Abstract Controlled environment agriculture is important in regions where traditional farming is constrained by short growing seasons. Of particular relevance, vertical farming is an innovative agricultural technology that enables year‐round production in Canada. However, Canadian consumers’ preferences for vertically farmed products remain a knowledge gap. This study investigates how nudges and local food labelling change market outcomes for identical food produced using different production methods. In a pre‐registered field experiment, 610 Canadian consumers bid on vertically farmed, greenhouse grown, and field grown lettuce, each further differentiated by local and non‐local labels, using the Becker‐DeGroot‐Marschak (BDM) mechanism. Nudges highlighting the benefits of vertical farming were randomized between‐subject at the individual level. Results show that consumers are willing to pay a significant premium for local lettuce, regardless of the production method. Although consumers respond positively to nudges, local labelling is by far the largest contributor to willingness‐to‐pay premium. This study underscores the importance of advancing innovative food production technologies to enhance the availability of locally grown food year‐round.
Abstract In Naylor, Deaton, and Ker (2025), we discuss an appropriate econometric method for estimating the pass‐through of the Nutrition North subsidy in the presence of heterogeneous effects and endogenous sampling. Applying this method to the data set compiled by Galloway and Li (2023), who conclude that there is “large leakage” of the subsidy, we fail to find evidence that supports their conclusion. After our paper was published, Galloway and Li published both a corrigendum to their 2023 article and a comment to our paper based on that corrigendum. In their comment, Galloway and Li (2026) claim that after “minor but easily justified” changes to their original data, our econometric approach leads to either imprecise or incomplete estimates of pass‐through. In our response we show that: (i) Galloway and Li (2026) choose a classification of market structure that differs from the one recommended by federal government officials and from the classification they themselves use in their most recent work, including Galloway and Li (2025b) and Li, Daley, and Watson (2025); (ii) the classification structure consistent with the recommendations of federal government officials and their aforementioned research supports full pass‐through; (iii) Galloway and Li's (2026) removal of 75% of the original sample is not minor; and (iv) Galloway and Li's (2026) repeated emphasis on sub‐sampling, robustness, and statistical power is incomplete and thus misleading. Importantly, our response emphasizes that the correct econometric approach does not turn on whether one can selectively find a data set in which the empirical estimate of pass‐through changes.
I review historic and contemporary circumstances and issues linked with the ownership of land. I emphasize the importance of land ownership in influencing economic relations which are important to our understanding of the economy itself, the formation of the economy, winners, and losers.
With the widespread adoption of sugar-sweetened beverage (SSB) taxes, top-down facilitation measures-designed to influence consumer tax cognition-have limited impact, even though they are widely promoted as a means of enhancing tax effectiveness. This study introduces a bottom-up facilitation approach that targets immediate and direct information available to consumers. We examine how these two types of facilitation measures jointly affect tax policy efficacy. Results indicate that top-down measures, such as public health education campaigns, do not significantly reduce SSB purchases when implemented alone. However, when combined with bottom-up measures-such as displaying the specific tax amount on product labels-the tax's effectiveness increases substantially. In addition, a difference-in-differences style analysis reveals that the combination of top-down and bottom-up facilitation measures significantly reduces consumer willingness to purchase SSBs and helps mitigate reactance observed under top-down-only conditions, particularly among consumers who are more likely to ignore or discount the top-down educational information about the SSB tax. These findings provide actionable insights into how the design of public health taxation-such as SSB taxes-can be optimized to strengthen behavioral responses and enhance policy outcomes. Avec l'adoption g & eacute;n & eacute;ralis & eacute;e des taxes sur les boissons sucr & eacute;es (SSB), les mesures de facilitation descendantes - con & ccedil;ues pour influencer la perception des taxes par les consommateurs - ont un impact limit & eacute;, m & ecirc;me si elles sont largement promues comme moyen d'en am & eacute;liorer l'efficacit & eacute;. Cette & eacute;tude introduit une approche de facilitation ascendante, qui cible l'information imm & eacute;diate et directement accessible aux consommateurs. Nous examinons comment ces deux types de mesures de facilitation influencent conjointement l'efficacit & eacute; des politiques fiscales. Les r & eacute;sultats indiquent que les mesures descendantes, telles que les campagnes d'& eacute;ducation en sant & eacute; publique, ne r & eacute;duisent pas significativement les achats de boissons sucr & eacute;es lorsqu'elles sont utilis & eacute;es seules. En revanche, lorsqu'elles sont combin & eacute;es & agrave; des mesures ascendantes-comme l'affichage du montant exact de la taxe sur les & eacute;tiquettes des produits-l'efficacit & eacute; de la taxe augmente de mani & egrave;re substantielle. De plus, une analyse de type & laquo; diff & eacute;rence de diff & eacute;rences & raquo; r & eacute;v & egrave;le que la combinaison de ces deux approches r & eacute;duit significativement la propension des consommateurs & agrave; acheter des boissons sucr & eacute;es et att & eacute;nue la r & eacute;sistance observ & eacute;e lorsque seules des mesures descendantes sont en place. Cet effet est particuli & egrave;rement marqu & eacute; chez les consommateurs plus enclins & agrave; ignorer ou minimiser l'information & eacute;ducative li & eacute;e & agrave; la taxe. Ces r & eacute;sultats offrent des pistes concr & egrave;tes pour optimiser la conception des politiques de taxation en sant & eacute; publique-comme les taxes sur les boissons sucr & eacute;es-afin de renforcer les changements de comportement et d'am & eacute;liorer les r & eacute;sultats des politiques.
This study expands the framework for analyzing the interplay of agricultural area and crop diversity on agroecosystem services by incorporating the species-area relationship concept from biology. We estimate panel fixed effects models that include both agricultural area and crop diversity, along with their interaction term. This approach allows us to derive a crop diversity threshold-the point at which agricultural land no longer exerts a negative marginal effect on water quality, driven by adjustments along the intensive margin rather than the extensive margin. By replicating well-established water quality models from the literature and conducting robustness checks, we validate this framework. Our results empirically demonstrate that crop diversity can mitigate the adverse impact of agricultural land on water quality, aligning with the goals of conservation programs. This framework provides a more comprehensive understanding of agriculture's non-unidirectional contributions to water quality, rather than only negative impacts, which are pervasive in the literature. Moreover, the thresholds identified in this study provide valuable insights for prioritizing regions for landscape-based, crop diversity-driven conservation strategies and policy design.
True dietary change typically occurs through consumer preferences, and when changes in product attributes reflect these preferences, category-level demand can be substantially rearranged. In this study, we show that a successful new product may fundamentally change the nature of an entire category, and change consumers' nutrient consumption by altering the nutrient content of the food products they consume. Greek yogurt, for example, offers a very different combination of nutrients relative to other types of yogurts. The fact that it was immediately successful after its introduction provides an example of a transformational new product-one that potentially changed the nutrient-consumption profiles of yogurt buyers. We use a quasi-experimental approach with propensity score matching (DiD + PSM) to identify the effect of introducing Greek yogurt on yogurt buyers' nutrient consumption. We find that the introduction of Greek yogurt led to yogurt purchases with greater overall protein and calorie content, but lower fat and carbohydrate content. We use the case of Greek yogurt to show that a relatively simple innovative common consumer product can have far-reaching implications for the nature of nutrients consumed from that category. Our findings point to the importance of information policies, and their interaction with consumer preferences, on changing dietary outcomes. Les v & eacute;ritables changements alimentaires surviennent g & eacute;n & eacute;ralement & agrave; travers les pr & eacute;f & eacute;rences des consommateurs, et lorsque les caract & eacute;ristiques des produits & eacute;voluent pour refl & eacute;ter ces pr & eacute;f & eacute;rences, la demande au niveau d'une cat & eacute;gorie peut & ecirc;tre profond & eacute;ment r & eacute;organis & eacute;e. Dans cette & eacute;tude, nous montrons qu'un nouveau produit r & eacute;ussi peut transformer fondamentalement la nature d'une cat & eacute;gorie enti & egrave;re et modifier la consommation de nutriments des consommateurs en changeant la composition nutritionnelle des aliments qu'ils consomment. Le yogourt grec, par exemple, offre une combinaison de nutriments tr & egrave;s diff & eacute;rente de celle des autres types de yogourts. Le fait qu'il ait connu un succ & egrave;s imm & eacute;diat apr & egrave;s son introduction constitue un exemple de produit v & eacute;ritablement transformateur - susceptible d'avoir modifi & eacute; les profils de consommation de nutriments des acheteurs de yogourt. Nous utilisons une approche quasi exp & eacute;rimentale avec appariement par score de propension (DiD + PSM) afin d'identifier l'effet de l'introduction du yogourt grec sur la consommation de nutriments des acheteurs de yogourt. Nous constatons que cette introduction a entra & icirc;n & eacute; des achats de yogourt pr & eacute;sentant une teneur globale plus & eacute;lev & eacute;e en prot & eacute;ines et en calories, mais plus faible en lipides et en glucides. & Agrave; travers le cas du yogourt grec, nous montrons qu'un produit de consommation courant, relativement simple mais innovant, peut avoir des r & eacute;percussions importantes sur la nature des nutriments consomm & eacute;s au sein de cette cat & eacute;gorie. Nos r & eacute;sultats soulignent l'importance des politiques d'information, ainsi que leur interaction avec les pr & eacute;f & eacute;rences des consommateurs, dans la transformation des habitudes alimentaires.
