Introducing and lifting COVID-19 restrictions caused significant disruptions throughout the world economy, including in international trade. This study employs a panel gravity model to examine the impact of the pandemic on the agri-food trade of EU countries. Specifically, we estimate the direct effects of the intensity of lockdown-type policies on bilateral trade across country, product, and time dimensions, and the indirect effects of those policies as they work through domestic market impacts. We also decompose the indirect effects of COVID-19 between the domestic demand side and supply side impacts. We provide insights into the sources of pandemic disruptions by comparing a 'no-COVID' counterfactual scenario from March 2020 to February 2022 to the COVID-19 reality. Our data analysis reveals a loss of 162 billion EUR in agri-food trade due to direct and indirect effects of COVID-19, equivalent to 11.3% of imports over the period. Approximately half of this total is comprised of intra-EU bilateral trade. The COVID-19 effects were proportionally greatest in the trade of fats and oils, and animal-origin products, while vegetable-origin and processed food products were affected only about half as much. Reduced intra-industry demand was a dominant source of indirect effects in the trade of non-processed food. In turn, the weakening of consumer demand was the main factor behind trade losses in processed food imports. The proportional trade impacts differ greatly across EU countries.

We exploit the variation in the rollout of refrigerated almond milk across U.S. retail stores from 2008 through 2010 to estimate the causal effects on cow's milk and soymilk. Using monthly retail store scanner data, we find that introducing almond milk reduced retail quantities of soymilk (3.6%) and lactose-free cow's milk (3%), with smaller effects on organic (2%) and conventional cow's milk (1%). Effects are larger in stores that adopt earlier or reach higher almond milk shares. Our econometric estimates indicate significant displacement of per capita consumption of soymilk and lactose-free cow's milk, but not for conventional cow's milk.

We present an integrated drought impact assessment framework to capture the cascading effects of drought on water supply, agriculture, and the broader economy, using California’s 2020–2022 drought as a case study. The assessment was conducted as the drought unfolded, applying a top-down methodology to estimate changes in agricultural water supply, cropland adaptation responses, and spillover effects across downstream sectors. Despite data limitations, we demonstrate a replicable framework for predicting land fallowing and estimating economic impacts, relevant for timely drought assessments in California and other semi-arid irrigated regions worldwide. The framework leverages diverse, readily available datasets, including remote sensing based evapotranspiration estimates, records of reservoir storage and allocations, crop insurance claims, and regional economic statistics, combined with economic modeling tools. Our results indicate that in both 2021 and 2022, surface water deliveries in the Central Valley declined by about 43%, with varying spatial footprints. To partially offset these reductions, groundwater pumping rose by 51% in 2021 and 41% in 2022, with the largest increases occurring in the Tulare Lake region. These shifts resulted in an estimated 212 thousand hectares (8.2% reduction) of fallowed land in 2021 and 282 thousand hectares (10.9% reduction) in 2022, with direct crop revenue losses of $1.2 and $1.5 billion dollars, and 8.9 and 10.2 thousand jobs lost. Regional value added declined by $1.3 billion in 2021 and $1.9 billion in 2022 from both crop production and downstream food processing industries. Ex-post validation using newly released state water balance and crop mapping datasets shows that aggregate fallowing and water supply impacts were captured within −13% to +2% at the Central Valley scale, with more variable performance across individual crops and hydrologic regions. We highlight both the strengths and limitations of the framework while demonstrating its usefulness for timely drought impact assessment and mitigation planning.

Per capita consumption of fluid cow’s milk has declined steadily in North America and Europe. In the United States, that well-known decline accelerated in percentage terms in the past two decades as the market for plant-based substitutes surged. This paper documents and explains significant impacts of plant-based products on the retail prices and quantities of fluid cow’s milk products in the United States, using a discrete-choice model of milk product demand with random coefficients. Demand estimates based on household purchase and store scanner data from 2018 to 2020 show that plant-based milk is more substitutable for organic and lactose-free cow’s milk products than for conventional cow’s milk. Based on our demand estimates, if plant-based milk products had not been available in the consumer choice set, the retail quantity of organic cow’s milk would have been 14.5%, lactose-free cow’s milk 10.2% higher, and conventional cow’s milk by 7.7% higher. The absence of plant-based alternatives would increase annual retail purchases of fluid cow’s milk by 1.46 gallons for a representative survey of households. In these data, each gallon of plant-based milk displaced 0.68 gallons of cow’s milk. While plant-based milk continues to affect the demand for fluid cow’s milk products, especially the higher-priced organic and lactose-free products, evidence shows that it has not been the primary driver in the recent accelerated decline in the consumption of fluid cow’s milk.

