SABIIA - Sistema Aberto e Integrado de Informação em Agricultura (Sabiia)

Xie, Fang; Horan, Richard D.; Wolf, Christopher A..

Bovine tuberculosis (bTB) in cattle has caused significant economic losses to livestock producers and has proven difficult to eradicate. It is suspected that cattle movement across different farms and regions is one of the key factors of bTB transmission in the United States. Prior attempts to model the epidemiology of bTB infection within cattle to predict disease transmission have not adequately captured the behavioral aspects of trade. A better understanding of livestock trade patterns would help in predicting disease transmission and the associated economic effects. In this paper, we develop a gravity model of livestock trade and link it to an epidemiological model of bTB transmission, with the goal being that this information could lead to improved...

A Model of Incentive Compatibility under Moral Hazard in Livestock Disease Outbreak Response

Palavras-chave: Bovine tuberculosis; Gravity model; Disease management; Resource /Energy Economics and Policy.

Ano: 2009

URL: http://purl.umn.edu/49382

Gramig, Benjamin M.; Horan, Richard D.; Wolf, Christopher A..

This paper uses a principal-agent model to examine incentive compatibility in the presence of information asymmetry between the government and individual producers. Prior models of livestock disease have not incorporated information asymmetry between livestock managers and social planners. By incorporating the asymmetry, we investigate the role of incentives in producer behavior that influences the duration and magnitude of a disease epidemic.

BANKING ON EXTINCTION: IVORY STORAGE AND ELEPHANT CONSERVATION

Palavras-chave: Livestock disease; Moral hazard; Principal-agent model; Institutional and Behavioral Economics.

Ano: 2005

URL: http://purl.umn.edu/19200

Bulte, Erwin H.; Horan, Richard D.; Shogren, Jason F..

Ivory poachers threaten the half million remaining African elephants. In response, Kremer and Morcom (2000) offer a novel solution to reduce the risk of extinction -- a local government can stockpile ivory and threaten to dump it on the market if the elephant population falls too low lowering the expected returns from ivory sales and driving poachers out of business). We show that ivory stockpiling could be detrimental to elephant conservation because large stocks create strong incentives for strategic extinction by African governments. This result suggests an alternative strategy to enhance the viability of African elephant stocks -- international conservation organizations rather than governments should hold the stockpiles.

CLIMATE CHANGE, AGRICULTURE, AND WATER QUALITY IN THE CHESAPEAKE BAY REGION

Palavras-chave: Resource /Energy Economics and Policy.

Ano: 2001

URL: http://purl.umn.edu/20505

Abler, David G.; Shortle, James S.; Carmichael, Jeffrey J.; Horan, Richard D..

Owing to the fundamental importance of food to human welfare and of climate to crop and livestock production, agriculture has been a focus of research on the impacts of climate change and variability. This research has been largely concerned with implications for the supply and cost of food and for producer incomes. Societal interest in agriculture is, however, much broader than these issues. Agriculture is a source of several positive and negative environmental externalities. Several studies have been directed at the effects of climate change on the negative environmental externalities from agricultural production, including runoff, leaching, and erosion. These studies excel at modeling the biological and physical relationships and processes...

Coevolutionary Investments in Human Speech and Trade

Palavras-chave: Environmental Economics and Policy.

Ano: 2001

URL: http://purl.umn.edu/20504

Bulte, Erwin H.; Horan, Richard D.; Shogren, Jason F..

We propose a novel explanation for the emergence of language in modern humans, and the lack thereof in other hominids. A coevolutionary process, where trade facilitates speech and speech facilitates trade, driven by expectations and potentially influenced by geography, gives rise to multiple stable development trajectories. While the trade-speech equilibrium is not an inevitable outcome for modern humans, we do find that it is a relatively likely result given that our species evolved in Africa under climatic conditions supporting relatively high population densities.

Competitive Exclusion, Diversification, and the Origins of Agriculture

Palavras-chave: Institutional and Behavioral Economics.

Ano: 2006

URL: http://purl.umn.edu/21318

Horan, Richard D.; Shogren, Jason F.; Bulte, Erwin H..