Supply management (SM) has recently attracted a lot of attention nationally and internationally. A bill (C-202) to safeguard SM from future international trade negotiations was voted unanimously by the Canadian parliament in 2025. At the international level, tariffs associated with SM have been criticized by the Trump administration. Given that SM is based on a tacit social contract between SM farmers and society at large, as well as its political significance, it appears important to assess the level of knowledge of Canadians regarding this policy, as well as their perception of SM themes raised in the media. This paper reports the literacy score and perceptions on SM of a national survey of over 1200 respondents. To analyze the data, perceptions on SM themes are regressed on respondents' level of SM literacy, sociodemographic data, as well as on two questions that are of a more ideological nature. Results indicate that Canadians have little knowledge of the working or scope of SM. Furthermore, after providing neutral information on themes related to SM that are or have been in the media, we find that the views toward SM policy are mostly negative, with the most negative perceptions held by respondents with ideologies that we loosely classify as economic conservatism. La gestion de l'offre (GO) a r & eacute;cemment suscit & eacute; beaucoup d'attention au Canada et & agrave; l'& eacute;tranger. Un projet de loi (C-202) visant & agrave; la prot & eacute;ger des n & eacute;gociations commerciales internationales futures a & eacute;t & eacute; vot & eacute; & agrave; l'unanimit & eacute; par le Parlement canadien en 2025. Au niveau international, les tarifs douaniers associ & eacute;s & agrave; la GO ont & eacute;t & eacute; critiqu & eacute;s par l'administration Trump. & Eacute;tant donn & eacute; que la GO repose sur un contrat social tacite entre les agriculteurs de la GO et la soci & eacute;t & eacute; dans son ensemble, ainsi que son importance politique, il semble important d'& eacute;valuer le niveau de connaissance des Canadiens & agrave; l'& eacute;gard de cette politique, ainsi que leur perception des th & egrave;mes de la GO soulev & eacute;s dans les m & eacute;dias. Ce document pr & eacute;sente le score de litt & eacute;ratie et les perceptions de la GO, suivant un questionnaire national de plus de 1200 r & eacute;pondants. Pour analyser les donn & eacute;es, les perceptions des th & egrave;mes de la GO sont r & eacute;gress & eacute;es sur le niveau de litt & eacute;ratie de la GO des r & eacute;pondants, les donn & eacute;es sociod & eacute;mographiques, ainsi que sur deux questions de nature plus id & eacute;ologique. Les r & eacute;sultats indiquent que les Canadiens ont peu de connaissances sur le fonctionnement ou la port & eacute;e de la GO. De plus, apr & egrave;s avoir fourni des informations neutres sur les th & egrave;mes li & eacute;s & agrave; la GO qui sont ou ont & eacute;t & eacute; dans les m & eacute;dias, nous constatons que les points de vue sur la politique de la GO sont majoritairement n & eacute;gatifs, avec les perceptions les plus n & eacute;gatives d & eacute;tenues par les r & eacute;pondants avec une id & eacute;ologie est que nous classons de mani & egrave;re informelle comme & laquo; conservatisme & eacute;conomique & raquo;.
