn?es mensuelles d'achats issues d'un panel de consommateurs,
concernant 218 produits alimentaires. Ils montrent que le
d?veloppement des marques de distributeurs a un effet
significatif sur les prix des marques nationales (144 cas sur 218)
qui est positif (89%). Ils montrent aussi que l'augmentation
des prix des marques nationales est, en partie, expliqu?e par
une strat?gie de diff?renciation des producteurs de marques
nationales. Enfin, la r?action en prix des marques nationales
est diff?rente suivant le type des marques de distributeurs. Ce
papier confirme, sur un plus grand nombre de produits, nos
pr?c?dents r?sultats empiriques.
Keywords: PRIVATE LABELS; PRICING; EMPIRICAL MODELS; FOOD
PRODUCTS ; MARQUE DE DISTRIBUTEUR; DIFFERENCIATION DES
PRODUITS; PRIX; CONSOMMATION DES MENAGES
JEL: L81 Q13 D4
Date: 2005
URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:rea:inrawp:200506&r=agr
10. Heterogeneity of preferences, limited commitment and
coalitions : empirical evidence on the limits to risk sharing
in rural Pakistan
Dubois, P.
In this paper, we study the determinants of the value of
informal risk sharing groups. In particular, we look at the
effects of heterogeneity of preferences and of limited commitment
constraints that restrict feasible allocations differently if
individuals can deviate form risk sharing agreements in
coalitions or not. We test impirically several predictable
implications in rural Pakistan taking into account the
heterogeneity of households' preferences. Our results show that
exogenous size of risk sharing groups can be rejected or that
only imperfect risk sharing is obtained within the village
because of limited commitment and because of the risk of
coalition formation that needs to be deterred. ...French Abstract
L'auteur ?tudie les d?terminants de la valeur du partage de
risque informel dans un groupe. En particulier, il ?tudie les
effets de l'h?t?rog?n?it? des pr?f?rences et de
l'engagementlimit? sur les limites au partage des risques.
Plusieurs implications sur des donn?es au Pakistan sont test?es,
en tenant compte de l'h?t?rog?n?it? des pr?f?rences des
m?nages. Les r?sultats montrent qu'une taille, exog?ne des
groupes de partage de risque peut-?tre rejet?e ou qu'un partage
de risque imparfait est obtenu dans le village ? cause de
contraintes d'engagement limit? et ? cause du risque de
formation de coalitions.
Keywords: RISK; INSURANCE; RISK AVERSION; LIMITED COMMITMENT;
COALITIONS; PAKISTAN ; ASSURANCE; RISQUE; MILIEU RURAL;
THEORIE DES CONTRATS; PAYS EN DEVELOPPEMENT ; PAKISTAN
Date: 2005
URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:rea:inrawp:200505&r=agr
11. Double informational asymmetry, signaling, and environmental
taxes
Manel Antelo (Universidad de Santiago de Compostela)
This paper examines the effect of signaling on environmental
taxation when each polluter privately knows whether its
production cost is low or high, whereas third parties (i.e. the
rival firms and the regulator) have only a subjective perception
on such a cost. Consequently, there is both horizontal and
vertical asymmetric information, and each polluting firm can
strategically manipulate both the competitor and the
policymaker's prior cost perceptions. We show that if the
policymaker's ecological conscience is sufficiently high,
polluters wish to be perceived as low-cost firms and, to this end,
they will produce a high output level and they will emit a high
emissions level. Therefore, optimal pollution taxes are higher
than would be the case if firms' costs were not signaled in such
a manner as to force low-cost polluters, in an attempt to
distinguish themselves from high-cost polluters (by increasing
their output level and their emissions level), to reduce the
distortions in their production and also in their emissions
levels. By contrast, if the policymaker values environmental
quality less than consumption, environmental taxes become
negative (a subsidy per unit of pollutant emitted), but each
polluting firm continues to attempt to convince the other players
the rival firm and the regulator) that it is a low-cost supplier.
In this case, if the quantity produced by each polluter signals
its costs, over-subsiding holds as compared to the benchmark case
of non-signaling.
Keywords: Polluting firms, horizontal and vertical asymmetric
information, signaling and non-signaling, environmental
taxes
JEL: D82 L13 Q28
Date: 2005
URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cea:doctra:e2005_25&r=agr
12. The Geographic Distribution of Disaster Damages across the
United States
Jeff Olson (Department of Geography, Ohio State University)
Mark Skidmore (Department of Economics, University of
Wisconsin - Whitewater)
In this paper we examine the geographic distribution of economic
damages caused by natural disasters throughout the United States.
