Frederick Rossi

The influence of gender and product design on farmers’ preferences for weather-indexed crop insurance

Highlights • We identify gender-specific needs and barriers to weather-index insurance.• We test farmers’ preferences for non-traditional weather-index insurance-savings bundles.• Our results indicate a gender gap in farmers’ weather-index insurance product preferences.• This gap appears to be caused by differences in institutional trust and financial literacy.• Bundled weather-index insurance-savings disinterest women; most farmers favor standalone inundation insurance.

Role of social capital in determining conservation attitude: a case study from Cat Tien National Park, Vietnam

The Cat Tien National Park (CTNP) is located in South Vietnam. This park is home to many rare and endemic species. However, Park resources face heavy anthropogenic pressure and some species are vulnerable to extinction. In this context, this study assesses the efficacy of social capital and other socio-economic variables in influencing conservation attitude of local people towards CTNP resources. Using suitable survey tools and regression analysis, we find social capital to be a significant determinant of the overall conservation attitude of locals. All components of social capital, except trust, are significant in explaining one or more indicators of conservation attitude. Among socio-economic variables, education, income and ethnic groups were significant in explaining the overall conservation attitude. We suggest that participatory conservation programmes should incorporate suitable actions for promoting social capital among local people as a part of their institution-building efforts. This may improve institutional stability leading to better resource conservation and improved welfare of local people.

Optimal Management of a Potential Invader: The Case of Zebra Mussels in Florida

Dominant users of Lake Okeechobee water resources are agricultural producers and recreational anglers. These uses will be directly affected, should the lake become infested with zebra mussels. We employ a probabilistic bioeconomic simulation model to estimate the potential impact of zebra mussels on consumptive water uses, recreational angling, and wetland ecosystem services under alternative public management scenarios. Without public management, the expected net economic impact from zebra mussels is -

U.S. Cotton Subsidies: Drawing a Fine Line on the Degree of Decoupling

244.1 million over 20 years. Public investment in prevention and eradication will yield a net expected gain of +

Agricultural Subsidies Under Decoupling

188.7 million, a superior strategy to either prevention or eradication alone.

What does benchmarking of wheat farmers practicing conservation tillage in the eastern Indo-Gangetic Plains tell us about energy use efficiency? An application of slack-based data envelopment analysis

The impact of the U.S. cotton policy depends on several interrelated factors; how input subsidies interact with producer price supports, producer price expectations, and the extent to which price supports are decoupled from production. Cotton subsidies have a direct impact on world cotton prices, depending on the extent to which price supports are coupled to production. At one extreme, there is a price impact of 12.4% when producers make decisions at the loan rate, but the average price impact is 20.9% when producers make decisions based on the target price. Results are presented for intermediate cases of decoupling.

Agricultural Subsidies in Developed Countries: Impact on Global Welfare

Following the World Trade Organization (WTO) ruling favoring Brazil over U.S. cotton growers, the debate continues over the impact of U.S. farm policy. For U.S. cotton policy, the price impact depends on several factors, including the extent to which it is decoupled from production. The impact on world cotton prices under decoupling (the loan rate is used in supply response analysis) is much less than under coupling (the target price is used in producer production decisions). Also, the welfare impacts are very different. Using cotton as an example, the welfare cost of U.S. cotton policy is much less under a decoupled program.