We estimate the environmentally adjusted productivity growth and shadow price for Ontario dairy farms. We use an input-oriented directional distance function and farm-level data from 2000 to 2020. First, we find that while GHG emissions per cow increase with higher milk yields, emission intensity decreases as milk yield per cow increases. We also find that emission intensity decreased over the study period. Second, we find that environmentally adjusted productivity growth is higher than unadjusted productivity growth. Technological change contributed more to both environmentally adjusted and unadjusted productivity growth than did efficiency change. Third, the estimated shadow price for GHG emissions was CAN$286 per metric ton. Nous estimons la croissance de la productivit & eacute; ajust & eacute;e sur le plan environnemental ainsi que le prix implicite (shadow price) pour les fermes laiti & egrave;res de l'Ontario. Nous utilisons une fonction de distance directionnelle orient & eacute;e vers les intrants et des donn & eacute;es au niveau des exploitations couvrant la p & eacute;riode de 2000 & agrave; 2020. Premi & egrave;rement, nous constatons que, bien que les & eacute;missions de gaz & agrave; effet de serre (GES) par vache augmentent avec des rendements laitiers plus & eacute;lev & eacute;s, l'intensit & eacute; des & eacute;missions diminue & agrave; mesure que le rendement laitier par vache s'accro & icirc;t. Nous observons & eacute;galement que l'intensit & eacute; des & eacute;missions a diminu & eacute; au cours de la p & eacute;riode & eacute;tudi & eacute;e. Deuxi & egrave;mement, nous constatons que la croissance de la productivit & eacute; ajust & eacute;e sur le plan environnemental est sup & eacute;rieure & agrave; la croissance de la productivit & eacute; non ajust & eacute;e. Le changement technologique a davantage contribu & eacute; & agrave; la croissance de la productivit & eacute; - tant ajust & eacute;e que non ajust & eacute;e - que l'am & eacute;lioration de l'efficacit & eacute;. Troisi & egrave;mement, le prix implicite estim & eacute; des & eacute;missions de GES pour le secteur laitier ontarien s'& eacute;l & egrave;ve & agrave; 286$ CA par tonne m & eacute;trique d'& eacute;missions.
Wetlands play a crucial role in the agricultural landscapes of Canada's Prairie Pothole Region (PPR) but are being lost to agricultural and urban development. There is increased interest from governments and conservation organizations in restoring previously drained wetlands, but these projects are costly and associated with intangible ecosystem service benefits. We conduct a stated preference survey of 1,999 people in Alberta, Saskatchewan, and Manitoba to elicit preferences for provincial wetland restoration programs using an incentive compatible valuation question. We estimate welfare measures from these choices and find that people are willing to pay on average $368 per year to restore 10% of lost wetlands in their home province when they feel their choice is consequential. Willingness to pay (WTP) estimates are consistently highest in Manitoba and exhibit heterogeneity with respect to respondent characteristics in all provinces. Our results show that the aggregated per hectare social benefits of wetland restoration can exceed the per hectare costs of restoration, but the per hectare social benefits diminish as restored wetland area increases.
Wetland conservation continues to be a pressing issue as wetlands continue to be lost due to urban, industrial, and agricultural expansion. This paper synthesizes the current knowledge about wetland conservation economics in Canada, with a focus on prairie landscapes. We review the methods economists use to empirically measure the costs (i.e., supply) and benefits (i.e., demand) of wetlands and their ecosystem services. We find a wide range of wetland conservation cost estimates both across studies and across wetlands suggesting an important role for targeting. For the benefits side, we outline the wetland ecosystem service conceptual framework, describe the main approaches used in wetland benefit valuation, and review the sparse empirical evidence. The paper concludes with a call for more careful empirical evidence demonstrating the economic benefits of wetlands that can be compared to conservation costs operationalized into policies.
This study conducts a meta-regression analysis to synthesize the marginal effects of 12 factors that frequently appear in empirical studies examining farmer's technology adoption behavior. The analysis includes 187 observational studies on technology adoption in agriculture, which are published in 32 peer-reviewed journals in the broader field of agricultural economics, covering farmer's adoption in 47 countries for a diverse range of agricultural technologies. Using this broad meta-dataset, we investigate whether each of the 12 determinants has a true effect on technology adoption rates and examine whether Type I and Type II publication bias are present in the adoption literature. Our results reveal that while most determinant factors significantly affect adoption rates, their marginal effects are generally of small magnitude and vary considerably by technology type and country group. Additionally, our results provide evidence of the presence of Type I publication bias in half of the factors considered and Type II publication bias in nearly all, underscoring the need for caution when interpreting results in the adoption literature by researchers and policymakers. Overall, the findings highlight the critical need for proactive measures to address publication bias and promote more transparent and credible research practices in agricultural economics.
