Searching for suitable measures to solve internal economic problems and
promote economic development, many third world countries have switched from
competitive to government-controlled trade of their agricultural staples. Such
government intervention has failed in many LDCs and researchers have
formulated models and made suggestions to alleviate the resulting distortions.
Modelling...
A cost function characterizes a firm's cost-minimizing behavior. It is defined
as a function of the level of outputs produced and the prices of factors which enter
the production process. Econometric estimation of a cost function allows one to test
hypotheses regarding the structure of cost and the structure of...
Agricultural revenues, the product of stochastic prices and yields, lead to markets which are
incomplete, thereby entreating and complicating economic inquiry. The following three essays
explore the incomplete nature of agricultural markets and consider the implications of
incompleteness for a range of policy questions and economic tools.
The first essay,...
Governments in less developed countries have recognized
in recent years the need to liberalize economic policies in
order to increase efficiency in agricultural commodity
markets. In an attempt to help decision makers assess
alternative choices, most policy studies, however, have
focused on the efficiency norm criterion without much
consideration for...