The beginnings of agriculture, or the agricultural revolution, is now recognized to be the widespread adoption of known practices – a change in behavior – as opposed to a phenomenon of discovery and innovation. In this paper, we combine elements of three theories—climate change, property rights, and competitive exclusion—to create a paleoeconomic model of agriculture and its diffusion. We focus on climate change as a necessary trigger, which combined with group property rights and competitive exclusion processes produced conditions sufficient for the diffusion of early agriculture. In contrast to other models in which farming emerges as technological progress or climate makes it a more productive option than hunting, farming emerges in our model even if...

CONTROLLING WILDLIFE AND LIVESTOCK DISEASE WITH ENDOGENOUS ON-FARM BIOSECURITY

Palavras-chave: Farm Management; Research and Development/Tech Change/Emerging Technologies.

Ano: 2008

URL: http://purl.umn.edu/6410

Horan, Richard D.; Wolf, Christopher A.; Fenichel, Eli P.; Mathews, Kenneth H., Jr..

The spread of infectious disease among and between wild and domesticated animals has become a major problem worldwide. We analyze the socially optimal management of wildlife and livestock, including choices involving environmental habitat variables and on-farm biosecurity controls, when wildlife and livestock can spread an infectious disease to each other. The model is applied to the problem of bovine tuberculosis among Michigan white-tailed deer. The optimum is a cycle in which the disease remains endemic in the wildlife, but in which the cattle herd is depleted when the prevalence rate in deer grows too large.

Disease and Behavioral Dynamics for Brucellosis Control in Elk and Cattle in the Greater Yellowstone Area

Palavras-chave: Research Methods/ Statistical Methods.

Ano: 2004

URL: http://purl.umn.edu/20349

This paper investigates private responses and ecological impacts of policies proposed to confront the problem of brucellosis being spread from elk to cattle in Wyoming. The policies consist of combinations of changes in elk feeding and population levels. Farmers’ responses to these dynamics are modeled along with the associated impacts to livestock population dynamics. Our findings suggest that feedbacks between jointly determined disease dynamics and decentralized economic behavior matter, and the elk feedgrounds do not actually generate economic harm to the individual farmers.

Disease and Behavioral Dynamics for Brucellosis Control in Elk and Cattle in the Greater Yellowstone Area

Palavras-chave: Bioeconomics; Disease ecology; Epidemiology; Replicator dynamics; Susceptible-infected-recovered (SIR) model; Wildlife disease; Wildlife feeding; Resource /Energy Economics and Policy.

Ano: 2009

URL: http://purl.umn.edu/51707

Disease and Behavioral Dynamics for Brucellosis in Elk and Cattle in the Greater Yellowstone Area

This paper investigates private responses and ecological impacts of policies proposed to confront the problem of brucellosis being spread from elk to cattle in Wyoming. The policies consist of combinations of changes in elk feeding and population levels. Farmers' responses to these dynamics are modeled along with the associated impacts to livestock population dynamics. Our findings suggest that feedbacks between jointly determined disease dynamics and decentralized economic behavior matter, and the elk feedgrounds do not actually generate economic harm to the individual farmers.

Tipo: Journal Article

Palavras-chave: Bioeconomics; Brucellosis; Disease ecology; Epidemiology; Replicator dynamics; Susceptible-infected-recovered (SIR) model; Wildlife disease; Wildlife feeding; Livestock Production/Industries; Resource /Energy Economics and Policy.

Ano: 2009

URL: http://purl.umn.edu/50165

We investigate private responses to policies that have been proposed to confront a human-wildlife conflict that likely emerged as a result of a management regime designed to address an earlier human-wildlife conflict: specifically, brucellosis in elk that has spread to cattle in Wyoming. We examine population and disease dynamics under several different management options for the Jackson elk herd, where each option involves a combination of changes in elk feeding and population levels. Farmer responses to these dynamics, when vaccination is not required, are modeled along with the associated impacts to livestock dynamics. We also examine livestock management when there is little-to-no consideration given to the risk posed by elk. In practice, the...

