Member in the News: Marc Bellemare

Against the Grain

From the Print Edition: The Economist

IS THE global fad for quinoa a bane or boon to the peasants of the Andes? For centuries they were more or less the only people to grow or eat the stuff. Dieticians in the rich world have known how nutritious it is for a long time: in 1993 a study by NASA, America’s space agency, stated: “While no single food can supply all the essential life-sustaining nutrients, quinoa comes as close as any other in the plant or animal kingdom.” But it took adulation from the likes of Oprah Winfrey (who in 2008 included it in her 21-day “cleanse” diet) to give the grain global appeal. Now, wherever yuppies can be found, it can be too, usually lurking near Puy lentils or goji berries in a salad. The UN even branded 2013 the International Year of Quinoa.

As demand galloped ahead, supply could not keep pace. So between 2000 and its peak in 2014, the average price of quinoa exports from Peru and Bolivia more than tripled, to $6-7 a kilogram. That panicked the Guardian, a British newspaper, among other hand-wringers: in 2013 it ran the headline “Can vegans stomach the unpalatable truth about quinoa?” It accused heedless Western hipsters of pricing poor Andeans out of their staple food. Given that 16% of Bolivians and 7.5% of Peruvians are undernourished, according to the UN, that is a serious charge.

Happily, the food fadsters are not guilty. Although average quinoa consumption in Peru fell as quinoa prices rose, it did so steadily, and much less abruptly, than the movement in the price. This suggests that the switch was as much to do with changing preferences as prices. Young Peruvians are keener to indulge in food fads of their own—for more Western food—than to gorge on their grandparents’ staple.

Not so keen on quinoa

In any case, only a tiny portion of Peruvian household spending is devoted to quinoa. In countries like Bangladesh, Malawi and Vietnam, sharp increases in the price of staple foods can plunge the poor into even deeper poverty, as they often spend more than a third of their income on them. But a study by Andrew Stevens at the University of California found that quinoa accounted for a mere 0.5% of household spending, on average.

For farmers, meanwhile, higher prices meant higher incomes. Peruvian and Bolivian quinoa-growers need all the money they can get. Before the boom, many were barely scraping by. Another study, published in March, found that the total household spending of the typical quinoa-growing family (including consumption of their own crop) was only 40% of that of the typical quinoa-consuming family.

Surging prices helped lift quinoa farmers’ household expenditure by 46% between 2004 and 2013 (compared with an increase of around 30% for non-producing households). Better still, even households that did not produce quinoa enjoyed a boost to their consumption. It seems that by spending their newfound income, flush quinoa producers benefited the local economy more broadly. For every 25% increase in the price, household consumption increased by 1.75%.

View the entire article online: http://www.economist.com/news/finance-and-economics/21699087-fad-andean-staple-has-not-hurt-pooryet-against-grain

Member in the News: David Just

A clever tweak to how apples are sold is making everyone eat more of them

By Roberto A. Ferdman May 19

 

Three years ago, a group of researchers at Cornell University's Food and Brand Lab had a hunch. They knew that many of apples being served to kids as part of the National School Lunch Program were ending up in the trash, virtually untouched. But unlike others, they wondered if the reason was more complicated than simply that the kids didn't want the fruit.

Specifically, they thought the fact that the apples were being served whole, rather than sliced, was doing the fruits no favor. And they were on to something.

A pilot study conducted at eight schools found that fruit consumption jumped by more than 60 percent when apples were served sliced. And a follow-up study, conducted at six other schools, not only confirmed the finding, but further strengthened it: Both overall apple consumption and the percentage of students who ate more than half of the apple that was served to them were more than 70 percent higher at schools that served sliced apples.

"It sounds simplistic, but even the simplest forms of inconvenience affect consumption," said David Just, a professor of behavioral economics at Cornell who studies consumer food choices, and one of the study's author. "Sliced apples just make a lot more sense for kids."