Digital advancements have reshaped the sales channels for industrial products like chemical fertilizers, allowing for the elimination of certain intermediaries. Utilizing survey data from 1374 rice-growing smallholder farmers across counties in central China, this study explored the impact of disintermediation in chemical fertilizer sales channels on application rates among smallholder farmers. Benchmark regression analyses indicated that channel disintermediation significantly decreased chemical fertilizer application across various scenarios. Additionally, the alignment of contractual factors and technical services between chemical suppliers and farmers, facilitated by disintermediation, reduced chemical fertilizer application. Heterogeneity analysis revealed that the reduction in chemical fertilizer application due to channel disintermediation was more pronounced among farmers with higher digital literacy or lower production capacity. These findings highlighted the importance of encouraging chemical suppliers with direct-to-consumer channels to enhance their technical services and increase supervision over the quality of their products and services, thereby building trust among farmers and facilitating their adaptation to changes in the sales channel structure.
Reducing the negative environmental impact of production activities without (substantial) loss of production is a crucial challenge for the agricultural sector. Investigating farms' environmental and technical efficiency (TE) levels and drivers can contribute to addressing this issue. In this regard, based on recent theoretical developments on the appropriate handling of undesirable outputs in the modeling of production technologies, this paper introduces a multi-equation stochastic frontier framework for technical and environmental efficiency (EE) analysis. This framework is applied to a sample of French suckler sheep farms. The results indicate that, on average, farms in the sample can increase their desirable output by 20% without using more inputs while reducing their greenhouse gas emissions by 24%. Findings also show that relatively high (low) levels of TE are associated with relatively low (high) levels of EE and that the likelihood for a farm to be both technically and environmentally efficient is relatively low. Only 32% of the farms in the sample have a high level of TE and EE. Drivers such as decoupled direct payments are positively associated with EE and negatively associated with TE, while no significant effect is found for green direct payments.
Price is one of the most important factors affecting consumer purchase decisions. Consumers may use price as a quality cue or reference point to make the decisions. However, few studies have considered the quality cue by controlling the price anchoring and vice versa. We conduct four identical experiments weeks apart to estimate the effect of price on consumers' product quality evaluation and WTP. The results show that (1) the price has a significant impact on appearance rating and taste rating; (2) product quality mediates the price effect on consumer WTP only if consumers have incomplete quality information about the product; and (3) the marginal effect of price on consumer WTP differs over time. The results of this study provide deep insights into the role of price on consumers' quality assessment and valuation formation of products.
This paper develops a sequential game-theoretic model of technology licensing with heterogeneous firms and consumers in a mixed oligopoly to systematically analyze the optimal licensing decision of the cooperative and the market and welfare impacts of cooperative involvement in the licensing of cost-reducing process innovations. Analytical results show that the organizational form does matter in technology licensing; cooperative behavior differs from that of its investor-owned counterparts yielding significantly different equilibrium outcomes in mixed oligopolies where the cooperative is the licensor of the process innovation involved. While our analysis focuses on cost-reducing process innovations, our results are more general and hold also for quality-enhancing product innovations.
Agriculture is a cornerstone of the Sub-Saharan African (SSA) economy, and leveraging ICT to enhance productivity is vital for improving food security. While prior studies focus on ICT's micro-level effects in agriculture, its macro-level impact on SSA's cereal production remains underexplored. This study employs the method of moment quantile regression (MMQR) and a balanced panel dataset to analyze the effects of ICT adoption on cereal production across SSA from 2001 to 2022. The findings reveal that mobile phone usage significantly boosts cereal production, particularly benefiting lower-productivity farmers. Internet access enhances yields, with its impact strengthening at higher productivity levels. Expanded network coverage also positively influences production, while fixed broadband subscriptions show a negative correlation, likely due to rural infrastructure limitations. Furthermore, the study identifies education and agricultural credit as key channels through which ICT improves cereal production. Finally, we find bidirectional causality between cereal production and mobile phone usage, internet access, and network coverage, while fixed broadband subscriptions exhibit a unidirectional causal effect. These insights suggest that policies promoting network expansion, mobile connectivity, and internet access, especially in rural areas, could significantly enhance cereal production in SSA.
