david zilberman - Profile on Academia.edu (original) (raw)
Papers by david zilberman
California Agriculture, 2008
Foundations and Trends® in Microeconomics, 2007
The magazine of food, farm, and resource issues 1st Quarter 2014 • 29(1) ©1999-2014 CHOICES. All ... more The magazine of food, farm, and resource issues 1st Quarter 2014 • 29(1) ©1999-2014 CHOICES. All rights reserved. Articles may be reproduced or electronically distributed as long as attribution to Choices and the Agricultural & Applied Economics Association is maintained. Choices subscriptions are free and can be obtained through .
GM Crops & Food, 2013
The differences between GM policies in the US and Europe have several causes. GM technology holds... more The differences between GM policies in the US and Europe have several causes. GM technology holds a home court advantage in the US and European chemical companies did not support its introduction. The technology did not seem to provide benefits to consumers, and the crops it applied to were not significant in Europe. Green parties and politicians in Europe have held significant power in coalitions government, and have used their leverage to influence policies that aim to block GM technology. There is also much less trust in the government's capacity to handle food safety regulations in Europe than there is in the US. The technology was introduced during a time when the political influence of green parties in Europe was especially significant, and European trust of government capacity to enter food security issues was at its lowest.
Introduction to the special issue on: Management of water resources for agriculture
Agricultural Economics, 2000
ABSTRACT The Environmental Stewardship Scheme provides payments to farmers for the provision of e... more ABSTRACT The Environmental Stewardship Scheme provides payments to farmers for the provision of environmental services based on agricultural foregone income. This creates a potential incentive compatibility problem which, combined with an information asymmetry on farm land heterogeneity, could lead to adverse selection of farmers into the scheme. However, the Higher Level Scheme (HLS) design includes some features that potentially reduce adverse selection. This paper studies the adverse selection problem of the HLS using a principal agent framework at the regional level. It is found that, at the regional level, the enrolment of more land from lower payment regions for a given budget constraint has led to a greater overall contracted area (and thus potential environmental benefit) which has had the effect of reducing the adverse selection problem. In addition, for landscape regions with the same payment rate (i.e. of the same agricultural value), differential weighting of the public demand for environmental goods and services provided by agriculture (measured by weighting an environmental benefit function by the distance to main cities) appears to be reflected into the regulator’s allocation of contracts, thereby also reducing the adverse selection problem.
American Journal of Agricultural Economics, 2002
There is growing literature on the economics of alternative mechanisms of controlling pests in ag... more There is growing literature on the economics of alternative mechanisms of controlling pests in agriculture. Researchers have developed models to analyze pest control decisions under a variety of strategies (see survey by Carlson and Wetzstein). Some of these strategies include chemical use, monitoring and disrupting the life cycle of the pest through trapping and sterile insect release, using beneficial insects and bio-control, altering cultural practices, and developing resistant varieties. Pest problems are transmitted across locations (e.g. insect flight, carriage of weed seeds by wind, and pathogens transmitted by vectors) and can be controlled by impeding the transmission process. This paper develops a framework for analyzing a spatially dependent pest problem emanating from a source and spreading via a vector, and investigates the use of transmission and/or source control in combating a pest or disease problem. In particular, we design optimal barriers to slow the spread of a pest or disease problem under alternative assumptions about the feasibility and cost of reduction of the pest population at the source. We apply simulations of the model to the problem of controlling Pierce's disease (PD) in California wine grapes.
Environmental Research Letters, 2007
Biofuels have become a leading alternative to fossil fuel because they can be produced domestical... more Biofuels have become a leading alternative to fossil fuel because they can be produced domestically by many countries, require only minimal changes to retail distribution and end-use technologies, are a partial response to global climate change, and because they have the potential to spur rural development. Production of biofuel has increased most rapidly for corn ethanol, in part because of government subsidies; yet, corn ethanol offers at most a modest contribution to society's climate change goals and only a marginally positive net energy balance. Current biofuels pose long-run consequences for the provision of food and environmental amenities. In the short run, however, when gasoline supply and demand are inelastic, they serve as a buffer supply of energy, helping to reduce prices. Employing a conceptual model and with back-of-the-envelope estimates of wealth transfers resulting from biofuel production, we find that ethanol subsidies pay for themselves. Adoption of second-generation technologies may make biofuels more beneficial to society. The large-scale production of new types of crops dedicated to energy is likely to induce structural change in agriculture and change the sources, levels, and variability of farm incomes. The socio-economic impact of biofuel production will largely depend on how well the process of technology adoption by farmers and processors is understood and managed. The confluence of agricultural policy with environmental and energy policies is expected.