of the U.S. wine industry, focusing on California. Among countries, the United States is the world’s fourth-largest producer of wine, and the largest consumer and importer. The wine industry is located primarily on the U.S. west coast, and California alone accounts for more than four-fifths of production. Growth in population and income and shifting preferences for different types of alcoholic beverages have been driving evolving per capita demand and hence changes in production, markets, and imports in this vibrant sector of the U.S. economy. In recent years, the U.S. wine and winegrape industry has been coping with stresses from difficult vintages and abrupt policy shifts, on top of the shrinking demand and depressed markets that have affected producers worldwide. The market-driven pressures are more pronounced in the lower-priced segments. The industry is adjusting without the benefit of any substantial assistance from national or state governments to reduce the structural surplus and restore market balance. We illustrate these patterns using detailed data on California’s wine grape industry.

As highlighted in the Global Methane Pledge, reducing methane emissions has been identified as a core strategy and the best short-term solution against atmospheric warming. Well before the release of the United Nations Environmental Program's Global Methane Assessment in 2021, California had set aggressive targets for reducing methane 40% below 2013 levels by 2030 with the passing of SB 1383 in 2016. All methane sources including those from the dairy and other livestock industries are required to reduce emissions. Dairy comprises approximately 45% and other livestock make up 10% of the total anthropogenic annual methane emitted in California. This analysis focuses on California's efforts to reduce dairy methane emissions and the progress it has made toward the target over the past 7+ years. The California dairy industry is on track to achieve these emission reduction targets based on falling cow numbers, constructing anaerobic digesters and manure management infrastructure, and the potential to implement feed additives for enteric methane reduction. Looking into the future, this case study highlights the additional methane emission reduction efforts that are underway that will enable the California dairy industry to achieve its full contribution toward the 40% reduction goal by 2030.

Introducing and lifting COVID-19 restrictions caused significant disruptions throughout the world economy, including in international trade. This study employs a panel gravity model to examine the impact of the pandemic on the agri-food trade of EU countries. Specifically, we estimate the direct effects of the intensity of lockdown-type policies on bilateral trade across country, product, and time dimensions, and the indirect effects of those policies as they work through domestic market impacts. We also decompose the indirect effects of COVID-19 between the domestic demand side and supply side impacts. We provide insights into the sources of pandemic disruptions by comparing a ‘no-COVID’ counterfactual scenario from March 2020 to February 2022 to the COVID-19 reality. Our data analysis reveals a loss of 162 billion EUR in agri-food trade due to direct and indirect effects of COVID-19, equivalent to 11.3% of imports over the period. Approximately half of this total is comprised of intra-EU bilateral trade. The COVID-19 effects were proportionally greatest in the trade of fats and oils, and animal-origin products, while vegetable-origin and processed food products were affected only about half as much. Reduced intra-industry demand was a dominant source of indirect effects in the trade of non-processed food. In turn, the weakening of consumer demand was the main factor behind trade losses in processed food imports. The proportional trade impacts differ greatly across EU countries.

California agriculture will undergo significant transformations over the next few decades in response to climate extremes, environmental regulation and policy encouraging environmental justice, and economic pressures that have long driven agricultural changes. With several local climates suited to a variety of crops, periodically abundant nearby precipitation, and public investments that facilitated abundant low-priced irrigation water, California hosts one of the most diverse and productive agroecosystems in the world. California farms supply nearly half of the high-nutrient fruit, tree nut, and vegetable production in the United States. Climate change impacts on productivity and profitability of California agriculture are increasing and forebode problems for standard agricultural practices, especially water use norms. We highlight many challenges California agriculture confronts under climate change through the direct and indirect impacts on the biophysical conditions and ecosystem services that drive adaptations in farm practices and water accessibility and availability. In the face of clear conflicts among competing interests, we consider ongoing and potential sustainable and equitable solutions, with particular attention to how technology and policy can facilitate progress.