Some economists have advocated the use of appropriately priced
comprehensive natural disaster insurance as a means of disaster
mitigation. The presumption implicit in the comprehensive
disaster framework is that natural disasters are not uniformly
distributed across the nation. While it clear that disasters
occur more frequently and cause more damages in some regions than
in others, limitations on the availability of and public access
to disaster damage data have constrained researchers in their
examination of the actual experiences across the states. Which
states have the most damages resulting from natural disaster
events? The objective of the paper is to compile information on
disaster damages from multiple sources and present the spatial
distribution of damages across the country. Some of the results
are in line with what one might expect. However, we document some
surprising results. The research also demonstrates the paucity of
data on disaster damages over time and across space, highlighting
the need for a systematic and comprehensive single public source
of information on disaster damages for all types of natural
hazards.
Date: 2005-08
URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:uww:wpaper:05-05&r=agr
13. Two-part tariffs versus linear pricing between manufacturers
and retailers : empirical tests on differentiated products
markets
Bonnet, C.
Dubois, P.
Simioni, M.
We present a methodology allowing to introduce manufacturers and
retailers vertical conracting in their pricing strategies on a
differentiated product market. We consider in particular two
types of non linear pricing relationships, one where resale price
maintenance is used with two part tariffs contracts and one where
no resale price maintenance is allowed in two part tariffs
contracts. Our contribution allows to recover price-cost margins
from estimates of demand parameters both under linear pricing
models and two part tariffs. The methodology allows then to test
between different hypothesis on the contracting and pricing
relationships between manufacturers and retailers in the
supermarket industry using exogenous variables supposed to shift
the marginal costs of production and distritution. We apply
empirically this method to study the market for retailing bottle
water in France. Our empirical evidence shows that manufacturers
and retailers use non linear pricing contracts and in particular
two part tariffs contracts with resale price maintenance. At last,
thanks to the estimation of our structural model, we present
some simulations of counterfactual policy experiments like the
change of pricing policies from two part tariffs to linear
pricing between manufacturers and retailers, or the change of
ownership of some products between manufacturers. ...French
Abstract : Dans cet article, les auteurs pr?sentent une
m?thodologie permettant de mod?liser des contrats dans les
strat?gies de fixation des prix des distributeurs et des
producteurs sur un march? o? les produits sont diff?renci?s.
Notamment, ils consid?rent deux types de contrats ? tarifs
bin?mes pour mod?liser les relations verticales : avec ou sans
prix de revente impos?s par les producteurs. Ce papier permet de
d?terminer les marges prix-co?t ? partir de param?tres
estim?s de la demande ? la fois pour des mod?les de double
marginalisation et pour des mod?les ? tarifs bin?mes.
Diff?rentes hypoth?ses sur les relations entre producteurs et
distributeurs sont alors test?es en utilisant des variables
exog?nes suppos?es faire varier les co?ts marginaux de
production et de distribution. Les auteurs appliquent
empiriquement cette m?thode au march? de l'eau plate nature
embouteill?e en France. Les r?sultats empiriques montrent que
les producteurs et les distributeurs utilisent des contrats ?
tarifs bin?mes avec prix de revente impos?s. De plus, gr?ce
aux estimations du mod?le structurel, les auteurs simulent des
changements de propri?t? des produits entre producteurs et
distributeurs ainsi que des changements de la politique de
fixation des prix dans les relations verticales.
Keywords: VERTICAL CONTRACTS; TWO PART TARIFFS; MANUFACTURERS;
RETAILERS; DOUBLE MARGINALIZATION; COLLUSION;
COMPETITION; WATER; DIFFERENTIATED PRODUCTS; NON NESTED
TESTS ; CONTRAT; PRODUCTEUR; DISTRIBUTION; COUT
MARGINAL; CONCURRENCE ECONOMIQUE; DIFFERENCIATION DES
PRODUITS; PRIX; EAU MINERALE; MODELE
JEL: L13 L81 C12 C3
Date: 2005
URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:rea:inrawp:200509&r=agr
14. Matchmakers in Wine Marketing Channels : The Case of French
Wine Brokers WINE BROKERS
Virginie Baritaux (UMR MOISA - INRA - Montpellier France)
Magali Aubert (UMR MOISA - INRA - Montpellier France)
Etienne Montaigne (UMR MOISA - AGRO.M - Montpellier France)
Herv? Remaud (UMR MOISA-AGRO.M - Montpellier France)
Wine brokers are wholesale intermediaries. They belong to the
category of the matchmaker intermediaries. These middlemen are
not well known. Their role is to help buyers and sellers of bulk
wine to meet and transact. Assuming that wine merchants appeal to
brokers because they reduce transaction costs, we analyze how a
broker intervention can reduce search costs, negotiation costs,
and monitoring and enforcement costs of a transaction on bulk
wine. A data base of contracts on bulk vins de table and vins de
pays is used to estimate a logistic model of the probability
?broker intervention?.
Keywords: Broker, Matchmaker, Marketing Channels, Wine,
Transaction costs, France
JEL: L11 L14 L22
Date: 2005-12-15
URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wpa:wuwpio:0512007&r=agr
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