Economic Liberalization and Productivity Growth: Further Evidence From Bangladesh

The impact of economic liberalization reforms on the productive performances of manufacturing firms remains a contentious issue in the literature. This paper attempts to contribute to the debate by empirically estimating productivity growth of Bangladesh food manufacturing using firm level data before and after reform. Empirical results show that the share of output growth was accounted for by input growth in most sectors of this industry. In some sectors, the estimated rate of total factor productivity (TFP) growth is negligible or even negative. Decomposition of the TFP growth shows that technological progress plays a significant role in TFP growth across firms within the sub-sectors of this industry. Empirical results also show that the relative contribution of capacity realization to TFP growth is not substantial in inhibiting the industry's high and sustained growth. These dismal performances indicate that the industries responded a little to the implementation of economic reforms.     

Information,efficiency, and welfare in agricultural markets

Information and communications technologies (ICTs) have spread rapidly in the developing world. There has been considerable interest in the potential role ICTs, particularly mobile phones, have begun to play in the marketing of agricultural outputs in these countries. In this article, we discuss the potential impacts ICTs may have on welfare, both in terms of potential efficiency gains (via improved arbitrage), and welfare transfers among agents in the supply chain (via reduced informational asymmetries and market power). We also review the recent empirical evidence for such effects.     

The impact of agricultural productivity increases in the former Soviet Union and Eastern Europe on world agricultural markets

This paper studies the impact of productivity increases in the former Soviet Union and Eastern Europe on world agricultural markets and the regions’ bilateral and sectoral agricultural trade flows. We use a six‐region, 13‐sector general equilibrium model. We find that productivity increases lead to a significant increase in the regions’ agricultural output and exports and the former Soviet Union's agricultural imports. The former Soviet Union's net agricultural imports increase, whereas Eastern Europe's net agricultural trade balances improve. Overall, agricultural exporters will benefit, particularly, if productivity increases are not limited to or disproportionally high in agriculture.     

The integration of energy and agricultural markets

This article addresses the evolving links between energy and agricultural markets. Prior to 2005, there was little correlation between energy and agricultural commodity prices. In 2006–2008, with the ethanol boom in the United States, there emerged a strong link between crude oil, gasoline, and corn prices. There was little link between ethanol and corn. However, in late 2008 and 2009, the markets changed as ethanol production came under severe economic pressure and 2 billion out of 12 billion gallons of capacity shut down. During this period ethanol became priced more on corn, as the breakeven corn price helped drive the ethanol market. This article explores the drivers in these markets as well as other major issues facing the corn ethanol industry in the United States such as the blend wall. The article concludes with a review of prospects of a future cellulosic biofuels industry.     

Food commodity price changes and consumer welfare in Bangladesh: Valuable lessons for today

The recent rise in global food prices threatens many countries worldwide, especially the vulnerable populations. Viable coping strategies can only be designed based on the important policy lessons learned from the experiences of these countries in confronting the similar shocks of 2007–2011. However, the disproportionate effects of these events and the impacts of policy responses remain largely unexplored. We examine the impact of a food price surge and the effectiveness of various mitigating policies in Bangladesh, one of the most populous, densely populated countries in the world that is plagued by poverty. Specifically, we combine individual-level expenditure survey data with recent advances in consumer theory to examine the welfare consequences across income groups and geographic areas of the country over 2000–2016. Our empirical findings lend support to the hypothesis that the brunt of the price surge was borne by relatively less affluent and rural households, and government poverty alleviation programmes were largely ineffective.     

农业水权市场综合框架体系及案例分析

以较为成熟的水权市场建设和水权制度改革理论与实践为支撑,以对多个农业水权市场的实地调研为基础,提出融合制度基础、经济动力、交易参与人、第三方保护和设施基础等5大模块,涵括14个要素的农业水权市场综合框架体系,阐明了各要素之间的内在联系。以澳大利亚维多利亚州、智利Limarí流域和中国石羊河流域为例,在农业水权市场综合框架体系下对3个国家农业水权市场进行分析,进而从水权法律体系、水资源产权管理制度、水权信息共享度、水权交易媒介等多个方面总结出建立健全农业水权市场的必要条件及建议,旨在给我国积极探索建立农业水权市场的决策者们提供参考。     