The hardest part is getting kids to start eating fruit, to take the first bite, and that's precisely what slicing an apple makes more appealing. A child holding a whole apple has to break the skin, eat around the core, and deal with the hassle of holding a large fruit. That barrier might seem silly or superficial, but Just says it's significant when you're missing teeth or have braces, as so many kids do.

Read the entire article online: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2016/05/19/the-apple-industrys-strange-savior/?tid=sm_tw

Members in the News: Brandon McFadden and Jayson Lusk

80 Percent of Americans Want to Label Food That Contains DNA

Katherine Mangu-Ward May. 24, 2016 3:25 pm

You might have heard that Americans overwhelmingly favor mandatory labeling for foods containing genetically modified ingredients. That's true, according to a new study: 84 percent of respondents said they support the labels.

Brandon McFadden and Jayson Lusk

But a nearly identical percentage—80 percent—in the same survey said they'd also like to see labels on food containing DNA.

Brandon McFadden and Jayson Lusk

DNA.

The study, published in the Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology Journal last week, also found that 33 percent of respondents thought that non-GM tomatoes "did not contain genes" and 32 percent thought that "vegetables did not have DNA." So there's that.
University of Florida food economist Brandon R. McFadden and his co-author Jayson L. Lusk surveyed 1,000 American consumers and discovered that "consumers think they know more than they actually do about GM food." In fact, the authors say, "the findings question the usefulness of results from opinion polls as motivation for public policy surrounding GM food."

Read the entire article online: http://reason.com/blog/2016/05/24/80-percent-of-americans-want-to-label-fo

Webinar Series- Agricultural and Applied Economics Priorities and Solutions Provocateur

Priorities and Solutions Project

Provocateur Webinars

As part of the agricultural and applied economic priorities and solutions project, we are going to host webinars to encourage greater engagement in the ideas presented at the workshop. Please consider attending to hear more about these innovative and forward-thinking ideas!

All webinars will be recorded and made available on the C-FARE YouTube Channel. 
This is a C-FARE facilitated event and part of AAEA Government Relations Activities. 

Tuesday, May 24, 2016, at 12 noon ET

Agricultural production and policy

Keith Coble, A W.L. Giles Distinguished Professor of Agricultural Economics, Mississippi State University

Keith Coble will discuss his vision for how our profession can contribute to solving important problems relating to agricultural production and policy questions associated with those problems. He will suggest that long-standing risks such as market volatility and weather and climate change will continue to pose new challenges while environmental and resource constraints will grow. However, the data used to answer important empirical questions appears be changing dramatically and big data is opening many new doors for research. Ultimately policy makers will still value quality scientific research from objective sources. The challenge is for our profession to provide it.

Agribusiness and food marketing systems      

James Vercammen, Professor of Food and Resource Economics, University of British Columbia

Academic work in agricultural economics is increasingly driven by the availability of high-quality data sets. While this is good in that important policy questions can be answered more carefully, it does mean, however, that subject areas such as agribusiness and food supply chains that are not well endowed with data are not receiving the research attention they deserve. Graduate students must be shown the value of strong conceptual frameworks, case studies and structural econometric methods of empirical analysis to ensure that they are well equipped to effectively tackle a broad array of topics in their professional careers.

Friday, May 27, 2016, at 12 noon ET

Consumer and food issues

Jayson Lusk, Regents Professor and Willard Sparks Endowed Chair, Oklahoma State University

The presentation will discuss emerging issues and priority areas related to food policy and consumer concerns about the the food.

Thursday, June 2, 2016 at 12 noon ET

Natural resources and environmental policy

Madhu Khanna, Professor of Agricultural and Consumer Economics, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Sustainably growing the food needed to feed 9 billion people by mid-century in the face of climate change and growing policy interest in bioenergy is a grand societal challenge. Integrated approaches that link natural systems with human decisions and that improve our understanding of the effects of climate change on human and natural systems and the potential for adaptation are critical to finding innovative solutions. The potential to use big data to improve private and societal decision-making, the challenges of designing effective policies to address the multiple ecosystem services affected by agricultural systems and the importance of understanding the multi-dimensional spillover effects of agricultural, energy and environmental policies will be discussed.

