Suchergebnisse

AbstractThis case considers the complex decision making required to vertically integrate forward from the production of raw agricultural commodities into value‐added niche markets. Wheat Montana Farms & Bakery evolved from a traditional wheat‐production farm business. Wheat Montana's initial experience with vertically integrated niche marketing involved the production of differentiated specialty wheats. Eventually, the company entered the specialty‐flour, bakery‐products, and food‐service industries. Future success hinges critically upon decisions regarding growth, human resource and risk management, market expansion, and land and machinery acquisitions.

AbstractBiofuel policies and concomitant market forces in the mid‐2000s systemically altered US corn markets. Because corn production requires large nitrogen fertilizer inputs, those policies may have also impacted US fertilizer markets. We model fertilizer price relationships across US regions and leverage the natural experiment of biofuel policy intervention to show the secondary impacts on fertilizer markets. Long‐run fertilizer price adjustments became faster and short‐run price dynamics became more responsive to corn markets and less affected by natural gas prices. Additionally, regions where corn production significantly increased after the policies had a 10–20% increase in influencing the fertilizer price discovery process.