Environmental & Resource Economics, 1992
Modern irrigation technologies have been suggested as a means of conserving scarce water and redu... more Modern irrigation technologies have been suggested as a means of conserving scarce water and reducing environmental pollution caused by irrigated agriculture. This paper applies an economic model of technology selection that provides a general framework to analyzing adoption of irrigation technologies under various environmental conditions. Data from the San Joaquin Valley of California is used to verify the theoretical relationships. Results suggest key variables to be considered by policy makers concerned with adoption of modern irrigation technologies. Among these variables are crop prices, water technology costs, farm organizahon characteristics, and the environmental conditions of the farm or the field. Policy implications were discussed and analyzed.
Optimal combination of pollution prevention and abatement policies: The case of agricultural drainage
Environmental & Resource Economics, 1995
The adoption of pollution prevention and abatement practices is examined in the context of a mode... more The adoption of pollution prevention and abatement practices is examined in the context of a model of exhaustible resource use with a backstop technology. For the sake of concreteness, the paper focuses on the problem of water-logging caused by the subsurface accumulation of agricultural drainwater. In modelling this problem, a region's underground capacity to store drainwater is considered an exhaustible
Environmental & Resource Economics, 1995
Soil is usually considered as a renewable resource for dynamic crop and production management dec... more Soil is usually considered as a renewable resource for dynamic crop and production management decision problems. For peatland, however, soil should be regarded as an exhaustible resource. This paper determines the optimal utilization of peatland for agricultural production within a dynamic context and it also presents an empirical study where the quasirent function is convex in the input and not concave as assumed in many economic studies. As a result of this convexity a comer solution is obtained. Moreover, the study demonstrates that there is only a slight difference between short-and farsighted behavior, and that both lead ultimately to an accelerated exhaustion of the resource. Private optimization leads to intensive use of the peat in the production of high value crops, which depletes the peat in a relatively short period of time. However, peatland also posseses a value as an environmental asset. The study provides a benchmark for the decision as to whether to convert peatland into productive agricultural land or to conserve it.
Environmental and Resource Economics, 2008
In spite of its potential health and environmental risks and contribution to agribusiness, the us... more In spite of its potential health and environmental risks and contribution to agribusiness, the use of agricultural chemicals for yard care has not been well studied. In our discrete-continuous choice model, estimated with data from a national survey, a household chooses how much money, if any, to initially spend on types of agricultural chemicals and applicators and how much time to subsequently spend on other yard work. Households in big cities or with large gardens are more likely to use organic chemicals. The probability that a household chooses a mix of do-it-yourself and hired applications of synthetic chemicals increases with income and the number of minors or presence of preschoolers. Among households that apply only synthetic chemicals without hired help, those with young children, with higher incomes, in big cities, and with male heads spend more on the chemicals.
Transaction costs and trading behavior in an immature water market
Environment and Development Economics, 2002
ABSTRACT Water scarcity is a constraint on economic activity in many regions, and improving the a... more ABSTRACT Water scarcity is a constraint on economic activity in many regions, and improving the allocation of water is an important part of the process of economic devel- opment. Economists have advocated water markets as a way to increase efficiency and to cope with ...