Friday, June 3, 2016, at 12 noon ET

Rural community development

Mike Woods, Chair of the Department of Agricultural Economics, Oklahoma State University

The talk will briefly assess contributions made by agricultural economists to enhance the well-being of rural residents through research and outreach. Many models and approaches have been utilized to address issues of economic growth, wealth creation, poverty, and many quality of life factors. Emerging needs related to technology, health care and education will be reviewed. Agricultural economists have much to offer through applied research, extension programming and classroom instruction.

International economics

TBA

Webinar: Understanding the Rise in Rural Child Poverty, 2003-2014

Monday, May 23, 2016 at 1:00 pm EDT

Hosted by: Thomas Hertz

Rural child poverty fell during the 1990s, but trended upward from 2003 to 2012, rising during the economic expansion of 2003-07, the recession of 2007-2009, and in the first few years of economic recovery. The share of rural children living in poverty peaked in 2012 at 26.7 percent, the highest rate since at least 1968. The rural child poverty rate has since declined, but it remains significantly higher than in 2003. 

ERS economist Thomas Hertz will present findings from his recent report co-authored by ERS geographer Tracey Farrigan, Understanding the Rise in Rural Child Poverty, 2003-2014, on the causes of rising rural child poverty since 2003. Their analysis seeks to explain the relative importance of changes in average rural incomes, changes in income inequality, and changes in rural demographics.

Register for this webinar HERE
Streaming audio available through your computer 

Member in the News: David Just

Food and Nutrition Economics: Fundamentals for Health Sciences

Oxford University Press has recently published a textbook by George Davis and Elena Serrano, entitled, “Food and Nutrition Economics: Fundamentals for Health Sciences.”  This book is intended for upper level undergraduates, graduate students, and health professionals.   Though the title indicates it is for the health sciences (it is being published by the Medical Division of OUP), you may find it a useful reference for an economist as well.  It is effectively an intermediate micro-economics textbook with all the applications being food but modifying the standard consumer and producer treatment to incorporate food and nutrition targets or constraints within our standard models.  There are individual chapters on income, prices, convenience, behavioral economics, neuroeconomics, food systems, cost-effectiveness and cost-benefit analysis, among others.

Attached you will find a brief description of the book and below is the link to the Oxford University Press website giving more details, such as the table of contents.

https://global.oup.com/academic/product/food-and-nutrition-economics-9780199379118?cc=us&lang=en&#

Call for Judges: SS-AAEA Academic Bowl

The Student Section seeks judges for the 2016 SS-AAEA Academic Bowl.  The Academic Bowl is held during the AAEA annual meeting; this year’s event runs from July 31-August 2 in Boston, MA.  The actual competition will run from 8:00 AM to 4:00 PM on Monday, August, 1.  The highest demand for judges takes place early in the day when we are operating in three rooms for the competition. Depending on the number of teams competing, we should require just two rooms from 2:00 PM to 4:00 PM. Please email timothy.meyer@sdstate.edu if you are able to judge and list your time preferences/availability in the following time slots:

• 8:00 AM to 10:00 AM
• 10:00 AM to 12:00 PM
• 12:00 PM to 2:00 PM
• 2:00 PM to 4:00 PM

If your university is also bringing a registered team or two to compete, please let me know how many students you intend to bring.  Finally, if you cannot judge, but know someone who can who is not a recipient of this email, please pass on the information.

Please consider making this small time commitment; it is a great investment in the future of Applied and Agricultural Economics. Email Timothy Meyer at timothy.meyer@sdstate.edu with your availability at the 2016 AAEA Annual Meeting in Boston, MA.