Economic Incentives for Controlling Trade-Related Biological Invasions in the Great Lakes

Palavras-chave: Livestock Production/Industries.

Ano: 2008

URL: http://purl.umn.edu/6404

Lupi, Frank; Horan, Richard D..

Ballast water from commercial ships engaged in international trade has been implicated as the primary invasion pathway in over 60 percent of new introductions of invasive alien species (IAS) in the Great Lakes since 1960. Recent policies have recognized that IAS are a form of biological pollution and have become focused on preventing new introductions. Given that emissions-based incentives are infeasible for the case of biological emissions, we investigate the cost-effectiveness of various performance proxy-based and technology-based economic incentives to reduce the threat of new invasions of Ponto-Caspian species in the Great Lakes.

Tipo: Journal Article

Palavras-chave: Aquatic nuisance species; Ballast water; Uncertainty; Risk management; Performance-based incentives; Environmental subsidies; International Relations/Trade; Resource /Energy Economics and Policy.

Ano: 2005

URL: http://purl.umn.edu/10200

Economics of Water Quality Protection from Nonpoint Sources: Theory and Practice

Ribaudo, Marc; Horan, Richard D.; Smith, Mark E..

Water quality is a major environmental issue. Pollution from nonpoint sources is the single largest remaining source of water quality impairments in the United States. Agriculture is a major source of several nonpoint-source pollutants, including nutrients, sediment, pesticides, and salts. Agricultural nonpoint pollution reduction policies can be designed to induce producers to change their production practices in ways that improve the environmental and related economic consequences of production. The information necessary to design economically efficient pollution control policies is almost always lacking. Instead, policies can be designed to achieve specific environmental or other similarly related goals at least cost, given transaction costs and any...

Tipo: Report

Palavras-chave: Water quality; Nonpoint-source pollution; Economic incentives; Standards; Education; Liability; Research; Environmental Economics and Policy.

Ano: 1999

URL: http://purl.umn.edu/33913

ENVIRONMENTAL RISK AND AGRI-ENVIRONMENTAL POLICY DESIGN

Horan, Richard D.; Claassen, Roger; Cooper, Joseph C..

Agricultural nonpoint pollution is inherently stochastic (e.g., due to weather). In theory, this randomness has implications for the choice and design of policy instruments. However, very few empirical studies have modeled natural variability. This paper investigates the importance of stochastic processes for the choice and design of alternative nonpoint instruments. The findings suggest that not explicitly considering the stochastic processes in the analysis can produce significantly biased results.

Improving the Efficiency and Effectiveness of Agri-environmental Policies for the Chesapeake Bay

Palavras-chave: Agricultural and Food Policy; Environmental Economics and Policy.

Ano: 2000

URL: http://purl.umn.edu/21827

Ribaudo, Marc; Shortle, James S.; Blandford, David; Horan, Richard D..

Tipo: Journal Article

Palavras-chave: Water Quality; Nonpoint Source Pollution; Policy Instrument; Chesapeake Bay; Environmental Economics and Policy; Resource /Energy Economics and Policy; Q25; Q58.

Ano: 2011

URL: http://purl.umn.edu/117403

INSTRUMENT CHOICE AND BUDGET-CONSTRAINED TARGETING

Horan, Richard D.; Claassen, Roger; Agapoff, Jean; Zhang, Wei.

We analyze how choosing to use a particular type of instrument for agri-environmental payments, when these payments are constrained by the regulatory authority's budget, implies an underlying targeting criterion with respect to costs, benefits, participation, and income, and the tradeoffs among these targeting criteria. The results provide insight into current policy debates.

Jointly-Determined Livestock Disease Dynamics and Decentralized Economic Behavior

Palavras-chave: Research Methods/ Statistical Methods.

Ano: 2004

URL: http://purl.umn.edu/20387

Gramig, Benjamin M.; Horan, Richard D..