In this study, we attempt to infer the effect of the COVID-19 pandemic on the intra-European Union (EU) agrifood trade from out-of-sample forecasts. We compare the actual level of trade during the COVID-19 period with counterfactual values derived from univariate forecasting models [regARIMA (Linear regression with autoregressive integrated moving average errors) and Holt-Winters methods]. We analyse agrifood imports and exports of specific EU countries and the EU-27 aggregate on the basis of monthly data for the period from January 2010 to February 2022. The findings reveal a significant decrease in trade activity in the first year of the pandemic that was negatively correlated to COVID-19 restrictions applied by EU countries. Surprisingly, COVID-19 restrictions do not significantly explain the diversified agrifood trade response among EU countries during the pandemic.

The transformation of California's dairy industry is a prime example of structural change in agriculture. The state has been on the leading edge of changes in the geography of food and agriculture for 150 years, and many characteristics of modern large-scale agriculture emerged-or reached their culmination-in California. We examine the spatial transformation of dairy production in California as a window into the potential futures for the dairy industry both within California and elsewhere. We use data from county agricultural reports and USDA Censuses of Agriculture data to demonstrate, through a series of original maps and animations, the dramatic increase in production of milk, the rapid fall in the number of dairies, and the spatial redistribution of the industry over the past 40 years. These visualizations reveal illustrative spatial patterns and insights into rapid changes in the geography of dairy production-and agriculture more generally-within California. Based on these visualizations and analyses, we propose a framework for understanding the intersecting phenomena of dairy transformations in California: regional concentration, industry consolidation, and farm-level intensification. In explaining how these processes are nested, overlapping, and multiscalar, we offer an account of past and current trajectories, while examining the applicability and implications of these findings for other dairy-producing regions into the future.

Climate extremes bring both challenges and opportunities for increasing resilience in agriculture and communities. Drought impact assessments are useful to identify systemwide vulnerabilities and downstream effects from water shortages to agriculture, and aid governments, irrigation user organizations and farmers in both short-term response and planning. The recent climate extremes in California, USA over the past 2012-2022 decade provide a useful case study as one of the largest irrigated agricultural systems which are applicable to other semi-arid areas in the world. We present a framework to gather water supply availability for irrigation in California’s large and complex water supply system, estimate idle land, potential cropping patterns response and economic costs to irrigated agriculture, downstream food processing sectors and regional economies. Recent groundwater regulation forcing sustainable pumping rates at a local level bring additional challenges to cope with water scarcity. We employ regional water balances which consider diverse water supply portfolios for agriculture, remote sensing, and economic models which estimate profit-maximizing crop response and economic costs of water shortages to agriculture and related sectors. We also discuss data challenges in quantifying ultimate impacts of low precipitation, surface water reserves and groundwater restrictions, in a highly engineered and diversified water supply system. Estimated impacts on agriculture and regionwide income and employment from the 2012-2016 and the more recent 2019-2022 drought in California are discussed along with insights for short-term response, and longer-term water management, planning and policy.

This article studies the economic effects of regulations that restrict farm practices used to produce products sold within a regulating jurisdiction, regardless of where the product was produced. We apply this analysis to the impact of California's law on sow housing and the North American hog/pork supply chain. California's Proposition 12 requires that specified pork products sold in California come from hogs whose mothers were housed according to California requirements. Such regulations, whether imposed by national or subnational authorities, have unique impacts on production, demand, prices, and economic welfare both within and outside the regulating jurisdiction. Our model identifies these effects and quantifies their impacts within a calibrated equilibrium framework. Results show that California consumers will buy less pork under Proposition 12 because retail prices of regulated cuts of pork will rise by about 7%. Compliant hog producers will, on average, earn greater profits, while impacts on prices and quantities of products sold outside of California are minimal. Regulations like Proposition 12 are especially costly ways to affect farm animal treatment because they impose costs throughout the supply chain. We consider a simple alternative policy that would achieve far more change in animal housing at lower cost.