We examine the effect of emissions pricing on the cost of Canadian food. We describe emissions pricing policies relevant to the agriculture and food sectors and the differing design details of various provincial systems and the federal Greenhouse Gas Pollution Pricing Act . To quantify the potential effect of such policies, we use a detailed input-output model of Canada's economy to estimate both the direct and indirect cost increases across sectors. We also explore how exemptions and policy design can mitigate what would otherwise be larger effects. In particular, imported inputs, generous exemptions for most direct emissions in primary agriculture, and special provisions for large industrial emitters all dampen the effect. Overall, we find that emissions pricing at $80 per tonne could potentially increase the cost of domestically produced food by approximately 0.8% on average. Combined with imported food that is not directly affected by emissions pricing, we find an average effect of approximately 0.5%. While we abstract from general equilibrium responses, our analysis suggests emissions pricing in Canada has only a modest effect on food costs.
In an era of volatile global markets, stabilizing domestic food prices has become increasingly critical. This paper examines how participation in global agri-food value chains (GVCs) influences food price transmission through a robust two-step regression framework. First, we estimate country-specific long-run pass-through (LRPT) coefficients for 173 countries over four separate episodes between 2000 and 2022, quantifying the extent to which changes in international food prices lead to changes in domestic consumer food prices. Then, we regress these estimates on distinct measures of GVC participation: intermediate (two-sided or mixed) participation versus pure backward or forward trade (reflecting participation in later and earlier stages of production, respectively). Our findings reveal that nations with intermediate GVC participation experience a significant reduction in the transmission of price shocks, while those focused solely on backward or forward trade exhibit greater transmission of international food price shocks. These results challenge the dominant view that deeper global integration invariably increases the transmission of international food price shocks and highlight the potential of intermediate positioning as an effective policy tool for stabilizing domestic food prices. This study provides valuable insights for trade policy design and contributes to the broader discourse on food security.
This paper examines food price changes before and during the COVID-19 pandemic over a 5-year period from 2017 to 2021 in Fox Lake, a remote Indigenous community in Northern Alberta, and compares them to provincial trends in Alberta. Using retail price data for 51 food items from The Northern , the sole grocery store in Fox Lake, and Statistics Canada records, we analyze differences in food price levels, temporal changes in food price indices, and their implications for living wages. We identify significant food price disparities, with Fox Lake exhibiting consistently higher price levels. During the pandemic, we observe mixed trends: disparities narrowed for perishable goods but widened for non-perishable items. The Fox Lake food price index fluctuated over time, peaking above Alberta's in 2018 but remaining lower during the pandemic. These trends may reflect targeted strategies by The Northern to reduce disparities for essential items and stabilize prices, potentially supported by the Nutrition North Canada subsidy. Despite smaller percentage increases in food prices in Fox Lake, the higher share of food costs in total expenses resulted in a greater proportional impact on living wages. These descriptive results contrast with reports showing pandemic-related food price spikes in other remote Indigenous communities.
This article uses Canadian input–output data from 1997–2021 to explore the consumer food dollar in terms of its distribution between farmers (i.e., farm share) and post-farm gate industries. We have adopted the method developed by Canning (2011), which is based on a type one Input-Output multiplier model. The overall farm share (19.4% in 1997–18.6% in 2021); the food at home farm share (23.7% in 1997–22.8% in 2021) and the food away from home farm share (10.1% in 1997–9.6% in 2021) did not fluctuate widely, suggesting a fairly fixed distribution between farmers and post-farm gate industries. The overall farm share changed the most between 2019 and 2020 due to changing consumer behavior during the pandemic (COVID-19). The time series econometric analysis on farm shares and price indices for the agri-food value chain shows mild to significant associations among them. Given that, on average, 83% of every dollar Canadians spend on food goes to post-farm gate sectors, it may be insightful to study post-farm gate industries in greater detail in order to better understand the drivers behind recent food price inflation.
