Journal of Agricultural Economics最新文献

Existing studies on the association between environmental regulations and competitiveness have largely been conducted at the country, industry and firm levels, with little attention paid to their impacts on the economic performance of small farming households. We fill this gap by examining China's grassland ecological compensation policy, an environmental regulation aimed at grassland protection that restricts small herder households' grazing activities. Our empirical analysis is based on a relatively large-scale dataset of 570 herder households, and a stochastic frontier analysis is conducted to determine the technical efficiency of livestock production. The results show that the governmentally imposed grassland ecological compensation policy improves herder households' technical efficiencies, supporting the Porter Hypothesis, which suggests that environmental regulations trigger competitiveness. Further analysis shows that balance grazing, which is a less stringent regulation type, is effective in increasing technical efficiency, whereas grazing bans, which form a more stringent regulation type, fail to promote technical efficiency. This supports the narrow version of the Porter Hypothesis, which suggests that flexible environmental regulations have greater innovation effects than prescriptive ones. In addition, we find a positive and significant relationship between payment intensity and technical efficiency. Grassland plots covered by grazing ban and meeting ecological restoration standards should be converted to balance grazing to improve herders' technical efficiencies.

China imports 65% of the globally traded soybeans to meet the demand for vegetable oil and animal feed, accounting for about 85% of the country's total consumption. Extreme weather events (EWEs) significantly disrupt the global soybean market, with impacts transmitted to China. Using Superposed Epoch Analysis (SEA) and a global agricultural partial equilibrium model, this research examines the effects of EWEs on global soybean production, trade, and China's soybean-related sectors. The findings indicate that single-country EWEs have modest impacts, but simultaneous EWEs in multiple countries lead to global soybean production declines of 8.8%–17.1%, resulting in world price increases of 9.5%–33.2% and a decrease in China's imports by 1.5%–20.7%. Soybean oil and meal prices in China would increase by 0.8%–16.7%, and meat prices would rise by 0.1%–3.9%. Consequently, consumer spending on soybeans and meat may increase by 10.7–174.1 billion yuan. China's soybean stocks play a crucial role in mitigating the impacts of EWEs. Releasing stocks can limit soybean price hikes by up to 8.3% and meat price hikes by up to 1%, potentially lowering consumer spending on soybeans and meat by up to 37.4 billion yuan. Several measures are proposed to mitigate the impacts of EWEs and enhance resilience, including international cooperation for stabilising production, improving domestic stock and demand management, and building production capacity.

We analyse how a higher level of trade integration in global agricultural markets can mitigate food-security risks in a world where agro-climatic events increase both in frequency and intensity. By incorporating stochastically simulated crop-yield reductions into a partial-equilibrium model of global agricultural markets, we compare commodity supply, demand and price responses under two alternative trade pathways: a trade-liberalised world and a trade-restricted world. By implementing the same sets of yield reductions (input) on these two pathways and comparing synthesised market outcomes (output), we examine the role of trade as a mechanism for ensuring more resilient agricultural markets. Our findings indicate that trade integration could stabilise food availability and mitigate domestic and world price volatility. While trade policies can play a significant role in mitigating food-security risks in a climate-uncertain future, they must be complemented by broader policies to enhance global resilience and food security.

This study examines the impact of climate change on food security in Bangladesh, focusing on rice production and its sensitivity to climatic variability. By linking precipitation and temperature to rice yields and incorporating these relationships into a trade regime-switching partial equilibrium model, the research simulates future market conditions under alternative Shared Socioeconomic Pathways (SSPs). The analysis is divided into two parts: first, estimating yield variations for Bangladesh's two main rice harvests using historical weather data and stochastic simulations of future conditions; second, modelling the economic impacts of yield fluctuations under autarky and import parity regimes. The latter reduces the effects of domestic shocks but increases exposure to international market shocks. Climate variability interacts with trade regimes to determine food security outcomes: the effects on food availability and access, and the stability of food supplies, can be either nil or strong depending on the trade regime. The effectiveness of market interventions further depends on the trade regime in place, strengthening the case for more directly targeted support to food insecure households.

Submissions fell back in 2024 to 334 original manuscripts, a similar figure to pre-COVID levels. The drop in the number of submissions was associated with a modest increase in the acceptance rate from 8% to 11%. The Journal's acceptance rate remains higher for papers originating from Europe and North America. The Journal's Impact Factor remains similar to those of other leading field journals. The Editorial Team continues to evolve to reflect more closely the topics addressed and methods applied in journal submissions, and the journal's broad geographical coverage.

Scenarios examining the spread of agroecological transition in Europe concur that reducing livestock numbers and improving the synergies between crop and livestock areas are fundamental to curbing greenhouse gas emissions and increasing farmland biodiversity. This study employs an agent-based model to investigate the influence of a significant agroecological transition in France, which would entail a reduction in production and relocation of livestock to regions outside western France. The objective is to ascertain the impact of such a transition on the competitive dynamics within the meat industry. The large meat processors in western France, which currently dominate the market, would only process a small fraction of the livestock that would be relocated, due to higher transport costs. Their reduced market volume and share would lead to reduced profits for these processors, with some potentially going out of business because of high fixed costs. Driven by economic opportunities, small and medium-sized processors would enter the market and locate in northern, eastern and southern France. In all scenarios, increased production by small labour-intensive firms does not offset the impact of reduced production on job losses.