Recent research shows that disparities between willingness to pay (WTP) and willingness to accept (WTA) disappear with market experience and training. In effect, preferences can be refined by eliminating subjects’ misconceptions regarding elicitation procedures. We use a stated measure of confidence as a proxy for misconceptions and test the influence of confidence on truthful revelation of induced values in WTP and WTA auctions using the Becker-DeGroot-Marschak (BDM) mechanism. The results indicate that confidence matters for buyers and sellers. With confidence, WTA and WTP measures converge, and people with greater confidence choose the dominant bidding strategy more frequently.

Grain supply is the joint effect of both area and yield; however, research often targets either one or the other. The research presented here estimates the complete supply elasticity of grains using novel approaches to approximate producers’ price and weather expectations on both yield and acres planted. The results from this approach combining acreage and yield show the negative impact of expanded production on average yields and the supply response. Additionally, the research extends previous methods of approximating producers’ price expectations through the use of historical basis prices.

This study explored factors influencing consumers' beverage consumption. Consumers drank greater shares of beverages perceived as healthy and, in most cases, drank smaller shares of a beverage when they perceived alternative beverages as more healthy. One exception was carbonated sugar-sweetened beverages; the share of their consumption increased as health perceptions of 100 percent juice increased and vice versa. Another important determinant of beverage consumption share was objective and subjective health knowledge. Beverage drinking habit, which was measured by whether a beverage was consumed daily or weekly, was the most significant factor in explaining a beverage's diet share.

The fresh produce sector is subject to season-specific market conditions so understanding differential impacts of various factors across marketing periods is important. We analyze the market structure, key factors influencing shipments, and seasonal price relationships in regional apple markets at the shipping-point and terminal-market levels using a symmetric variable threshold autoregressive model that allows threshold bands (which define price ranges considered in shipping decisions) to vary seasonally. We find that transportation costs and seasonality have a significant impact on threshold bands of market pairs and that the impact varies seasonally. This varying band across seasons may represent suppliers who perceive more or less opportunities to adjust their supply between regional markets and gain advantage by being responsive to market conditions.

We compare the research productivity of faculties housed in departments offering doctoral degrees in agricultural economics (AgEcon) with faculties housed in departments offering doctoral degrees in economics (Econ) that specialize in environmental and resource economics. Rankings are based on faculty publications in EconLit between 1985 and 2010. We find that AgEcon departments publish more papers and rate higher overall on productivity measures than Econ departments but that average productivity is greater for Econ departments. AgEcon publications dominate the Journal of Economic Literature's (JEL's) agriculture (Q1) subdiscipline while Econ and AgEcon departments publish evenly in the other Q subdisciplines.

Due to expanding trade and increasing concentration of production during the past few decades, small local farms have faced ever-growing competitive pressures. We investigate the impacts of this globalization on production of local food by examining Hawai‘i's open island economy and econometrically evaluating impacts of import competition on the growth and survival of individual fruit and vegetable farms. We find evidence that rising levels of imports significantly hinder farm growth in Hawai'i and have a smaller impact on farm survival. Increased foreign competition increases the likelihood of exit for commercial farms but has little effect on small noncommercial farms.

A key organizational decision for retailers is whether to self-distribute or rely on a wholesaler-supplied network and yet little is known about the impact of this strategic choice on store-level productivity. We estimate a stochastic frontier model for food retailers that accounts for selectivity effects linked to the choice of distribution strategy. We find that adoption of data-sharing technologies has a positive impact on store-level gross margins of stores in self-distributing chains. Technical inefficiency among U.S. food retailers leads to a gross margin that is around $5,000 less for a conventional food retailer and about $7,670 less for a supercenter.

This study examines the relationship between generic advertising and perceived value for 100 percent orange juice using data from a survey on consumption, perceived value, advertising awareness, and other key measures. We investigate the relationships between consumption and perceived value and between generic advertising and perceived value and identify features of generic advertising of orange juice that have the greatest influence on consumers. Our analysis indicates that perceived value is strongly associated with increased consumption and is influenced by generic advertising. Generic advertising is most effective when consumers view the content of the ads as genuine and relevant.

This study examines the impact of publicly supported insurance on agricultural land values. The analysis employs confidential, nationally representative panel data on field-level pastureland values and exploits a natural experiment provided by gradual introduction of the Pasture, Rangeland, and Forage Insurance Pilot Program. We use a field-level fixed-effects model that controls for several time-variant factors. We find that insurance availability is associated with an increase of at least 4 percent in pastureland values. This increase is comparable with increases generated by other government programs but is much smaller than total farmland value increases experienced in recent years.

We estimate a demand system for ten nonalcoholic beverages to disentangle effects of prices, expenditures, advertising, and demographics on demand for nonalcoholic beverages for 1999 through 2010. We find that changes in demographic composition of the population between 1999 and 2008 played a much bigger role in observed purchasing patterns for recently introduced beverages like soy, rice, and almond drinks, isotonic and energy drinks, and bottled water whereas changes in prices and advertising expenditures largely explained declining demand for milk, regular carbonated soft drinks, and coffee and tea. However, between 2008 and 2010, declining demand for most nonalcoholic beverages was largely driven by income-led decreases in expenditures.

