IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/uow/depec1/wp07-10.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Optimal Control of Locusts in Subsistence Farming Areas

Author

Abstract

Locust swarms hit subsistence-staple-crop-growing households at random and are not privately controllable. An aerial-spraying optimal control model that supports the said households’ liveli-hood at least expected cost is therefore developed. The qualitative properties of the model are analysed under economically plausible but mild assumptions. The steady state comparative stat-ics reveal that the locust swarm size and the probability of a household’s crop being destroyed by a swarm decrease with the number of households, yield per household, and the staple crop’s replacement price, and increase with the marginal cost of spraying and the planner’s discount rate. A local comparative dynamics analysis is also conducted, as it provides the necessary eco-nomic intuition behind other ostensibly anomalous steady state comparative statics results.

Suggested Citation

  • Levy, Amnon & Caputo, Michael, 2007. "Optimal Control of Locusts in Subsistence Farming Areas," Economics Working Papers wp07-10, School of Economics, University of Wollongong, NSW, Australia.
    • Handle: RePEc:uow:depec1:wp07-10
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.uow.edu.au/content/groups/public/@web/@commerce/@econ/documents/doc/uow038554.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Darwin C. Hall & Richard B. Norgaard, 1973. "On the Timing and Application of Pesticides," American Journal of Agricultural Economics, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 55(2), pages 198-201.
    2. Gershon Feder, 1979. "Pesticides, Information, and Pest Management under Uncertainty," American Journal of Agricultural Economics, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 61(1), pages 97-103.
    3. Caputo,Michael R., 2005. "Foundations of Dynamic Economic Analysis," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521842723, Enero-Abr.
    4. Cowan, Robin & Gunby, Philip, 1996. "Sprayed to Death: Path Dependence, Lock-In and Pest Control Strategies," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 106(436), pages 521-542, May.
    5. Erik Lichtenberg & Robert C. Spear & David Zilberman, 1993. "The Economics of Reentry Regulation of Pesticides," American Journal of Agricultural Economics, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 75(4), pages 946-958.
    6. Jean-Daniel M. Saphores, 2000. "The Economic Threshold with a Stochastic Pest Population: A Real Options Approach," American Journal of Agricultural Economics, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 82(3), pages 541-555.
    7. Carlson, Gerald A. & Zilberman, David & Miranowski, John, 1993. "Agricultural and Resource Economics," Staff General Research Papers Archive 11104, Iowa State University, Department of Economics.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Lybbert, Travis J. & Magnan, Nicholas & Gubler, W. Douglas, 2012. "Multi-Dimensional Responses to Risk Information: How do Winegrape Growers Respond to Disease Forecasts and to What Environmental Effect?," Working Papers 162521, Robert Mondavi Institute Center for Wine Economics.
    2. Lybbert, Travis J. & Magnan, Nicholas & Gubler, W. Douglas, 2010. "Powdery Mildew Risk And Forecasting In Wine Grapes: Do Growers Change Risk Management Strategies In Response To Disease Forecasts?," 2010 Annual Meeting, July 25-27, 2010, Denver, Colorado 61745, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association.
    3. Ameden, Holly A. & Just, David R., 2001. "Pests and Agricultural Production under Climate Change," 2001 Annual meeting, August 5-8, Chicago, IL 20722, American Agricultural Economics Association (New Name 2008: Agricultural and Applied Economics Association).
    4. Saphores, Jean-Daniel & Conrad, Jon M., 1996. "The Economic Threshold With a Stochastic Pest Population: An Application to the European Red Mite," Working Papers 127904, Cornell University, Department of Applied Economics and Management.
    5. Lichtenberg, Erik & Zilberman, David & Archibald, Sandra O., 1990. "Economics and Pesticides," Working Papers 197750, University of Maryland, Department of Agricultural and Resource Economics.
    6. Eli Fenichel & Timothy Richards & David Shanafelt, 2014. "The Control of Invasive Species on Private Property with Neighbor-to-Neighbor Spillovers," Environmental & Resource Economics, Springer;European Association of Environmental and Resource Economists, vol. 59(2), pages 231-255, October.
