JOURNAL OF AGRICULTURAL ECONOMICS RESEARCH
Year:2011 | Volume:3 | Issue:1|Papers Count:12

The objectives of crop insurance are to enhance the farmers' income level, decreasing income fluctuations, increasing investment security in agriculture and, thereby, more efficient use of agricultural inputs. So, in present study, effects of crop insurance on farmers' production efficiency, their attitudes toward risk as well as agricultural demand function were estimated and evaluated. Also, the probable affects of systematic risk, adverse selection and moral hazard on the efficiency of crop insurance were investigated. Data were collected from a sample of 87 insured and 90 uninsured potato farmers in Eghlid region by multistage cluster sampling method in 2009-10. Farmers' technical efficiency and attitudes toward risk were estimated by the stochastic frontier production function and ELCE method, respectively. Agricultural crop insurance demand function was estimated by using Goodwin (1993) model. Also, existence of systematic risk, adverse selection and moral hazard were investigated by Miranda and Glauber (1997) model. Results of the study revealed that, insurance effect on production of potato farmers was not positive. However, it was effective in increasing farmers' attitude toward risk. Investigating for adverse selection and moral hazard showed that they were most likely the main causes of negative effect of insurance. Results also revealed the existence of a weak systematic risk which is especially important in the case of private insurance. Demand function estimation showed the positive effects of farmers' personal and managerial characteristics such as degree of risk aversion, education level, experience, age and ownership on their demand for crop insurance.

This paper investigates the impact of real exchange rate uncertainty on the agricultural sector growth in Iran during the period of 1969-2007. The Generalized Auto-Regressive Conditional Heteroskedasticity (GARCH) Approach is employed to measure the real exchange rate Uncertainty. Autoregressive Distributed Lag (ARDL) approach is used to obtain the estimates of the co-integrate relations and the short run dynamics.The results showed robust and significant short and long run relationships between variables in the Iranian agricultural sector growth model. The real exchange rate uncertainty had a significant negative effect on agricultural sector growth. The error correction term (-0.71) is found to be negative and statistically significant suggesting a quick adjustment process. Based on the results, it was suggested that in order to reduce uncertainty, foreign exchange, trade, monetary and fiscal policies must be coordinated. Furthermore, designing insurance programs to overcome this problem is recommended to compensate losses of exchange rate uncertainty.

The objective of this study is to determine the optimal model for investment in dairy plants in all provinces of the country under uncertainty conditions during 1380 to 1387. To this end, first, the effective indicators on the final goal and their weights according to viewpoints and experiences of experts were determined. Then, in order to overecome the ambiguities and inaccuracy in judgments of experts and lack of data and information the Interval Logic (special case of Fuzzy Logic) was used. Since the type of decision making in this study was based on several indicators, therefore, Interval TOPSIS technique was employed. Optimal investment and percentages for each province in the construction of dairy plants based on uncertainty in values of indicators and their weights were determined. The results showed that the current pattern of investment in the construction of dairy industries in all provinces of the country was not optimal. It was recommended that in order to eliminate the gap between the current and optimal investment, future investment should be directed to provinces with lower level of investment.

Due to significance of increasing efficiency in water use in this study, by using the CCR and BCC models, the relative efficiency of decision-making units of Gharehghom Basin, in Khorasan razavi province was determined. Irrigation water use efficiency based on the value judgments of decision-making units was investigated by BCC model with weighted restrictions. Results showed that, the performance of units in CCR and BCC models with non-weighted restriction were significantly lower. Most decision-making units were efficient, based on BCC model with weighted restriction. The target inputs and outputs were determined for inefficient decision-making units. The results of the study indicated that implementing suitable price policy for water, training and extension services could be helpful in improving efficiency of decision-making units under study.

The role of agriculture sector is important in earning foreign exchange. To sell products in international market, they must be competitive. This study investigates comparative advantage in Mazandaran province, by using common indices and linear programming method in 2006-2007. In the process, dollar and euro were used. The results of linear programming showed that among crops which had comparative advantage, rice, irrigated yam, irrigated and rain fed barley, rain fed soy been, irrigated tomato and rain fed lentil were in optimum model. Most limited factor of production was land. The results indicated that adding one hectare to irrigate and rain fed land, would increase, net social profit by 25 and 18.5 million Rials, respectively. Sensitivity analysis for outputs and inputs was done individually. Estimation of model by using dollar showed similar results with euro. Finally, based on the results, development of rice and oilseeds was recommended.