Environment and Development Economics, 2010
This paper addresses the potential of in situ crop landrace conservation, employing market-based ... more This paper addresses the potential of in situ crop landrace conservation, employing market-based instruments, which pre-requires that (1) consumers hold positive use-value for the landrace attribute and (2) their willingness to pay covers both the transaction cost of implementing these instruments and the opportunity cost of landrace cultivation. The empirical examination is based on two closely related analyses of eggplant production and consumption sectors of India. At present, the vegetable markets of south India provide the landrace cultivators with a price premium adequate enough to cover the opportunity cost of not opting for high-yielding modern varieties. However, we detect an underutilized consumer demand for landrace products. The wide margin that exists between the price premium farmers currently obtain for the landrace attribute and what consumers are willing to pay for it is indicative of the unexploited potential of labelling and certification schemes as an emerging agrobiodiversity conservation strategy.
Environment and Development Economics, 2008
Environment and Development Economics, 2014
Vitamin A enriched rice (Golden Rice) is a cost-efficient solution that can substantially reduce ... more Vitamin A enriched rice (Golden Rice) is a cost-efficient solution that can substantially reduce health costs. Despite Golden Rice being available since early 2000, this rice has not been introduced in any country. Governments must perceive additional costs that overcompensate the benefits of the technology to explain the delay in approval. We develop a real option model including irreversibility and uncertainty about perceived costs and arrival of new information to explain a delay in approval. The model has been applied to the case of India. Results show the annual perceived costs have to be at least US$199 million per year approximately for the last decade to explain the delay in approval of the technology. This is an indicator of the economic power of the opposition towards Golden Rice resulting in about 1.4 million life years lost over the past decade in India.
Indirect fuel use change (IFUC) and the lifecycle environmental impact of biofuel policies
Energy Policy, 2011
A common assumption in lifecycle assessment (LCA) based estimates of greenhouse gas (GHG) benefit... more A common assumption in lifecycle assessment (LCA) based estimates of greenhouse gas (GHG) benefits (or costs) of renewable fuel such as biofuel is that it simply replaces an energy-equivalent amount of fossil fuel and that total fuel consumption remains ...
Barriers to Energy-Efficiency in Electricity Generation in India
The Energy Journal, 1999
This paper explores the sources and magnitude of energy-inefficiency in the electricity generatin... more This paper explores the sources and magnitude of energy-inefficiency in the electricity generating sector in India and its implications for carbon emissions from this sector. An econometric methodology is developed to disaggregate and quantify the contribution of technical and institutional ...
Energy Economics, 2013
For the first time, we apply the wavelet coherence methodology on biofuels (ethanol and biodiesel... more For the first time, we apply the wavelet coherence methodology on biofuels (ethanol and biodiesel) and a wide range of related commodities (gasoline, diesel, crude oil, corn, wheat, soybeans, sugarcane and rapeseed oil). This way, we are able to investigate dynamics of correlations in time and across scales (frequencies) with a model-free approach. We show that correlations indeed vary in time and across frequencies. We find two highly correlated pairs which are strongly connected at low frequencies -ethanol with corn and biodiesel with German diesel -during almost the whole analyzed period (2003)(2004)(2005)(2006)(2007)(2008)(2009)(2010)(2011). Structure of correlations remarkably changes during the food crisis -higher frequencies become important for both mentioned pairs. This implies that during stable periods, ethanol is correlated with corn and biodiesel is correlated with German diesel mainly at low frequencies so that they follow a common long-term trend. However, in the crisis periods, ethanol (biodiesel) is lead by corn (German diesel) even at high frequencies (low scales), which implies that the biofuels prices react more rapidly to the changes in their producing factors.
Adoption of energy efficient technologies and carbon abatement: the electricity generating sector in India
Energy Economics, 2001
A behavioral micro-economic framework was developed to analyze the impact of alternative mixes of... more A behavioral micro-economic framework was developed to analyze the impact of alternative mixes of policy reforms that eliminate existing regulatory distortions and a carbon emissions-tax on incentives to adopt energy efficient technologies and their implications ...
Biofuel-related price transmission literature: A review
Energy Economics, 2013
ABSTRACT In this article, an extensive review of the rapidly growing biofuel-related time-series ... more ABSTRACT In this article, an extensive review of the rapidly growing biofuel-related time-series literature is carried out. The data used, the modeling techniques and the main findings of this literature are discussed. Providing a review of this flourishing research area is relevant as a guidepost for future research. This literature concludes that energy prices drive long-run agricultural price levels and that instability in energy markets is transferred to food markets.
