Agricultural producers have been experiencing significant income pressures, leading to a search for alternative sources of income. One of such is value-added agricultural businesses that allow the farmers to stay on the farm and undertake entrepreneurial ventures to improve their finances. How...

The IFAMR is published quarterly by the International Food and Agribusiness Management Assocation. www.ifama.org

This research examines the robustness of four different estimation approaches to evaluate their ability to estimate a “true” cost frontier and associated economic measures. The manuscript evaluates three parametric methods including a two-sided error system, OLS with only positive errors,...

The case begins with an examination of Land O' Lakes' diversified portfolio of businesses. The business had undergone significant changes since 1998 - it dominated market share in butter and deli cheese, had become the largest crop protection, plant nutrient, and feed manufacturer in the US, and...

Health care costs particularly those associated with chronic health conditions such as cancer have been significantly increasing for both individuals and governments in the past decades, prompting the demand for preventative medical initiatives, such as functional food, and spawning a new...

Welch Foods saw its purpose as building long-term value in the cooperative and releasing that value back to the grower-owners over time and to provide a reliable market for their grapes through excellence in product quality, customer service, market responsiveness and consumer satisfaction....

Sustainability initiatives are frequently imposed on upstream supply chain members by their more powerful downstream partners. This paper assesses the challenges of estimating costs and benefits for participants and the difficulties associated with identifying their locations and effects in the...

An optimization model to sequence wine flow through the production process is developed. The model is formulated as a mixed integer program and accounts for winemaking specifications, market conditions, grape availability, and tank capacity. An empirical example is provided to demonstrate...

Changes in international trade agreements while retaining protectionist sugar policies have led to the opportunity for confectionery manufacturers to relocate to take advantage of favorable international trade policies. Results suggest that NAFTA did not have a significant impact on location...