Agricultural political economy and emerging biotechnologies: an economic evaluation

This study comprises of three research papers. Paper I constitutes an illustration of PERT and PEST policies in analyzing the potential economic impacts of bST adoption and dairy protectionistic patterns across OECD countries. The results from OLS, PCSTS and PROBIT analysis indicate that the dairy producer protection levels across these countries are significantly influenced by the GNP per capita, group-size of dairy producers, and the share of food in consumers' household expenditures. In the theoretical framework, the ex-ante analysis incorporates a producers' political resource constraint indicative of their lobbying contributions. The bST is introduced in the ex-post framework via a yield enhancement function to account for milk increases from the use of bST. The Basic Linked System (BLS) of the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis is used to examine the impacts of bST adoption across selected countries under various policy and adoption scenarios;Paper II focuses on the economic and welfare effects of bST adoption across industrialized and developing countries. Some eco-ethical issues involved in the development and adoption of bST are discussed. The implications of inter-country exchange are then incorporated into a conceptual framework of the interactions among proponents and opponents of the technology as well as the politicians, highlighting public choice foundations of policy formulation and its effects across countries. The BLS model is used to ascertain the impacts of bST adoption under a number of scenarios regarding adoption rates and yield increases;Paper III examines the impacts of a parasite control, Ivomec, on pig average daily gains and feed efficiency. The experiment was conducted over a two-year period at an Iowa farm. Results indicate significant performance gains for treatment pigs during the grower phase in both years. In the first year, control groups outperformed treatment groups in overall average daily gains. Housing facilities comparisons indicated improved performance in case of groups weaned to grower 3 in both years. Results for seasonality analysis were mixed. Cost-benefit analysis showed that although gross revenues for treatment groups fell slightly below that for control, savings in feed costs resulted in a net benefit of 1.51 for each treatment pig.