Recent legislative initiatives call for studies to evaluate costs associated with cleaning U.S. grains to meet more stringent standards. This paper reports on a study which developed a mixed-integer programming model of the U.S. sorghum sector to (1) determine the least-cost geographic location...

Obtaining estimates of pesticides productivity is an economic response to the growing public concern about the steady increase of pesticide use in the United States. This type of research indicates the cost of limiting pesticide use in terms of foregone output. Pervious empirical studies give a...

Aggregate data are commonly used to determine returns to storage. However, recent studies have shown that aggregating data may lead to underestimated returns. This article compares aggregate and elevator data from Oklahoma to determine if aggregate data underestimate returns. We find no...

One method of implementing value-based marketing is a component pricing system. This research develops and evaluates alternative component pricing systems for pork. Two electronic technologies for estimating carcass components (optical probe and electromagnetic scanner) were evaluated on two...

Public health officials and physicians are concerned about possible development of bacterial resistance and potential effects on human health that may be related to the use of antimicrobial agents in livestock feed. The focus of this research is aimed at determining the economic effects that...

Two methods were used to estimate the cost of forward contracting hard red winter wheat. One hundred days before delivery, the estimated cost of forward contracting ranged from six cents/bu. To eight cents/bu. Thus, further evidence is provided that the cost of forward contracting grain is not zero.

In an inverted market, current prices are higher than future prices and thus the price of storage is negative. Market inversions as measured with futures spreads rarely occur during early months of the crop year. However, market inversions frequently occur across crop years and near the end of...

This paper determines the effects of cattle feeders' risk aversion on feeder cattle prices using pen data of Kansas feedlots. Higher profit risk results in lower feeder cattle prices. The elasticity of feeder cattle price with respect to profit risk was small (-0.013). The risk elasticity...

One frequently proposed policy is to consolidate rural school districts in order to save money by obtaining economies of size. The effects of school district size on both expenditures and standardized test scores are estimated for Oklahoma. Results indicate that economies of scale with respect...

This article determines the accuracy of quarterly land value forecasts provided by bankers through the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City’s Survey of Agricultural Credit Conditions. Bankers’ qualitative forecasts of up, down, or no change are compared against actual, selfreported...