California Agriculture, 2008
Foundations and Trends® in Microeconomics, 2007
The magazine of food, farm, and resource issues 1st Quarter 2014 • 29(1) ©1999-2014 CHOICES. All ... more The magazine of food, farm, and resource issues 1st Quarter 2014 • 29(1) ©1999-2014 CHOICES. All rights reserved. Articles may be reproduced or electronically distributed as long as attribution to Choices and the Agricultural & Applied Economics Association is maintained. Choices subscriptions are free and can be obtained through .
GM Crops & Food, 2013
The differences between GM policies in the US and Europe have several causes. GM technology holds... more The differences between GM policies in the US and Europe have several causes. GM technology holds a home court advantage in the US and European chemical companies did not support its introduction. The technology did not seem to provide benefits to consumers, and the crops it applied to were not significant in Europe. Green parties and politicians in Europe have held significant power in coalitions government, and have used their leverage to influence policies that aim to block GM technology. There is also much less trust in the government's capacity to handle food safety regulations in Europe than there is in the US. The technology was introduced during a time when the political influence of green parties in Europe was especially significant, and European trust of government capacity to enter food security issues was at its lowest.
Introduction to the special issue on: Management of water resources for agriculture
Agricultural Economics, 2000
ABSTRACT The Environmental Stewardship Scheme provides payments to farmers for the provision of e... more ABSTRACT The Environmental Stewardship Scheme provides payments to farmers for the provision of environmental services based on agricultural foregone income. This creates a potential incentive compatibility problem which, combined with an information asymmetry on farm land heterogeneity, could lead to adverse selection of farmers into the scheme. However, the Higher Level Scheme (HLS) design includes some features that potentially reduce adverse selection. This paper studies the adverse selection problem of the HLS using a principal agent framework at the regional level. It is found that, at the regional level, the enrolment of more land from lower payment regions for a given budget constraint has led to a greater overall contracted area (and thus potential environmental benefit) which has had the effect of reducing the adverse selection problem. In addition, for landscape regions with the same payment rate (i.e. of the same agricultural value), differential weighting of the public demand for environmental goods and services provided by agriculture (measured by weighting an environmental benefit function by the distance to main cities) appears to be reflected into the regulator’s allocation of contracts, thereby also reducing the adverse selection problem.
American Journal of Agricultural Economics, 2002
There is growing literature on the economics of alternative mechanisms of controlling pests in ag... more There is growing literature on the economics of alternative mechanisms of controlling pests in agriculture. Researchers have developed models to analyze pest control decisions under a variety of strategies (see survey by Carlson and Wetzstein). Some of these strategies include chemical use, monitoring and disrupting the life cycle of the pest through trapping and sterile insect release, using beneficial insects and bio-control, altering cultural practices, and developing resistant varieties. Pest problems are transmitted across locations (e.g. insect flight, carriage of weed seeds by wind, and pathogens transmitted by vectors) and can be controlled by impeding the transmission process. This paper develops a framework for analyzing a spatially dependent pest problem emanating from a source and spreading via a vector, and investigates the use of transmission and/or source control in combating a pest or disease problem. In particular, we design optimal barriers to slow the spread of a pest or disease problem under alternative assumptions about the feasibility and cost of reduction of the pest population at the source. We apply simulations of the model to the problem of controlling Pierce's disease (PD) in California wine grapes.
Environmental Research Letters, 2007
Biofuels have become a leading alternative to fossil fuel because they can be produced domestical... more Biofuels have become a leading alternative to fossil fuel because they can be produced domestically by many countries, require only minimal changes to retail distribution and end-use technologies, are a partial response to global climate change, and because they have the potential to spur rural development. Production of biofuel has increased most rapidly for corn ethanol, in part because of government subsidies; yet, corn ethanol offers at most a modest contribution to society's climate change goals and only a marginally positive net energy balance. Current biofuels pose long-run consequences for the provision of food and environmental amenities. In the short run, however, when gasoline supply and demand are inelastic, they serve as a buffer supply of energy, helping to reduce prices. Employing a conceptual model and with back-of-the-envelope estimates of wealth transfers resulting from biofuel production, we find that ethanol subsidies pay for themselves. Adoption of second-generation technologies may make biofuels more beneficial to society. The large-scale production of new types of crops dedicated to energy is likely to induce structural change in agriculture and change the sources, levels, and variability of farm incomes. The socio-economic impact of biofuel production will largely depend on how well the process of technology adoption by farmers and processors is understood and managed. The confluence of agricultural policy with environmental and energy policies is expected.
