This paper studies bidder behavior in an innovative program in which farmers compete to sell their development rights to the State. We derive a reduced form bidding model that includes both private value and common value components. This model allows us to estimate the role of bidder competition, the winner’s curse correction, and the underlying distribution of private values. We find that competition reducelers adjust for a possible winner’s curse by increasing their bids by roughly 10 percent over their reservation values.

In this paper, we analyze the factors that influence t he productivity of maize among smallholder farmers, given that unfavourable output and input market conditions throughout the 1990s have compelled smallholder farmers into unsustainable agricultural intensification. We use farm-household survey data in order to compare the productivity of smallholder maize production under integrated (ISFM) and chemicalbased soil fertility management using a normalized translog yield response model.

In the conditions of the Republic of Belarus there was shown the necessity of detection and recording of socially-significant sights and brand objects in the process of managing land resources. There was examined the classification of land plots and objects of real estate, which appear to be territory brands. There were determined the main approaches to the formation of the system of such objects on the basic level of state management.

This paper presents a case study of the economic damages to homeowners in a northern New Jersey community due to an exotic forest insect--the hemlock woolly adelgid. Hedonic property value methods are used to estimate the effect of hemlock health on property values. A statistically significant relationship between hemlock health and residential property values is established. Moreover, there are some signs of spillover impacts from hemlock decline, as negative effects are realized on the parcels where the declining hemlock stands are located as well as on neighboring properties.

A simulation model incorporating stochastic yields, prices, and government payments generates returns for landowners and tenants under cash, share, and flexible leases. Corn, soybeans, wheat, cotton, peanuts, and wheat-double crop soybeans crop enterprises are studied. Alternatives are evaluated by mean returns, coefficient of variation, and certainty equivalent analysis.

This paper develops a model to examine the impacts of uncertainty about crop production and irreversibility of program participation on determining land rental payments and least-cost land retirement targeting in the Conservation Reserve Enhancement Program. Results show that under risk aversion only, the marginal cost of abatement and the average land rental payment are less than those under risk neutrality. However, under uncertainty and irreversibility, the marginal cost and the average land rental payment are considerably higher than those under risk neutrality or risk aversion only.

Applying the Environmental Kuznets Curve hypothesis, the economic structure of pesticide consumption in the world was examined and its future consumption was predicted. It was found that the hypothesis is applicable and the income level significantly affects the pesticide consumption. Additionally, sustained population per land is also influential. In spite of the applicability of the hypothesis, it was also demonstrated that the great increase of pesticide consumption in developing countries would be predicted.