Determinants of agricultural land rental market transactions in Bangladesh

Land rental market transactions have been the norm in land scarce rural Bangladesh mainly due to the inadequacies of the governmental land distribution system to meet the growing demand for land and to correct imbalances in factor proportions at the farm-level. The present study jointly determines the socio-economic factors underlying decision to rent-in land and/or rent-out land by the Bangladeshi farmers in the land rental market using a bivariate Tobit model. The model diagnostic reveals that the decisions to rent-in and/or rent-out land is significantly correlated, implying that univariate analysis of such decisions are biased, thereby, justifying the use of a bivariate approach. Results reveal that a number of socio-economic factors affect farmers’ participation in the land rental market and work in opposite directions regarding the decision to rent-in or rent-out land. The likelihood of renting-in land is higher for farmers with inadequate cultivable land but with higher levels of livestock and other farm capital asset ownership, and also for those located in areas with developed infrastructure and fertile soils. On the other hand, the likelihood of renting-out land is higher among farmers with higher levels of cultivable land but inadequate farm capital and livestock resources, higher levels of education, less subsistence pressure, and poor extension contact. Geography does matter, as the likelihood of land transactions is higher in agriculturally intensive and/or developed regions. Government policy has an important role to play to improve the factor equalisation role of these land rental markets through, for example, investment in education, agricultural extension, rural infrastructure and the livestock sector.     

Financial activity in agricultural futures markets: evidence from quantile regressions

This study analyses the relationship between financial activity and price returns in 12 US agricultural futures markets. It contributes to the existing research by exploring the forecasting power of trading activity for returns from the perspective of conditional quantiles. Quantile regressions detect Granger‐causal effects from positions of speculators and index traders to price returns in a wide range of commodity markets such as cocoa, coffee, corn, sugar and SRW wheat.     

Price and quantity controlled agricultural markets and disequilibrium econometrics: a survey

This survey reviews the literature on estimating single markets in disequilibrium in the presence of regulated price and/or quantity controls, e.g., minimum price regimes and/or marketing quotas. Most of the literature is found to describe pure econometric technique, with only a few applications having emerged to date. Various reasons for the broad non-acceptance of this literature are offered, including a perceived lack of realism. Proposals to close this econometric theory–application gap are put forward, including: the use of effective demand concepts in specifying demand and supply functions; synthesizing some closely related literature on agricultural price/quantity controls with disequilibrium econometrics (i.e., endogenous government policy and the effects controls have on yield uncertainty and price risk); and outlining more ‘applicable’ econometric technique extensions.     

Efficiency tests of agricultural commodity futures markets in China

The efficiency of the Chinese wheat and soybean futures markets is studied. Formal statistical tests were conducted based on Johansen's cointegration approach for three different cash markets and six different futures forecasting horizons ranging from 1 week to 4 months. The results suggest a long-term equilibrium relationship between the futures price and cash price for soybeans and weak short-term efficiency in the soybean futures market. The futures market for wheat is inefficient, which may be caused by over-speculation and government intervention.     

Seasonality and spatial integration in agricultural (product) markets

The recent testing approaches of the ‘Law of One Price’ which ate based on co-integration analysis are modified by incorporating the seasonal components of the agricultural price series into the testing procedure. Application of the modified testing approach to the soft wheat market of live European Union member stales produces mixed results as some of the markets turn out to be integrated while in some cases a unified market cannot be assumed. I hese results differ in some cases from those obtained by co-integration tests which ignore seasonal unit roots.     

export credits: do they affect agricultural commodity markets ?