Environmental & Resource Economics, 1992
Modern irrigation technologies have been suggested as a means of conserving scarce water and redu... more Modern irrigation technologies have been suggested as a means of conserving scarce water and reducing environmental pollution caused by irrigated agriculture. This paper applies an economic model of technology selection that provides a general framework to analyzing adoption of irrigation technologies under various environmental conditions. Data from the San Joaquin Valley of California is used to verify the theoretical relationships. Results suggest key variables to be considered by policy makers concerned with adoption of modern irrigation technologies. Among these variables are crop prices, water technology costs, farm organizahon characteristics, and the environmental conditions of the farm or the field. Policy implications were discussed and analyzed.
Optimal combination of pollution prevention and abatement policies: The case of agricultural drainage
Environmental & Resource Economics, 1995
The adoption of pollution prevention and abatement practices is examined in the context of a mode... more The adoption of pollution prevention and abatement practices is examined in the context of a model of exhaustible resource use with a backstop technology. For the sake of concreteness, the paper focuses on the problem of water-logging caused by the subsurface accumulation of agricultural drainwater. In modelling this problem, a region's underground capacity to store drainwater is considered an exhaustible
Environmental & Resource Economics, 1995
Soil is usually considered as a renewable resource for dynamic crop and production management dec... more Soil is usually considered as a renewable resource for dynamic crop and production management decision problems. For peatland, however, soil should be regarded as an exhaustible resource. This paper determines the optimal utilization of peatland for agricultural production within a dynamic context and it also presents an empirical study where the quasirent function is convex in the input and not concave as assumed in many economic studies. As a result of this convexity a comer solution is obtained. Moreover, the study demonstrates that there is only a slight difference between short-and farsighted behavior, and that both lead ultimately to an accelerated exhaustion of the resource. Private optimization leads to intensive use of the peat in the production of high value crops, which depletes the peat in a relatively short period of time. However, peatland also posseses a value as an environmental asset. The study provides a benchmark for the decision as to whether to convert peatland into productive agricultural land or to conserve it.
Environmental and Resource Economics, 2008
In spite of its potential health and environmental risks and contribution to agribusiness, the us... more In spite of its potential health and environmental risks and contribution to agribusiness, the use of agricultural chemicals for yard care has not been well studied. In our discrete-continuous choice model, estimated with data from a national survey, a household chooses how much money, if any, to initially spend on types of agricultural chemicals and applicators and how much time to subsequently spend on other yard work. Households in big cities or with large gardens are more likely to use organic chemicals. The probability that a household chooses a mix of do-it-yourself and hired applications of synthetic chemicals increases with income and the number of minors or presence of preschoolers. Among households that apply only synthetic chemicals without hired help, those with young children, with higher incomes, in big cities, and with male heads spend more on the chemicals.
Transaction costs and trading behavior in an immature water market
Environment and Development Economics, 2002
ABSTRACT Water scarcity is a constraint on economic activity in many regions, and improving the a... more ABSTRACT Water scarcity is a constraint on economic activity in many regions, and improving the allocation of water is an important part of the process of economic devel- opment. Economists have advocated water markets as a way to increase efficiency and to cope with ...
Environment and Development Economics, 2010
This paper addresses the potential of in situ crop landrace conservation, employing market-based ... more This paper addresses the potential of in situ crop landrace conservation, employing market-based instruments, which pre-requires that (1) consumers hold positive use-value for the landrace attribute and (2) their willingness to pay covers both the transaction cost of implementing these instruments and the opportunity cost of landrace cultivation. The empirical examination is based on two closely related analyses of eggplant production and consumption sectors of India. At present, the vegetable markets of south India provide the landrace cultivators with a price premium adequate enough to cover the opportunity cost of not opting for high-yielding modern varieties. However, we detect an underutilized consumer demand for landrace products. The wide margin that exists between the price premium farmers currently obtain for the landrace attribute and what consumers are willing to pay for it is indicative of the unexploited potential of labelling and certification schemes as an emerging agrobiodiversity conservation strategy.
