JOURNAL OF AGRICULTURAL ECONOMICS RESEARCH
Year:2009 | Volume:1 | Issue:3|Papers Count:10

One of the most important industries in the agricultural sector ofIran is tomato processing industry. This industry also is important in Fars Province. The objective was to study efficiency of firms in Fars province.Data Envelopment Analysis was used for analyzing efficiency. Result showed that by using 97801 million Rials of capital, 909 man per year of labor, 56814 square meter of building and 225492 square meters of land that respectively were 61.42%, 36.05%, 42.73% and 57.71% less than current condition of using these resources, 164 thousand tons of tomato paste could be produced that was 1.66% greater than current production.This is possible by technical changes and use of full capacity of tomato paste industries. In this context, extending credit, subsidy and price support for tomato and tomato paste producers are suggested. Design of new tomato paste firms and corresponding costs could be analyzed byusing the approach proposed in this study.

The objective of this study was to develop a risk-based cropping pattern for Marvdasht district in Fars province. In addition, lowering water consumption was also considered. To achieve objectives of the study, Multi-Objective Programming approach was applied. The mentioned objectives were followed by considering the farmers preferences to reach a certain level of income. The Target MOTAD and Income Variance models were used. Desired solutions were selected using Cluster Analysis since several solutions were obtained by Income Variance model. The selection was carried out based on integrated criterion containing three goals, namely, reduced amount of water usage, reduced risk, and increased gross margin. The results showed that there was a trade off among the goals. In selected patterns wheat tended to increase by increasing risk. The selected patterns had more cultivated area under wheat and lesser under barely, maize and vegetables. The cultivated area under broad beans was remained unchanged compare to current pattern. It was also revealed that with increasing risk, the gap between the existing and optimal cropping patterns would increase.

Regarding the importance of kiwi production in Iran and necessity of penetrating global markets, surveying of export situation in the presence of competitors is essential. This study aims to explore export advantage of Iran’s kiwi against its main rivals. Revealed comparative advantage (RCA) investigation results showed that export advantage of Iran was increased during 1990-2005 period. Minimum and maximum amounts of the index were 1.669 and 10.620 for 1999 and 2005, respectively showing total growth of 88.863. Export advantage of Iran’s kiwi was significantly related to its export. Increase in export advantage of Chile’s kiwi had negative impact on Iran’s advantage indicating that Chile’s export could replace Iran’s export. New-Zeeland’s export advantage supports Iran’s export advantage. Furthermore, an increase in import advantage of Turkey and Russia as major importers of Iran’s kiwi would increase Iran’s export advantage. It is suggested that these potential markets need to be taken into consideration in the future.

In this paper moment-based approach (as developed by Antle, 1983) has been used in order to determine the effect of four inputs including food, labor, fuel and medicine on output risk. This is based on 166 pooled-data collected from a sample of poultry produces in Sabzevar region. The results showed that all inputs had significant and positive effect on output. Besides, the results demonstrated that only food and labor had significant and positive effect on output risk, while medicine and fuel affected output risk negatively. Based on the results, this study suggested more investment in order to persuade farmers to use new technology. Moreover extension service and maintaining fuel subsidy would be helpful to increase output and reduction of output risk.

Efficient fish marketing is a useful instrument for developing fishery industry and its sustainability. This study attempts to investigate fish market using data collected among 90 fishermen and 39 middlemen in Hormozgan Province. The results indicates that fishermen's share of consumer price was relatively low. In addition, due to inefficient cooperative performance in Bandar Lengeh, marketing margin in Bandar Lengeh was less than Bandar Abbas. Lack of market information, financial and infrastructural facilities were among important problems faced by fishermen. Based on the findings of the study, establishment of cooperatives and vertical integration are recommended to improve market performance.

In this paper by using the Revealed comparative advantage and Revealed Symmetric Comparative Advantage approaches, export advantage of Cumin Seed was determined. Product comparative advantage was determined by using DRC index. Finally, cumin trade mapping and Integration of International Trade indices were determined.Results showed that Iran had export comparative advantage and DRC index was 0.79. The best target markets were Sri Lanka, New Zealand, USA and Mexico respectively. Meanwhile, import trend in international market was decreasing while export of the product from Iran was increasing.

Monetary policies are among macroeconomic variables which have considerable effect on Gross National Product of various sectors of the economy. Due to importance of Agricultural Sector in the Iranian economy, the effect of monetary shocks on Agricultural Sector, by using Vector Autoregressive model and filter Hodric-Presscott has been examined in this paper. The results showed a weak relationship between monetary shocks and growth of agricultural sector and it is concluded that agricultural policies had negligible effect on growth of agricultural sector.Finally, some recommendations were made to improve the situation.

This study aims to determine income distribution in rural and urban areas of Iran during 1987-2007 periods. The family cost of living data which gathered by Statistical Center of Iran were used to calculate the changes of income distribution in the urban and rural areas of the country. For this purpose, various measures such as Gini coefficient, Theil index and Atkinson coefficient were utilized. Findings of the study indicated that income inequality decreased during the period of study steadily. Also it is concluded that income distribution in rural areas was more unequal and fluctuating compare to urban areas. On this basis, it is recommended that more emphasis must be placed on rural areas in development plans.