Market power and competition policy in food supply chains has emerged as an important economic issue in economics, and a highly sensitive item on the policy agenda. Consolidation is taking place in the food industry, both in high-income countries and in emerging economies, but the impact of...

In this article, I draw lessons from two quasi-natural experiments (the transition process in former Communist countries and the rapid globalization of food chains) on the optimality of farms and agricultural structures more generally. I argue that (a) the farm structures that have emerged from...