Agricultural Planning Expert is a software model designed for advising small-scale farmers in southern Maryland. Choosing farm enterprises is modelled as consisting of four activities: suggesting enterprises for consideration, investigating the suitability of enterprises, allocating resources to suitable enterprises, and controlling the overall direction of an advising session.

This paper investigates the factors that drive farmers’ simultaneous adoption of six water conservation practices (WCPs) and the intensity of their adoption. We estimate farmers’ adoption of these WCPs with a multivariate probit model, and for the intensity of their adoption, an ordered probit model is estimated. Our results show that gender, age, education, and farm size (among other factors) influence the probability and extent of adoption of WCPs. Furthermore, combinations like drip and/or sprinkler irrigations and cover cropping, drip and/or sprinkler irrigations and intercropping (among others) are complements, suggesting the bundling of these WCPs.

A number of aggregate agricultural labor market studies exist, typically concentrated on data at the national level. The Florida agricultural labor market, however, differs substantially from that of the rest of the nation, excepting California. In Florida, a large portion of the labor force is employed as harvesting labor. This is not only highly seasonal work, but also among the least demanding of skill. Also, over the period 1953-57 to 1967-69, the total number of farm workers declined in 49 states and by 43 percent nationally. During this time, Florida, however, experienced a 53 percent increase in hired labor usage, more than offsetting a 38 percent decline in family labor.

The U.S. export share in the world peanut market has decreased due to heavy competition. In this paper, the Latin American peanut industry is modeled using seemingly unrelated regression (SUR). Based on these estimations, a scenario analysis was conducted. The results show that the Latin American demand is not affected dramatically by either domestic or world price shocks. The effects of price changes on net trade are noticeable. However, the world price does not significantly affect the Latin American peanut supply. The results imply that Latin American peanut farmers are more sensitive to changes in domestic prices than world price changes.

Although South Africa accounts for half of the alternative meat market for the African continent, there remains a lack of information about consumer demand for plant-based and lab-cultured meat and its market potential domestically. This study reports the results of a nationwide survey of 649 South African consumers who completed a choice experiment in which they selected among conventional beef and three alternative burger patties at varying prices. Results indicate that holding prices constant and conditional on choosing a food product, 21% of the market share was estimated for plant-based meat alternatives and 38% for lab-cultured meat.

While it probably is not possible to cover comprehensively all the major resources issues in the South as we more into the 21st century, these three papers, taken together, give us a fairly good glimpse at some of the resource issues likely to dominate discussion in the next decade.

The issues raised in this paper session—concerning technical change, globalization, and chronic low returns in agriculture—are of long-standing importance in our profession. The papers, like many policy discussions in our discipline, have focussed largely on the U.S. agricultural sector. In this comment I will make some remarks relative to the domestic situation, but would also like to branch out a bit to address the worldwide impact of changing technology and increasingly open markets.

The difficulties associated with improving forest management practices on land held by farmers and other small landowners have been well documented. In North Carolina roughly four-fifths of all forest area is to be found in such holdings. To evaluate alternative strategies for improving land management, it is important to have information concerning the rates of change in land use on existing units. Aerial photographs provide a valuable source of this information, especially when flights have been made over an area at regular intervals extending back over several decades. In general, such regularity of aerial photo flights does exist for the continental United States. This article describes the use of such photographic data to construct land-use transition matrices.

The transhipment problem formulation has been and is still being used extensively by researchers to solve spatial equilibrium and plant location problems. Hurt and Tramel, King and Logan, Rhody, and Judge et al. have all treated the subject of alternative formulations of transhipment problems. This paper (1) proposes an alternative formulation of these problems using a negative-cost technique and, (2) suggests a matrix reduction scheme which will reduce computational time for some problems.

King and Logan used a three region, two-stage formulation of the transhipment model which was reformulated by Hurt and Tramel. As a point of departure, the same sample problem will be used to present the negative-cost formulation. This should enable the reader to more readily determine differences between formulations and decide which formulation best serves his particular needs.

This paper discusses plant location models applied to a honey processing-marketing cooperative firm with emphasis on sensitivity of findings to some alternative objectives and specifications. Though the study was nationwide in scope, the southern regions of the United States played a significant role in the analyses.

The first objective was to determine the number, size, and location of honey processing plants which would minimize total assembly, processing, and product shipment cost. In pursuit of the first objective, two of several questions receiving consideration were: 1. In comparing an optimizing least-cost result to an actual operating cost result, what is a valid specification of “actual” cost? 2. Is there a simple way of checking on the validity of a minimum cost solution?