    7. Atallah, Shady S. & Gomez, Miguel I. & Conrad, Jon M. & Nyrop, Jan P., 2012. "An Agent-Based Model of Plant Disease Diffusion and Control: Grapevine Leafroll Disease," 2012 Annual Meeting, August 12-14, 2012, Seattle, Washington 124936, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association.
    8. Lankoski, Jussi E. & Ollikainen, Markku & Uusitalo, Pekka, 2005. "To Till or Not to Till? Social Profitability of No-Till Technology," 2005 International Congress, August 23-27, 2005, Copenhagen, Denmark 24755, European Association of Agricultural Economists.
    9. Mitchell, Paul D., 2001. "Additive Versus Proportional Pest Damage Functions: Why Ecology Matters," 2001 Annual meeting, August 5-8, Chicago, IL 20775, American Agricultural Economics Association (New Name 2008: Agricultural and Applied Economics Association).
    10. Miranowski, John A., 1979. "Integrated Pest Management In Corn Rootworm Control: A Preliminary Economic Assessment," 1979 Annual Meeting, July 29-August 1, Pullman, Washington 277613, American Agricultural Economics Association (New Name 2008: Agricultural and Applied Economics Association).
    11. Mitchell, Paul D. & Zhu, En (John), 2003. "Moral Hazard And Bt Corn Refuge," 2003 Annual meeting, July 27-30, Montreal, Canada 22113, American Agricultural Economics Association (New Name 2008: Agricultural and Applied Economics Association).
    12. Adamson, David, 2010. "Climate change, Irrigation and Pests: Examining Heliothis in the Murray Darling Basin," Risk and Sustainable Management Group Working Papers 149879, University of Queensland, School of Economics.
    13. Moffitt, L. Joe & Hall, Darwin C. & Osteen, Craig D., 1984. "Economic Thresholds Under Uncertainty With Application To Corn Nematode Management," Southern Journal of Agricultural Economics, Southern Agricultural Economics Association, vol. 16(2), pages 1-7, December.
    14. Wilson, Clevo & Tisdell, Clem, 2001. "Why farmers continue to use pesticides despite environmental, health and sustainability costs," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 39(3), pages 449-462, December.
    15. Regmi, Anita, 1990. "The value of information in integrated pest management of corn rootworm and European corn borer in Minnesota," Faculty and Alumni Dissertations 307267, University of Minnesota, Department of Applied Economics.
    16. Davis, Rex & Tisdell, Clement A., 2001. "Alternative Specifications and Extensions of the Economic Threshold Concept and the Control of Livestock Pests," Economics, Ecology and Environment Working Papers 48381, University of Queensland, School of Economics.
    17. Robert G. Chambers & Giannis Karagiannis & Vangelis Tzouvelekas, 2009. "Yet Another Look at Pest Damage and Pesticide Productivity," Working Papers 0911, University of Crete, Department of Economics.
    18. Marten, Alex L. & Moore, Christopher C., 2011. "An options based bioeconomic model for biological and chemical control of invasive species," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 70(11), pages 2050-2061, September.
    19. Pannell, David J., 1988. "Weed Management: A Review of Applied Economics Research in Australia," Review of Marketing and Agricultural Economics, Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society, vol. 56(03), pages 1-15, December.
    20. Karagiannis, Giannis & Tsionas, Efthimios & Tzouvelekas, Vangelis, 2005. "Efficiency in Damage Control Inputs: A Stochastic Production Frontier Approach," 2005 International Congress, August 23-27, 2005, Copenhagen, Denmark 24642, European Association of Agricultural Economists.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Optimal control; local stability; steady state comparative statics; local comparative dynamics;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • O13 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Development - - - Agriculture; Natural Resources; Environment; Other Primary Products
    • O18 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Development - - - Urban, Rural, Regional, and Transportation Analysis; Housing; Infrastructure
    • O21 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Development Planning and Policy - - - Planning Models; Planning Policy

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:uow:depec1:wp07-10. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Peter Siminski The email address of this maintainer does not seem to be valid anymore. Please ask Peter Siminski to update the entry or send us the correct address (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/deuowau.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.