We develop a dynamic model of livestock disease and decentralized economic behavior as a jointly-determined system. By accounting for feedbacks between behavioral choices and disease outcomes we capture the endogenous nature of infection risks. We consider government mandated testing of livestock herds and how private biosecurity incentives are affected by the structure of disease eradication polices. How well disease control policies are targeted affects their effectiveness and may result in farmers substituting government testing and disease surveillance for private biosecurity. Numerical simulation results demonstrate that failing to account for feedbacks between disease and economic dynamics may underestimate the level of infection. Not accounting for...

Livestock Disease Indemnity Design When Moral Hazard is Followed by Adverse Selection

Palavras-chave: Bioeconomics; Epidemiology; Replicator dynamics; Externalities; Strategic behavior; Resource /Energy Economics and Policy.

Ano: 2009

URL: http://purl.umn.edu/49260

Gramig, Benjamin M.; Horan, Richard D.; Wolf, Christopher A..

Averting or limiting the outbreak of infectious disease in domestic livestock herds is an economic and potential human health issue that involves both the government and individual livestock producers. Producers have private information about preventive biosecurity measures they adopt on their farms prior to outbreak (ex ante moral hazard), and following outbreak they possess private information about whether or not their herd is infected (ex post adverse selection). We investigate how indemnity payments can be designed to provide incentives to producers to invest in biosecurity and report infection to the government, while simultaneously addressing the information asymmetry between producers and the government. We show how addressing the adverse selection...

Managing Excessive Predation in a Predator-Prey Setting: The Case of Piping Plovers

Palavras-chave: Food Consumption/Nutrition/Food Safety; Livestock Production/Industries; Risk and Uncertainty.

Ano: 2008

URL: http://purl.umn.edu/6542

Melstrom, Richard T.; Horan, Richard D..

Ecosystems involve interspecies interactions that can be influenced by human interventions. Prior work shows interventions that ignore these interactions cause efficiency-reducing ecosystem externalities. We show inefficiencies may also be attributable to nature, via interspecies interactions generating excessive competition or predation. Ecosystem management therefore may involve correcting both ecological and economic inefficiencies. We explore ecosystem management to correct ecological inefficiencies from predation. The inefficiencies are shown to be akin to anthropogenic externalities arising when humans harvest resources under open access conditions, and so the solution is to “regulate” predators. Viewing the ecological inefficiencies in this...

Tipo: Presentation

Palavras-chave: Bioeconomics; Wildlife management; Endangered species; Open access; Predator control; Predator removal; Exclosures; Piping Plovers; Merlins; Environmental Economics and Policy.

Ano: 2012

URL: http://purl.umn.edu/123350

Multi-Market Trading for Cooperative Resource Management: An Application to Water Pollution and Fisheries

Horan, Richard D.; Shortle, James S..

Increasingly, environmental problems are recognized to involve linkages across multiple environmental variables (e.g., pollution and a fishery). Prior work on managing these complex, linked systems generally focuses on efficiency rather than implementation. However, implementation is important and will generally involve changing human behaviors within the multiple economic sectors that impact upon the multiple environmental variables. Tradable permit markets are generally seen as a coordinating mechanism, within a particular regulated sector, that enhances efficiency by incentivizing agents to respond to behavioral choices of others within the sector. However, prior work stops short of coordinating behaviors across multiple sectors for cases where...

Optimal Control of Brucellosis in Bison in the Yellowstone National Park Area

Palavras-chave: Permit trading; Fisheries; Pollution; Shapley values; Bioeconomics; Environmental Economics and Policy; Resource /Energy Economics and Policy.

Ano: 2011

URL: http://purl.umn.edu/103591

Brucellosis is a highly infectious bacterial disease that causes infected females to abort their calves. It has caused devastating losses to U.S. farmers over the last century. The only known focus of Brucellosis left in the nation is wildlife such as bison and elk in the Greater Yellowstone Area. Vaccination and test-and-slaughter have been applied to brucellosis management in bison, and there has been discussion that a combination of both could potentially eradicate the disease in the Yellowstone National Park. However, there is no study on how to allocate resources between the two actions. This paper investigates the optimal allocation of these two selective management options, in a bioeconomic framework, when there are both existence and recreational...