DeeVon Bailey

Experimental Evidence on Willingness to Pay for Red Meat Traceability in the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, and Japan

We employed Vickrey auctions to generate willingness-to-pay (WTP) data for red meat traceability and related product characteristics with comparable experimental auctions in the United States, Canada, the U.K., and Japan. The results show that subjects are willing to pay a nontrivial premium for traceability, but the same subjects show even higher WTP for traceability-provided characteristics like additional meat safety and humane animal treatment guarantees. The implication is that producers might be able to implement traceable meat systems profitably by tailoring the verifiable characteristics of the product to consumer preferences.

Livestock Markets and Risk Management Among East African Pastoralists: A Review and Research Agenda

This paper provides an overview of the state of the livestock marketing channel in southern Ethiopia and northern Kenya, based mainly on secondary data, examines the relevant literature dealing with risk in livestock markets in sub-Saharan Africa, determines critical livestock marketing research needs in our study area of southern Ethiopia and northern Kenya and introduces a conceptual framework that we think can usefully guide further empirical research. We also examine methodologies that could be used to evaluate the market risks faced by pastoralists.

Subdiscipline-Specific Journal Rankings: Whither Applied Economics?

In light of widespread specialization of research and teaching, it seems appropriate to supplement the existing general rankings of economics journals with subdiscipline-specific rankings. That is the primary objective of this paper. The availability of subdiscipline-specific rankings also permits both (i) alternative journal ranking methods for the general discipline that account for the breadth of a journals impact across specialized fields, and (ii) estimation of the relative weights implicitly associated with each field in traditional disciplinary journal rankings. The results are robust to the exclusion of self-citations.

A Comparison of Video Cattle Auction and Regional Market Prices

The number of cattle sold through video auctions has increased substantially during the past five years. The nations largest video cattle auction offered over 450,000 cattle for sale in 1988. This study compares price differences between the nations largest satellite video cattle auction and three large regional auctions. Prices for both the regional and video auctions were adjusted for quality differences, transportation costs, commissions, and days to delivery. Net prices paid by buyers and received by sellers in video auctions exceeded the prices for three major regional auction markets.

MARKET OPPORTUNITIES AND THREATS TO THE U.S. PORK INDUSTRY POSED BY TRACEABILITY SYSTEMS

This paper demonstrates that the U.S. pork industry is lagging its principal international competitors and major international customers in terms of developing programs for traceability, transparency, and assurance (TTA). The primary areas of weakness in U.S. TTA programs are at the producer-level and in the area of providing consumers quality assurance regarding inputs used in producing pork products. We conclude that the U.S. pork industry may diminish its competitive advantage in world pork markets if it fails to enhance its TTA programs.

Government Programs and Adoption of Conservation Tillage Practices on Nonirrigated Wheat Farms

A whole-farm simulation analysis is used to investigate producer preferences for adoption of separate tillage practices (minimum-till, combination-till, or no-till) under provisions of both the 1981 and 1985 farm bills. An analysis of preference for participation or nonparticipation in government programs under both farm bills is also considered. For risk-averse producers, a combination-tillage practice with program participation is found to dominate (as measured by stochastic dominance) the other strategies considered under both the 1981 and 1985 provisions.

Identifying Buyer Market Areas and the Impact of Buyer Concentration in Feeder Cattle Markets Using Mapping and Spatial Statistics

The size and shape of market areas for buyers from four major cattle feeding areas are determined by mapping data from the nations largest video auction. Spatial statistics are also examined to determine their ability to identify market areas for feeder cattle. Mapping shows that procurement areas for feeder cattle buyers are large, irregularly shaped, and overlap substantially. A new statistic was developed to determine primary market areas. Feeder cattle buyers behave as oligopsonists in counties where most buyers are from one feeding area, and prices are higher for feeder cattle in counties where two or more market areas overlap.

Short-Run Supply Responses in the U.S. Beef-Cattle Industry

This article investigates the response of beef-cattle producers to changes in the price of cattle. Previous research has suggested that there may be a negative short-run supply response to a permanent increase in the price of cattle. We build a dynamic, rational expectations model that separates the markets for fed and unfed beef. This separation generates predictions that the supply response is generally positive, even for permanent shocks in the short run, and nests the negative supply response as a special case for appropriately restricted demand shocks. Copyright 2001, Oxford University Press.

Buyer Concentration at Feeder Cattle Auctions

The influence of buyer concentration in two large feeder cattle auctions on feeder cattle prices at the auctions was investigated. Buyer concentration increased slightly for steers and heifers at one of the auctions between 1987 and 1989 and the increased concentration was estimated to have depressed prices an average of

Rigidity in Packer-Feedlot Relationships

0.05/cwt. Overall, prices at the other auction were depressed by an average of