Increases in global meat demands cannot be sustainably met with current methods of livestock farming, which has a substantial impact on greenhouse gas emissions, land use, water consumption, and farm animal welfare. Cultivated meat is a rapidly advancing technology that produces meat products by proliferating and differentiating animal stem cells in large bioreactors, avoiding conventional live-animal farming. While many companies are working in this area, there is a lack of existing infrastructure and experience at commercial scale, resulting in many technical bottlenecks such as scale-up of cell culture and media availability and costs. In this study, we evaluate theoretical cultivated beef production facilities with the goal of envisioning an industry with multiple facilities to produce in total 100,000,000 kg of cultured beef per year or ~0.14% of the annual global beef production. Using the computer-aided process design software, SuperPro Designer®, facilities are modeled to create a comprehensive analysis to highlight improvements that can lower the cost of such a production system and allow cultivated meat products to be competitive. Three facility scenarios are presented with different sized production reactors; ~42,000 L stirred tank bioreactor (STR) with a base case cost of goods sold (COGS) of $35/kg, ~211,000 L STR with a COGS of $25/kg, and ~262,000 L airlift reactor (ALR) with a COGS of $17/kg. This study outlines how advances in scaled up bioreactors, alternative bioreactor designs, and decreased media costs are necessary for commercialization of cultured meat products.

This article studies the economic effects of regulations that restrict farm practices used to produce products sold within a regulating jurisdiction, regardless of where the product was produced. We apply this analysis to the impact of California's law on sow housing and the North American hog/pork supply chain. California's Proposition 12 requires that specified pork products sold in California come from hogs whose mothers were housed according to California requirements. Such regulations, whether imposed by national or subnational authorities, have unique impacts on production, demand, prices, and economic welfare both within and outside the regulating jurisdiction. Our model identifies these effects and quantifies their impacts within a calibrated equilibrium framework. Results show that California consumers will buy less pork under Proposition 12 because retail prices of regulated cuts of pork will rise by about 7%. Compliant hog producers will, on average, earn greater profits, while impacts on prices and quantities of products sold outside of California are minimal. Regulations like Proposition 12 are especially costly ways to affect farm animal treatment because they impose costs throughout the supply chain. We consider a simple alternative policy that would achieve far more change in animal housing at lower cost.

Biotechnology and BioengineeringVolume 120, Issue 4 p. 861-864 ISSUE INFORMATIONFree Access Biotechnology and Bioengineering: Volume 120, Number 4, April 2023 First published: 14 March 2023 https://doi.org/10.1002/bit.28137AboutPDF ToolsRequest permissionExport citationAdd to favoritesTrack citation ShareShare Give accessShare full text accessShare full-text accessPlease review our Terms and Conditions of Use and check box below to share full-text version of article.I have read and accept the Wiley Online Library Terms and Conditions of UseShareable LinkUse the link below to share a full-text version of this article with your friends and colleagues. Learn more.Copy URL Volume120, Issue4April 2023Pages 861-864 RelatedInformation

Two economists take readers on a tour of the economics of legal and illegal weed, showing where cannabis regulation has gone wrong and how it could do better. Cannabis "legalization" hasn't lived up to the hype. Across North America, investors are reeling, tax collections are below projections, and people are pointing fingers. On the business side, companies have shut down, farms have failed, workers have lost their jobs, and consumers face high prices. Why has legal weed failed to deliver on many of its promises? Can Legal Weed Win? takes on the euphoric claims with straight dope and a full dose of economic reality. This book delivers the unadulterated facts about the new legal segment of one of the world's oldest industries. In witty, accessible prose, economists Robin Goldstein and Daniel Sumner take readers on a whirlwind tour of the economic past, present, and future of legal and illegal weed. Drawing upon reams of data and their own experience working with California cannabis regulators since 2016, Goldstein and Sumner explain why many cannabis businesses and some aspects of legalization fail to measure up, while others occasionally get it right. Their stories stretch from before America's first medical weed dispensaries opened in 1996 through the short-term boom in legal consumption that happened during COVID-19 lockdowns. Can Legal Weed Win? is packed with unexpected insights about how cannabis markets can thrive, how regulators get the laws right or wrong, and what might happen to legal and illegal markets going forward.