Export Credits: Do they affect agricultural commodity markets ? Officially supported export credits in agriculture are often considered to be trade distorting and were a subject of negotiation during the Uruguay Round. Whereas explicit constraints were imposed on export subsidies at that time, participants did not agree to disciplines on export credits. However, there is little public knowledge about the size of these programmes or their impacts on markets. Recent OECD analysis provides information about the role of these schemes in agricultural trade, based on confidential survey data and existing methods of evaluating the impact of these programmes. Certain countries' export credit programmes are found to have distorted individual transactions, yet the aggregate market effects were small. The findings of the study do not support the argument that export credits added to world trade by allowing poor, importing countries to gain access to financing which would otherwise have been impossible. Instead, two of the empirical results suggest that export credit programmes offered very little support for such countries. First, the share of export credits targeting trade among OECD countries was far larger than the share going to those countries deemed most likely to suffer such financial constraints and, second, the average subsidy rates were relatively low. The results should encourage negotiators to seek an agreement that reduces trade distortions caused by export credits. les crédits à l'exportation affectent‐ils les marches de matieres premières agricoles ? Les crédits à l'exportation, lorsqu'ils sont d'origine publique, sont généralement considérés comme “distortifs”. A ce titre, ils ont été l'objet de négotiation au cours de l'Uruguay Round, mais, contrairement aux subventions à l'exportation, sur lesquelles des contraintes explicites ont été imposées, il n'y a pas eu d'accord pour les soumettre à une quelconque discipline. Pourtant, le public connaît fort mal leur volume et leur impact sur les marchés. C'est pourquoi un travail récent de l'OCDE analyse le rôle de ces politiques dans le commerce international de produits agricoles. Il est baséà la fois sur des enquêtes confidentielles et sur les méthodes standard utilisées dans les études d'impact de tels programmes. Les résultats montrent que si certaines transactions individuelles ont pu être influencées par ces politiques, les effets au niveau des marchés ont été dans l'ensemble assez faibles. Il est difficile d'admettre, au vu de cette étude, l'argument selon lequel les credits à l'exportation favorisent le commerce en aidant les pays pauvres importateurs à se procurer du financement auquel ils n'auraient pas eu accès autrement. Tout au contraire, deux constatations tendent à conclure que les crédits à l'exportation n'ont que très peu aidé ces pays: la premiere, c'est que la part des exportations ainsi aidées en direction d'autres pays de l'OCDE est bien plus grande que celle qui concerne les pays susceptibles d‘être soumis à une réelle contrainte de financement. La seconde, c'est que les taux de bonification accordés étaient fort has. Ces résultats devraient done conforter les négociateurs dans la récherche d'accord permettant de réduire les distorsions ainsi causées aux marchés. Haben Exportkredite eine Auswirkung auf landwirtschaftliche Rohstoffmärkte ? Subventionierte Exportkredite in der Landwirtschaft werden oft als handelsverzerrend betrachtet und waren Gegenstand der Verhandlungen in der Uruguayrunde. Die Teilnehmer beschlossen, Exportsubventionen explizit zu beschränken, während Exportkredite von Einschränkungen unberührt blieben. In der Öffentlichkeit ist jedoch nur wenig über den Umfang dieser Programme oder deren Auswirkungen auf verschiedene Märkte bekannt. Die kürzlich erschienene Analyse der OECD zeigt aufwelche Rolle diesen Programmen im Agrarhandel zukommt. Die Analyse basiert auf vertraulichen Untersuchungsergebnissen und auf bekannten Methoden zur Evaluierung der Auswirkungen dieser Programme. Es wurde nachgewiesen, dass die Exportkreditprogramme bestimmter Länder eine verzerrende Wirkung auf einzelne Transaktionen hatten, allerdings waren die Auswirkungen auf den Markt insgesamt gering. Die Ergebnisse der Studie unterstützen nicht das Argument, dass Exportkredite zum Welthandel beitragen, indem sie einkommensschwachen Importländern eine Moglichkeit zur Finanzierung eröffnen, welche anderenfalls nicht gegeben ware. Im Gegenteil, zwei Ergebnisse der empirischen Studie legen nahe, dass Exportkreditprogramme solchen Ländern wenig Hilfe bieten. Erstens war der Anteil derjenigen Exportkredite, welche auf den Handel zwischen OECD‐Ländern abzielen, sehr viel größer als der Anteil, welcher auf jene Länder fällt, die höchstwahrscheinlich den umfassendsten finanziellen Restriktionen unterliegen. Zweitens war die durchschnittliche Höhe der Subventionen relativ gering. Die Ergebnisse sollten die Verhandlungsführer dazu ermutigen, eine Vereinbarung zu treffen, welche die durch Exportkredite verursachten Handelsverzerrungen abbaut.     

Measuring the cost of liquidity in agricultural futures markets: Conventional and Bayesian approaches

Estimating the cost of liquidity in agricultural futures markets is challenging because bid‐ask spreads are usually not observed. Based on an ability to reflect simulated data from Roll's spread model, we assess the effectiveness of conventional and Bayesian bid‐ask spread estimators under different market conditions. Conventional serial covariance and absolute price change spread estimators appear to be biased. Hasbrouck's Bayesian estimator generates small costs of liquidity whose values depend on the correlation and noise in the data. The absolute value Bayesian estimator is precise and works well under conditions of high levels of noise and correlation usually found in agricultural futures markets. Using data from live cattle (LC) and lean hog (LH) contracts, we find similar patterns of performance that produce economically meaningful cost of liquidity differences.     

Rental markets for cultivated land and agricultural investments in China

The purpose of this paper is to empirically track the progress and consequences of the emergence of cultivated land markets in China since 2000. We draw on a set of nationwide, household‐level panel data (for 2000 and 2008) and find that the markets for cultivated land rental have emerged robustly. According to our data, 19 of China's cultivated land was rented in farm operators in 2008. We also find that the nature of China's cultivated land rental contracts has become more formal and lengthened the period of time that the tenant is able to cultivate the rented‐in plots. While there may be benefits for lessors and tenants, our data show that there are falling rates of investment in organic manure. The farmers in our sample have reduced organic manure use from 13 tons/ha in 2000 to 5 tons/ha in 2008. Part of this fall is due to the rise of cultivated land rental markets. The analysis, however, does not find that improved property rights in cultivated land rental affect investment largely because property rights have largely been established by 2000, the first year of our sample. Our results, however, also show that there are forces that appear to be mitigating the negative consequences of rising cultivated land rental. After holding constant initial rental rates and other factors, we find that the gap between investment in organic manure in own land and rented‐in land is narrowing. One interpretation of our findings is that if policymakers can find ways to even further strengthen the rights of lessors and tenants as well as lengthen contract periods, farmers—even those that rent—will invest more in their land, because they will be able to capture the returns to their investments.     

