Wayne C. Thomas

Separable Programming for Considering Risk in Farm Planning

This paper proposes use of separable programming for selecting farm enterprises which are efficient in terms of expected income and income variance. An empirical application on a croplivestock farm in the Columbia Basin of Washington is presented. The effects of removing statistically insignificant covariance terms and the error introduced by the linear approximation are explored.

Agricultural development in Alaska

Development during approximately 200 years of agricultural activity in Alaska has been varied and generally inadequate. Four stages are here identified. During the period from Russian and early American colonization to the late 1880s production was largely for personal consumption. From 1898 to World War II federal intervention stimulated local commercial agriculture, and from the late 1940s to the late 1960s commercial production expanded. Since then a state- supported strategy to develop an export-based agriculture has been tried, but implementation has not been completed. Alaska remains a frontier which has yet to find a workable manner in which to implement a strategy for its agriculture.

An alternative management system for Alaska Reindeer Herds

Abstract Extensive reindeer-herd management is generally conducted in conjunction with traditional subsistence activities. Herd ownership is restricted to Alaskas indigenous people and herd output includes meat, primarily for local consumption, and velvet antlers for export. Our approach is to define the extensive management system, then model intensive herd management using a profit-maximising, linear-programming framework. This allows estimation of the economic advantage of moving from extensive to intensive management. We determined that a substantial opportunity cost exists when the major emphasis of the herd owner is placed on subsistence activities. Given a high price for velvet antlers, herd composition under the intensive-management scheme concentrates on older animals because they produce heavier antlers. With intensive management, meat production is reduced compared with extensive management; however, with the present range-carrying, numbers of animals under intensive management could be increased, thereby expanding the output of reindeer meat by 60%.

Market Planning in Agricultural Development: An Alaskan Example of How Not to Do It

Less developed countries (LDC) often suffer from development malaise caused by discrepancies between export dreams and development structures. A major economic activity of LDC’s is in many cases concerned with raw material development for export. Infrastructure development, an internal economic activity, is often ignored even though such an economic goal could enhance export of raw goods. Without internal development, LDC’s remain dependent on activities requiring little capital support, i.e., subsistence agriculture. If such countries are to gain economic independence, both external and internal development objectives must be met to reduce dependence on subsistence agriculture and raise the capacity of the nation for self-generating economic growth. A major problem is the coordination of the internal and external development policies so as not to seriously limit each other. In this respect, governments often attempt to facilitate both of these activities by acting as an employer and an administrator for a substantial range of marketing and infrastructural development programs.