Using annual data of urban red meat, broiler, and fish consumptions over 1974-2008 period, this study compares the forecast performance of vector error correction models with and without imposing the homogeneity restriction in the cointegration space. To this end, out of sample forecasts for both restricted and unrestricted models were generated and evaluated based on the Mean Square Error (MSE) criterion. The test of equality of forecast errors indicated that there was a significant difference between the forecast errors of restricted and unrestricted models. This suggests that imposition of homogeneity restriction tends to improve the forecast accuracy when the restriction is not rejected.

The main objective of this study was to determine technical, allocative and economic efficiency of cotton producers. Data set were obtained from a sample of 180 cotton producers in Gorgan township using systematic random sampling method in 2008. Stochastic frontier production and cost frontier functions were used to analyze technical, allocative and economic efficiency. Results showed that some variables such as land area, machinery, labor, fertilizer and water had positive effects on cotton production. Education and extension affected technical inefficiency negatively while, relationship between technical inefficiency and number of patches was significant and positive. Average of technical, allocative and economic efficiencies were 90%, 85% and 77% respectively. The difference between minimum and maximum technical, allocative and economic efficiencies were 42%, 37% and 39% respectively.

In this study, three irrigation methods, namely, clouding tape, sprinkler and furrow in Rozveh Agricultural Research station (Fereidan Region in Isfahan) were evaluated. This study was conducted as randomized complete blocks design as a split-split strip plot layout with three replication during two years. Three irrigation systems were considered as main plots, two planting methods (one- row planting and two-row planting) as split subplots and two potato cultivars (Marfuna and Agria) as split-split subplots. Significant difference way observed between irrigation method treatments and planting method by analyzing two years results. Results of the 1st year showed the advantage of production mean in sprinkler and tape methods comparing to furrow method while the second year results showed the advantage of sprinkler method to tape method and tape method to furrow method. Comparison of yield mean of cultivars indicated that although Agria cultivar was preferred to Marfona cultivar in the 1st year, two year comparison of yield mean showed no significant difference between Agria and Marfuna cultivars with yield means of 24083 kg. and 23233 kg., respectively. The two year comparison results of yield means using different planting methods indicated that one row planting with mean yield of 24839 kg. was preferred significantly compare to two row planting with mean yield of 22927kg. One row planting showed significant preference in the 1st and 2nd year. Two year interaction effect of treatments showed that, except cultivar × year source, other interaction effects were not significant. Tape irrigation led to highest mean of WUE equal to 4.92 kg/m3. Economic evaluation of the project was carried out using benefit -cost ratio and present value of net benefits. The results indicated that sprinkler system was more beneficial. Tape and furrow methods for potato planting stood in the next place.

In the literature of development economics there are two well known propositionsabout poverty reduction. (i); poverty can be reduced by promoting economic growth and by improving income distribution. (ii); increasing economic growth may worsen income distribution. This study attempted to investigate the relationship between inequality income and economic growth in urban and rural regions using Kuznets curve during 1980-2007 period. The results showed evidence of the inverted N-shaped relationship between per capita income and inequality of income in rural regions while, there was N-shaped relationship between per capita income and inequality income in urban areas. Also, increment in per capita income by 1 percent increased inequality of income in urban and rural areas by 0.44 and 0.41 percent respectively.

The objective of this paper is to investigate the welfare effects of reduction in rice import tariffs as a major factor in price stabilization policy. Iranian government in certain time decided to reduce rice import tariff from 150% to 4% to prevent sharp price increase and protect consumers. For this purpose, time series data for period of 1386-1358 were collected from the Ministry of Agriculture, FAO database and Statistical Yearbook of Customs. The effects of such policy on domestic prices, demand, domestic production, import level, social welfare and tariff income were investigated under different scenarios i.e. tariff reduction of 100, 80, 40 percent and posing fixed tariff of 1500 Rials per kilogram using a simple partial equilibrium framework. Results showed that consumers gain at the expense of the producers and government. Other disadvantages of such policy were increase in probability of bankruptcy, failure of self sufficiency policy and more dependence on foreign markets. Finally, some recommendations were made to improve the situation.