That’s the title of a new article by David Just released by the European Review of Agricultural Economics, and the subject of David’s keynote at the European Association of Agricultural Economics Meeting this week in France. He writes:
“Throughout the early 2000s, many departments of agricultural economics reduced their faculty size and some prominent departments began to generalise their focus to cover applied economics broadly and/or diminish their emphasis on agriculture in particular. This was in response to what had been seen as a long and inevitable drift to the irrelevance of agricultural economics and the agricultural economy in developed nations. But a funny thing happened on the way to the dustbin of history. Highlighted by efforts such as the comprehensive report of the Scientific Group of the UN Food Systems Summit (von Braun et al., 2021) or the widely circulated Eat-Lancet report (Willett et al., 2019), suddenly agriculture finds itself as the keystone to solving myriad grand challenges facing the world; and agricultural economic analysis and tools are central to doing so effectively (Just, 2022).”
Despite the rising importance and prominence of the work by agricultural economists, Just argues:
“In each of these cases [price spikes circa 2008, trade wars, COVID-19 supply chain disruptions, and price spikes in the last two years], foundational and relatively straightforward agricultural economic analysis could have identified the growing vulnerability and threat to global stability and welfare. However, in each case, such analysis was not published, publicised or available until after the threat was realised. Having the analysis beforehand, and credibly argued before relevant policymakers, in each case could have led to mitigation or prevention of the crisis. This is a failure of our discipline and one that we should work to address.”
He continues …
“Agricultural economics has come to the fore as a key to addressing a confluence of global challenges. In addressing these challenges, agricultural economists are vital not only in advising on policies to directly impact the challenge goals but also in creating an atmosphere in which solutions are attainable and sustainable. In these three examples, one can see a pattern of crises that are at once economically significant and entirely predictable with rudimentary agricultural economic analysis. Yet, no credible agricultural economists were addressing these issues prior to crisis onset.”
David’s article is well written, well reasoned, and an important encouragement to practicing agricultural economists. One need not agree with all of David’s claims to buy into the larger argument that timely economic analysis on food and agriculture issues are needed to improve public policy responses and reduce vulnerabilities.
There are a couple nuances to add. First I’m not sure that “no credible agricultural economists were addressing these issues prior to crisis onset.” It may very well be the case that there were not many peer reviewed journal articles published prior to these major events, but there were certainly economists writing on blogs and newsletters and being interviewed in media. Thus, I suspect the issue is not the lack of foresight by economists, but rather: 1) the institutional constraints on the types of economic research that is publishable in peer-reviewed journals of the sort Just cites, and 2) agricultural economists’ lack of influence in converting their ideas into main stream discourse. On the latter point, media and policy makers are often not very interested in crises that haven’t yet happened. Perhaps the bar is set high to avoid false positives, or it may simply just be that attention is scarce. I have published a number of articles and editorials in top media outlets, but I have had many, many more rejected.
Let me give a couple of examples from my own writing where I’ve projected an economic outcomes of interest of the sort Just describes. I use my posts as examples simply because I know them best, but there are many other examples from my colleagues as well.
The first is from March 16, 2020 at the onset of the COVID19 shutdowns. Even before any of the major meat packing plants had shutdown, it was clear given the concentrated nature of meat packing and the reliance on labor was a vulnerability. I wrote then:
“Now, take a step back in the supply chain, and this is where worker issues could have serious issues. Remember all the fervor over the beef packing-plant fire back in August? While the impacts was counter-intuitive to many producers, the economics were straightforward: an unexpected disruption in supply depressed cattle prices and boosted wholesale beef prices. It isn’t far-fetched to imagine worker illnesses getting to the point that plants have to temporarily shut down on a scale that is at least as large as the August-fire, which removed about 5% of the nation’s beef processing capacity. One difference is that destroying a plant via fire is not the same as temporarily closing plants due to lack of healthy workers; one resulted in a long-term price adjustment while the latter is more likely a temporary price fluctuation.
One thing that makes me nervous even about temporary closures, if large scale, is the animals that have been placed to be market-weight in the next few weeks. While feedlot cattle can likely remain on feed a few weeks longer with relatively small changes in profitability, that is less true for hogs, and particularly chickens. Meat supply chains are optimized for efficiency and low-cost production, not necessarily for flexibility and resiliency. ”
It was only a few weeks later than many packing plants in fact closed due to worker illnesses. The low point was in early May 2020 when meat production was roughly 40% prior year levels, and actual the price dynamics and supply disruptions were exactly as described earlier in mid March.
As another example, see this post about a year ago, where I highlighted the high likelihood of rising cattle and beef prices, given the supply-side disruptions and biological lags in beef production. Indeed, we’ve seen a significant run-up in cattle prices over the past year, and more is likely to come. I’m not claiming any special insights that aren’t well known to economists working in these areas, and indeed many others were writing similar things at that time, but I am highlighting that there are folks actively doing precisely what Just advocates.
Finally, I agree wholeheartedly with Just’s conclusion (see below) and it has been the focus of some of our recent work (e,g, see here or here):
“ Agricultural economists can and should play a role in identifying such vulnerabilities and highlighting them for policymakers. This requires the field to adopt a forward-looking research agenda—one oriented towards identifying and preventing problems before they arise.”
The challenge will be identifying institutions and mechanisms by which this sort of economic analysis can have broader influence.