Environment and Development Economics, 2008
Environment and Development Economics, 2014
Vitamin A enriched rice (Golden Rice) is a cost-efficient solution that can substantially reduce ... more Vitamin A enriched rice (Golden Rice) is a cost-efficient solution that can substantially reduce health costs. Despite Golden Rice being available since early 2000, this rice has not been introduced in any country. Governments must perceive additional costs that overcompensate the benefits of the technology to explain the delay in approval. We develop a real option model including irreversibility and uncertainty about perceived costs and arrival of new information to explain a delay in approval. The model has been applied to the case of India. Results show the annual perceived costs have to be at least US$199 million per year approximately for the last decade to explain the delay in approval of the technology. This is an indicator of the economic power of the opposition towards Golden Rice resulting in about 1.4 million life years lost over the past decade in India.
Indirect fuel use change (IFUC) and the lifecycle environmental impact of biofuel policies
Energy Policy, 2011
A common assumption in lifecycle assessment (LCA) based estimates of greenhouse gas (GHG) benefit... more A common assumption in lifecycle assessment (LCA) based estimates of greenhouse gas (GHG) benefits (or costs) of renewable fuel such as biofuel is that it simply replaces an energy-equivalent amount of fossil fuel and that total fuel consumption remains ...
Barriers to Energy-Efficiency in Electricity Generation in India
The Energy Journal, 1999
This paper explores the sources and magnitude of energy-inefficiency in the electricity generatin... more This paper explores the sources and magnitude of energy-inefficiency in the electricity generating sector in India and its implications for carbon emissions from this sector. An econometric methodology is developed to disaggregate and quantify the contribution of technical and institutional ...
Energy Economics, 2013
For the first time, we apply the wavelet coherence methodology on biofuels (ethanol and biodiesel... more For the first time, we apply the wavelet coherence methodology on biofuels (ethanol and biodiesel) and a wide range of related commodities (gasoline, diesel, crude oil, corn, wheat, soybeans, sugarcane and rapeseed oil). This way, we are able to investigate dynamics of correlations in time and across scales (frequencies) with a model-free approach. We show that correlations indeed vary in time and across frequencies. We find two highly correlated pairs which are strongly connected at low frequencies -ethanol with corn and biodiesel with German diesel -during almost the whole analyzed period (2003)(2004)(2005)(2006)(2007)(2008)(2009)(2010)(2011). Structure of correlations remarkably changes during the food crisis -higher frequencies become important for both mentioned pairs. This implies that during stable periods, ethanol is correlated with corn and biodiesel is correlated with German diesel mainly at low frequencies so that they follow a common long-term trend. However, in the crisis periods, ethanol (biodiesel) is lead by corn (German diesel) even at high frequencies (low scales), which implies that the biofuels prices react more rapidly to the changes in their producing factors.
Adoption of energy efficient technologies and carbon abatement: the electricity generating sector in India
Energy Economics, 2001
A behavioral micro-economic framework was developed to analyze the impact of alternative mixes of... more A behavioral micro-economic framework was developed to analyze the impact of alternative mixes of policy reforms that eliminate existing regulatory distortions and a carbon emissions-tax on incentives to adopt energy efficient technologies and their implications ...
Biofuel-related price transmission literature: A review
Energy Economics, 2013
ABSTRACT In this article, an extensive review of the rapidly growing biofuel-related time-series ... more ABSTRACT In this article, an extensive review of the rapidly growing biofuel-related time-series literature is carried out. The data used, the modeling techniques and the main findings of this literature are discussed. Providing a review of this flourishing research area is relevant as a guidepost for future research. This literature concludes that energy prices drive long-run agricultural price levels and that instability in energy markets is transferred to food markets.