ABSTRACT Weather and climate cause variation in agricultural production. The extent to which farmers are able to adjust to weather shocks is important for understanding the potential impacts of climate change and formulating agricultural policy. Public and private research organizations have increasingly developed agricultural technologies to help farmers cope with changing climatic conditions. We examine the degree to which farmers adjust production technologies in response to temperature shocks. Using data from Japan, we estimate the effect of high temperatures on the adoption of heat‐tolerant and late‐maturing rice varieties: two technologies that could potentially mitigate the negative impacts of a warming climate. Exposure to extremely high temperatures increases the share of heat‐tolerant rice varieties, while exposure to moderate temperatures increases the share of late‐maturing rice varieties. Projected warming is expected to increase the adoption of these varieties, although varietal adjustment remains incomplete, suggesting potential for policies that support farmers’ adaptation behavior.
ABSTRACT The escalation of conflict in the Middle East in 2026 and the disruptions affecting major maritime chokepoints, particularly the Strait of Hormuz and the Bab el‐Mandeb/Red Sea corridor, threaten global food security through higher energy, fertilizer, and shipping costs. We argue that the shock is more structural than previous crises because it simultaneously affects core agricultural inputs and trade routes, unlike the 2022 price spike in the wake of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, which primarily caused temporary supply shortages. This has especially severe consequences for import‐dependent economies in the Gulf area, Africa, and other low‐ and middle‐income countries (LMICs). While energy price shocks can be transmitted relatively quickly to food markets through immediate changes in production and transportation costs, shipping cost and fertilizer price shocks tend to operate with longer adjustment lags because they propagate through physical supply chains and agricultural production processes. Prolonged energy market disruptions stemming from conflict around the Strait of Hormuz, together with tensions affecting Bab el‐Mandeb, or future disruptions from (geo)political conflicts, entail the risk of trade policy responses and further market disturbances that could exacerbate the ongoing crisis. We highlight that rising prices for energy, shipping, and food are placing an immense strain on LMICs already burdened by heavy debt, limited access to finance, and inflationary pressure, with implications for food security and hunger.
ABSTRACT Edge‐of‐field (EOF) practices installed at field borders to filter agricultural runoff are critical for improving water quality. Despite their effectiveness, adoption by farmers remains critically low. This study explores the influence of messengers on farmers' decisions to adopt EOF practices. We conducted an information treatment experiment using two information sources—an Extension professional and a farmer early adopter—versus a control group. Using an online survey of 373 Iowa farmer respondents in 2022, we built an empirical model to detect the treatment effect on farmer intention to adopt EOF practices. Our results reveal that farmers with less experience in conservation practices responded more positively to the treatments, and that a farmer messenger was more effective than an Extension professional in encouraging practice adoption. The farmer messenger increased adoption probability by 20.4 percentage points among respondents who are not currently enrolled in the Conservation Reserve Program, while the professional messenger yielded a statistically insignificant 7.7‐percentage‐point increase. Among respondents who decline adoption, both messengers reduced self‐reported difficulty understanding how the practice works. These findings suggest that professional and peer messengers can each build technical understanding of EOF practices, while peer messengers are distinctively better at converting that understanding into stated intention to adopt. Outreach programs may therefore benefit from leveraging peer experiences and narratives, as farmer‐to‐farmer communication appears to resonate more effectively in these communities.
ABSTRACT This study estimates the crop‐specific area elasticities for 10 countries or regions using Bayesian methods to ensure that the results are consistent with the expectations suggested by economic theory and applied economics. Important outcomes are as follows. First, a rich set of elasticities and first derivatives are provided that go far beyond any recently published paper to support applied economic analysis of market commodity supplies and changing land use of key crop‐producing countries and regions. Second, double‐cropping can induce unexpected area responses, such as positive cross‐effects. Third, the expected returns of the major crops in a country, such as corn in the United States and soybeans in Brazil, potentially lead to a greater increase in the total crop area than other crops. Fourth, total land constraints reduce parameter uncertainty but highlight potential differences between reallocating land versus cropland expansion and contraction.
This study evaluates equity analysts' earnings forecasts, comparing United States (U.S.) sugar-using firms (SUF), and a selected group of agribusinesses (AGB). Aspects of U.S. sugar policy, reinitiated in 1982, help to ensure a reliable and predictable domestic supply of SUF's primary ingredient, sugar. U.S. sugar policy requires the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) to generate publicly available sugar supply and demand forecasts through its World Agriculture Supply and Demand Estimates (WASDE) report, introduced in 1992 and expanded in 2008 to include Mexican sugar forecasts. Therefore, we examined whether the reinitiation of U.S. sugar policy, the initiation of WASDE sugar forecasts, and the implementation of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) for sugar trade benefited SUF by improving equity analysts' earnings per share (EPS) forecasting accuracy for these firms. This analysis, mainly based on difference-in-differences and event-study regression, focused on EPS forecast accuracy from 1976 to 2025. Consistent with our hypothesis, we found that improvements in SUF EPS forecast accuracy were statistically associated with the reinitiation of U.S. sugar policy in 1982 and, to a lesser extent, with the implementation of the NAFTA sugar provision in 2008. More broadly, our analysis suggests that, given its role as a price- and supply-stabilizer, U.S. sugar policy might have caused a structural shift in the U.S. sugar industry, providing a more predictable business environment, and that its legacy may remain present in the contemporary forecasting environment.
