Keri Jacobs, Georgeanne Artz, and Kevin Kimle of the Department of Economics were recent recipients of a $175,000 grant from the USDA to fund their work in agricultural cooperatives, as part of the Iowa Alliance for Cooperative Business Development (IACBD). Learn more. 

"Feeding Kids or Feeding the Garbage: Fruits and Vegetables in the School Lunch Program," with David Just, Cornell University. October 29, 3:40 pm - 5:30 pm, 368A Heady Hall.

David Just is an associate professor at Cornell University, and received his PhD from the University of California at Berkeley. His research interests center around the use of information, and more particularly, how differences in human capital and information availability affect decisions. Some research questions addressed by his research include: Why do individuals and firms use the information they do? Do firms with greater informational resources take advantage of smaller firms? How do problems with information updating affect risk-averting behavior? How can economists' interpretations be tainted by ignoring issues of information? These concerns are of particular importance in agriculture, where firms of widely differing sizes compete in a market replete with profit risk. Other areas of interest include the introduction of food psychology in the design of food assistance programs, product perception, and the impact of family interactions on purchasing behavior.

Abstract: The Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act introduces new guidelines for school lunches, including a requirement that a meal must include a serving of fruits and vegetables to receive federal reimbursements. This approach may be thought of as emphasizing the nutrition on the tray. This new policy represents a default option in which the items go on the child¹s tray by default, but the child can choose whether or not to discard the items. The results of several field experiments suggest that while some of the additional fruits and vegetables will be eaten, the majority of the additional cost is in fruits and vegetables that children choose to throw away. Results of a wide scale field experiment substantiate some of these fears. The current approach is compared to two alternatives: 1. Providing direct incentives to children who eat servings of fruits and vegetables, 2. Pairing the current guidelines with behavioral economic mechanisms to encourage fruit and vegetable consumption. In both cases we find our alternative approach to reduce waste and improve cost effectiveness.

Mike Duffy spoke with the Congressional Quarterly about the farm bill. He also spoke with National Public Radio on land values and impacts on beginning farmers.

Chad Hart spoke with Philip Brasher, Executive Briefing – Agriculture and Food, on proposition 37 in California.

Lee Schulz spoke with Allison Suesse, Northwest Iowa Review, regarding pork production and the outlook for hog and pork prices. He also spoke with Zoe Martin, Iowa Farmer Today, about this year’s drought and its impact on farmers, food prices, and consumer demand.

The Department of Agricultural and Resource Economics at the University of California, Berkeley, invites applications for a tenure-track assistant professor position (academic year) in the area of international trade, to begin July 1, 2013. This position includes a joint appointment in the California Agricultural Experiment Station. We seek candidates with a strong interest in teaching at both the undergraduate and graduate levels, and evidence of high productivity in policy-relevant, theoretically sound, and empirically grounded research on international economics. The Department emphasizes the economics of the environment and natural resources, international economic development, and agricultural policy. Trade-related research involving one or more of these areas is desirable. The department is interested in candidates who will contribute to diversity and equal opportunity in higher education through their teaching, research, and service.

Applicants should have a PhD or equivalent in Economics, Agricultural Economics, or a related area, by the appointment date. Interested candidates should submit a letter of intent containing a teaching and research statement, c.v., evidence of teaching effectiveness, a copy of their job market paper, a graduate school transcript, and three letters of recommendation (requested directly through our online application system). All letters will be treated as confidential per University of California policy and California state law. Please refer potential referees, including when letters are provided via a third party (i.e., dossier service or career center), to the UC Berkeley statement of confidentiality: http://apo.chance.berkeley.edu/evalltr.html.

Materials may be submitted online at: http://aprecruit.berkeley.edu/apply/JPF00077. The closing date for applications is December 7, 2012.

For additional information on the Department and the campus visit http://are.berkeley.edu/, and http://berkeley.edu.

The University of California is an Equal Opportunity/Affirmative Action Employer.

Wallace Huffman was a delegate to the 4th OECD World Forum on Statistics, Knowledge and Policy: Measuring Well-Being for Development and Policy Making, New Delhi, India, October 16-19, 2012.