State programs promoting their agricultural products have proliferated in response to increased consumer interest in locally grown foods. Tennessee, for example, currently has two state-funded programs promoting its agricultural products. This study examines the factors associated with participation by Tennessee fruit and vegetable farmers in those programs. The results suggest that farmer participation is associated with farm income, use of extension resources, and fresh produce sales. These results should be of interest to anyone attempting to increase producer participation in such programs.

Research on the efficiency of dairy farming in New Zealand is limited and has focused predominantly on technical efficiency. We contribute to the literature on empirical analysis by examining cost efficiency of New Zealand dairy farms. We construct simplified translog stochastic cost frontiers based on an unbalanced panel of 824 farms. Average cost efficiency is estimated at 83 percent for dairy farms in the North Island and 80 percent for farms in the South Island. Our analysis of the relationship between inefficiency and farm characteristics suggests significant associations between cost efficiency and capital intensity, livestock quality, and farm size.

We examine the impact of four policy options on consumption of carbonated soft drinks (CSDs) by estimating a random-coefficient discrete-choice model of demand. Policy simulations using demand estimates indicate that the impacts of banning television advertising, limiting container size, and limiting calories on total consumption would be similar—an estimated 15.40–15.75 percent reduction. However, limiting calories would have a significantly greater impact on consumption of regular CSDs (–28.89 percent) and on calories consumed from CSDs (–19.34 percent). A tax on calories was least effective in curtailing overall consumption and consumption of regular CSDs.

In traditional contingent valuation, the researcher seeks the amount a respondent is willing, ceteris paribus, to pay to obtain something. But if a respondent receives a “warm glow” from a yes response, ceteris is not paribus. In estimating willingness to pay (WTP) to reduce environmental impacts from consumption of transportation fuel, we find that respondents who were relatively less environmentally focused in the past receive greater warm-glow benefits from a “yes” response and have greater “warm” WTP (WTP that includes warm-glow benefits). Yet respondents who were relatively more environmentally focused in the past have greater “cold” WTP (WTP excluding warm-glow benefits).

Understanding willingness to harvest (WTH) is essential to assessing the social availability of woody biomass from private land. Currently, the only economically feasible way to harvest woody biomass is in conjunction with sawlogs. We examined WTH sawlogs and woody biomass from owners of family forests using data from a survey of Missouri forest owners. While their WTH increased with revenue expected from woody biomass, revenue expected from sawlogs was a stronger influence. Incentive payments for woody biomass thus are unlikely to increase its supply, and the social availability of woody biomass will remain limited unless sawlog prices rise significantly.

Producing biomass energy requires extensive land resources. In western Massachusetts, where almost 90 percent of former farmland is no longer in commercial use, we study factors that motivate landowners to grow biomass energy crops. A geographic information system model identifies a landowner population, and a contingent valuation survey reveals payments landowners are willing to accept (WTA) for growing biomass crops. The median WTA estimate is $321 per hectare per year, which is high compared to regional land rental rates. Nonpecuniary factors appear to be as important in landowner acceptance as profit opportunities, especially for nonfarmer landowners.

There is increasing interest in local foods among consumers in the United States and a rise in offerings of local products in restaurants. We use Zagat survey data and restaurant-specific menu information to estimate factors that influence the availability of New York State (NYS) wine in 1,401 NYS restaurants. We focus on wine because its production region is clearly labeled on menus and there is a burgeoning industry in NYS. Our econometric results indicate that decor ratings, cuisine styles, certain wine list characteristics, and distance to wine regions have statistically significant impacts on the likelihood of NYS restaurants serving local wine.

The number of wineries in nontraditional cool climate regions of the United States has increased dramatically in the last decade. We examine factors influencing distribution channel choices by these wineries, including winery characteristics, marketing strategies, and the extent of vertical and horizontal integration. Using a survey of winery operators in Michigan, Missouri, and New York, we developed fractional logit models to test hypotheses regarding their distribution channel choices. We find that the share of wine sold through intermediated channels increases with winery size, years of operation, increased vertical and horizontal integration, and greater promotional intensity and levels of self-reported marketing challenges.

Consumers’ willingness to pay for postharvest-processed (PHP) raw oysters—oysters without health risks—is studied in experimental auction markets. The experimental design decomposes the effects of taste, objective risk information, and information on four PHP technologies on consumer valuations. Results show that relatively uninformed consumers are willing to pay equivalent amounts for PHP and traditional raw oysters. However, after a blind taste test, consumers are willing to pay a significant premium for traditional raw oysters, and the premium persists after objective information on risk and processing technologies is provided. The results are robust across PHP technologies.