An inverse live-hog demand model was estimated to analyze whether there has been a recent increase in the magnitude of live-hog, own-quantity demand flexibility. Estimating the impact of processing capacity-utilization rate changes on live-hog prices was a second objective of this research. Results indicate that live hog prices have become more responsive to changes in hog slaughter, slaughter weight, cold storage stocks, and changes in the processing capacity-utilization rate. Finally, model results indicate that the sharp increase in processing capacity-utilization rates, the increase in average dressed weight, and the increase in hog slaughter all had a negative effect on the live-hog prices.

A school system can be visualized as a firm utilizing capital and labor to produce its output. It must compete with other firms in purchasing its inputs. It is broadly concerned with efficient use of resources to produce its product. However, there is no well-defined product nor a price that can be attached to its product, and most of its product is not directly sold. Users (students) exert little pressure to increase efficiency, not only because they lack mature judgment and are unaware of input-output relationships (often inputs as well as outputs are ill-defined and uncertain), but also because efficiency gains are not passed to users. Furthermore, factors outside the school system influence output throughout the long production process. Even if the price mechanism does not work, economic principles can still be used in education to improve decision making.

This research identifies and quantifies the determinants of first-year academic performance in the College of Agriculture at Kansas State University, 1990–1999. Forty-eight percent of the variation in first-semester college grades was explained by high school grades, standardized test scores, socioeconomic variables, high school characteristics, credit hours completed, and major field of study. Approximately 62% of the variation in second-semester grades was explained. First-semester college grades explained 43% of second-semester grades. Several statistically significant relationships are detected, and the implications for students, advisors, and administrators are discussed.

Variations in price occur frequently in the U. S. shell egg industry and, consequently, interest has been widespread among the traders and the producers with regard to such price variations. Quantitative models for the specific purpose of predicting shortrun egg price have so far been conspicuously absent. The basic objectives of this discussion are first, to present an econometric model to predict quarterly shell egg price and, second, to explain the casual factors which appear to affect price in the immediate future. Finally, alternative methods of estimating the predictive model have been compared with regard to their relative predictive ability.

Forage production variability is incorporated into a decision theory framework for a beef producer in East Texas. The results suggest that the least risky, and also the most profitable, approach to intensive forage beef production is to plan for relatively poor weather conditions and low forage production. This results in a more diverse forage system and a smaller herd size than would be found optimal under the assumption of constant average forage production. These results also demonstrate that the assumption of constant average forage production may result in grossly exaggerated estimates of expected net returns.

This paper is concerned with analysis of economic feasibility of solar energy systems. Methodology for estimating energy output from different sized systems is briefly presented, and this is used to determine technical coefficients for a mixed integer model which optimizes the size of the solar heating unit for a particular use. An empirical example of hot water heating on a Georgia dairy is presented. Cost curves are provided for the dairy example to illustrate the effect of sizing on the economic feasibility of solar heating and to elucidate the structure of the optimal sizing decision.

Soybean Trader is a microcomputer simulation of international grain trading. The program uses the format of a graphics-oriented game to teach basic economic principles and to stimulate interest in agricultural trade. Profits from trading serve as a score, and competition is encouraged by ranking top scores in Traders' Hall of Fame. Results of tests with adult and youth audiences indicated that the program is an interesting and effective teaching tool.

Recent commodity price volatility and development of new futures contracts has kindled interest in hedging among farmers in many parts of the country. Due to the importance of feeder cattle production in Kentucky and in the South generally, recent development of a feeder cattle contract is of special interest. This paper addresses some potential problems associated with use of feeder cattle futures markets by Kentucky producers. Specifically, it tries to: (1) determine the effect, if any, of location basis variability on ex post hedging results in Kentucky markets versus delivery markets at Omaha and Oklahoma City, (2) assess the ability of hedging to reduce revenue variability as compared to cash marketing and (3) determining the presence of bias in feeder cattle futures prices.

Morale and faculty development are closely related. The agricultural economics profession must decide what it is about. There is room to practice the principle of comparative advantage and allow a degree of specialization in teaching, extension, and research. To continue in the role of an applied discipline, there must also be an opportunity for the young professional to establish rapport with, and understanding of, the private sector and the policy-making arena. If that is to happen, there must be encouragement in the institutional setting and by faculty colleagues who respect the importance of investment in building rapport and in establishing credibility. If that environment is present, morale should be good and faculty development will occur.

Discussion of changes taking place in American agriculture followed by a review of the traditional model of extension suggests there is dissonance between what is needed to inform contemporary agriculture and what extension actually does. The paper further suggests that difficulty in packaging the newly needed information in ways that achieve the institutional maintenance objectives of extension explain a part of the system's decadence and reluctance to change. Since the intellectual problems of market failure, even political market failure, are within the domain of economists, diffidence by agricultural economists to those issues within the Land-Grant system can make a difference.