The interaction of speculators and index investors in agricultural derivatives markets

Through the analysis of the weekly Commodity Futures Trading Commission reports on 12 US traded agricultural commodities, we revisit the heated debate on the impact of index flows on commodities prices. After introducing a novel stock‐to‐use proxy that may be used to represent inventory variations at the intra‐month level, we show that speculators, contrary to index investors, are sensitive to commodity‐specific fundamental information. Their endogeneity to commodities markets hinders the estimation of their market impact. Regarding the market impact of index flows, the endogeneity problem is alleviated in two ways: first, we restrict the scope to agricultural commodities, for which index flows are more exogenous to market prices; second, we introduce two novel instrumental variables that are computed from index flows outside the market under analysis. We find that index investment flows are offset by commercial players, not speculators. The serial correlation of index flows may explain the tendency of speculators to synchronize with index investors. There is strong evidence of an index flows' impact in those commodities markets where speculative and index positions are the most correlated. The market impact of index flows is located in periods of liquidity stress, as is the correlation between speculative and index positions. Overall, our results demonstrate an impact of index investors on some agricultural prices and suggest that the synchronicity between speculative and index positions is an important determinant of this impact.     

Commodity price bubbles and macroeconomics: evidence from the Chinese agricultural markets

This article investigates the links between commodity price bubbles and macroeconomic factors, with an application to the agricultural commodity markets in China from 2006 to 2014. Price bubbles are identified using a newly developed, recursive right‐tailed unit root test. A Zero‐inflated Poisson model is used to analyze the factors contributing to bubbles. Results show that (a) there were speculative bubbles in most Chinese agricultural commodity futures markets during the sample period, though their presence was infrequent; (b) economic growth, money supply, and inflation have positive effects on bubble occurrences, while interest rates have a negative effect; and (c) among all macroeconomic factors considered, economic growth and money supply have the greatest impact in triggering bubbles. Our findings shed new light on the nature and formation of bubbles in the Chinese agricultural commodity markets.     

Measuring the functional efficiency of agricultural futures markets

This article presents a method for measuring the functional efficiency of agricultural futures markets in terms of social welfare using a standard futures market structural model. Employing the concept of social surplus, it can be shown that, when futures prices are used to estimate future spot prices, the errors in prediction produce to some degree resource misallocation, which in turn results in welfare losses. Therefore, the social welfare associated with the presence of futures markets can be measured using a Social Loss index. The indicator was calculated for the period 1975–2015 and for several subperiods, which allow us to analyse functional efficiency before and after the 2007–2008 spikes in the prices of agricultural commodities. Futures contracts for 12 products are evaluated. The products are grouped in three different categories: ‘soft products’, ‘livestock’ and ‘grains and oilseeds’. The results indicate that livestock contracts tended to be more efficient than the rest of the contracts during the whole period, but in 2008–2015 their efficiency decreased vis‐á‐vis the rest of the products. Nevertheless, 2008–2015 proved to be the most efficient subperiod, confirming the remarkable development of agricultural futures markets over time.     

A quantile autoregression analysis of price volatility in agricultural markets

This paper investigates the dynamics of agricultural price volatility based on a quantile autoregression (QAR) model. The QAR model provides a flexible representation of the distribution of price and its dynamics. The approach is applied to U.S. wheat and corn markets over the period of 1980–2017. This period is of significant interest as it covers important changes in agricultural policy and increased reliance on markets. The price analysis is conducted conditional on stocks held in the previous period. We show how increasing previous stocks shift the price distribution to the left and decreases the odds of facing price spikes (by shifting down the upper tail of the price distribution). Our analysis also examines the effects of changing public stocks on prices. For both wheat and corn, this reflects changing agricultural policy, contrasting the 1980s (when public stocks were relatively high) with the post-2005 period (when public stocks became zero). We document how higher public stock ratio during the previous period did not lower the odds of facing price spikes. Applied to the wheat and corn markets, we also uncover evidence of local dynamic instability in the upper tail of the price distribution, suggesting that price instability becomes more pronounced when previous stocks are low.