The rapid expansion of biofuel production has generated considerable interest within the body of empirical economic literature that has sought to understand the impact of biofuel growth on the global food economy. While the consensus within the literature is that biofuel emergence is likely to have some effect on future world agricultural market, there is a considerable range in the estimated s...

It is a pleasure to be invited to discuss this rich paper by Jeffrey Frankel and Andrew Rose. After the events of the past few years, with a range of commodity prices exhibiting great volatility, it is not hard to motivate Frankel and Rose’s choice of topic, seen from either a longor medium-term perspective. The authors use annual data, mainly in a panel context, to examine the relationship bet...

Labor market wages do not typically provide an accurate or representative measure of the economic returns to child labor in rural settings, especially for women. This paper is a first attempt to identify other outcomes that can shed light on the longer-term impact of child labor. In particular, we examine the quality of marriage matches as measured by per capita household wealth and bride price...

This paper identifies some of the main determinants of exports in Fiji. A single equation model for exports is developed in which trading partner income and relative prices play a central role. The underlying conceptual framework is an imperfect substitution model, in which the key assumption is that exports are not perfect substitutes for domestic goods in importing countries. A distinguishing...

Federal dairy programs have been instituted to assist dairy farmers in marketing their milk. Milk marketing licenses were issued for city markets in 1933 during the depression. Federal Milk Orders replaced licenses in 1937 with enactment of the Agricultural Marketing Agreement Act. Low prices returned in the late 1940s and Congress passed the Agricultural Act of 1949 creating the support progra...

We propose a framework with endogenous allocation of land between agricultural production, sustainable forest management, and unsustainable forest exploitation in the form of illegal logging to explore deforestation and agricultural and timber supplies when property rights are insecure. Uncertainty over property rights arises through risk of confiscation on sustainably-managed forest land, and ...

This paper examines the effects of environmental zoning policies on lakefront land development, sorting, and economic welfare in a model where agents are heterogeneous in preferences and income. Agents consume lakefront amenities that are endogenous to development and the sorting process yields lakes which differ by amenities and frontage prices. Our findings include the following: i) lakes bec...

Water transfers from agricultural to urban and environmental uses will likely become increasingly common worldwide. Many agricultural areas rely heavily on underlying groundwater aquifers. Out-of-basin surface water transfers will increase aquifer withdrawals while reducing recharge, thereby altering the evolution of the agricultural production/groundwater aquifer system over time. An empirical...