The recent 9-billion-gallon increase in corn-based ethanol production, which resulted from a combination of rising gasoline prices and a suite of Federal bioenergy policies, provides evidence of how farmers altered their land-use decisions in response to increased demand for corn. As some...

Many of the Nation’s conservation programs seek to achieve multiple environmental objectives. Implementing a multi-objective program efficiently requires program managers to balance different environmental and cost objectives. A number of conservation programs use an index approach to...

The 2002 and 2008 Farm Acts increased funding for conservation programs that provide financial assistance to farmers to implement conservation practices on working farmland. Along with seeking cost-effective environmental benefits, these programs have a goal of spreading conservation funding...

Profit-maximizing land developers are hypothesized to configure subdivisions to minimize the effects of a conservation regulation on developed land values, subject to their expectations about the demand for developed building lots. This hypothesis allows development of a hedonic price model that...

Conflicts over agricultural water use have been an issue in the western United States and worldwide since the widespread development of irrigation. Water management institutions serve to ration scare water resources, but can impose costs on water uses. These costs can be difficult to measure as...