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Common property institutions are often alyzed with Ostrom’s design principles, yet there are few applications of the alytical framework to institutions owned and controlled by organized farm producers (i.e. farm producer co-operatives). Applicable to any human group with a common interest, the potential of the design principles to study farm producer co-operatives as common property institutions is appealing as current theories and frameworks do not completely or satisfactorily explain their survival or longevity. Prior literature is consulted to determine if and how each of the design principles is applicable to farm producer co-operatives. To help inform a future research agenda, we highlight the alytical limitations and the empirical challenges of the design principles to study farm producer co-operatives as common property institutions.JEL Classifications: D23, L14, Q13

Considering the temporary closure of many food-away-from-home establishments, consumer expenditure on groceries during the COVID-19 pandemic has increased. While grocery shopping is an essential activity, not much is known about the dynamic relationship of the COVID-19 pandemic to the behavior of grocery shoppers. With an objective to inform variability in the behavior of grocery shoppers under various scenarios of the COVID-19 pandemic, we conducted an online framed choice experiment to elicit preferences for purchasing methods, time windows, minimum order requirements, and fees. The manipulating factor relates to the trend in the COVID-19 pandemic, where we consider three scenarios: an increasing, decreasing, or constant number of new cases in the past two-week period. Using 32,400 choice decisions from a representative sample of 900 grocery shoppers in the United States, we conclude that the trend in the COVID-19 pandemic causes significant differences in grocery shopping preferences. In situations where COVID-19 is spreading at an increasing rate, consumers are generally less willing to shop inside the grocery store. When COVID-19 is spreading at a decreasing rate, the relative importance of the purchasing method attribute is lower in its entirety. We use our findings to inform recommendations for practitioners and policymakers.

Since the 1990s, producers of farm commodities have been attempting to enter value-added agri-food sectors by means of joint ownership of hybrid cooperatives. New generation cooperatives, characterized by substantial supply and equity requirements, inspired much farm producer optimism before revealing weaknesses and limitations in the early 2000s. In response, recent innovations in US cooperative state law introduced the limited cooperative association (LCA), a new legal entity allowing joint ownership by member patrons and member investors to facilitate large-scale equity acquisition. However, business registration data indicate few such organizations have been formed in the agri-food industry. The LCA is adopted by several small-scale operations in niche markets such as lamb, elderberry, and non-GMO seed, but there is not much interest among business organizations in the commodity sector. This paper raises possible explanations for the limited adoption of the LCA, including the competing objectives of farmers and investors, the ambiguous legal interpretation of investor objectives, the superiority of other legal structures, and the lack of strategic advantages. The conclusion facilitates an invitation to further study the challenging future of farmer cooperatives in the agri-food industry.

Common property institutions in natural resource management are often analysed by means of Ostrom’s framework of design principles. Recently, the design principles have been generalised to study human groups in other collective action scenarios, including farm producers who collectively buy inputs or sell outputs. Several case studies have conceptualised farmer cooperatives as common property institutions to study how various collective action scenarios have been approached. We contribute to the scarce literature with a field study in the Upper West Region of Ghana, using Ostrom’s framework to compare the design principles of active and inactive farmer cooperatives. Using the mean group comparison method, we find numerous significant differences as active farmer cooperatives have clearer boundaries, require more capital investments, have more active board directors and managers, receive more governmental support, and have more locations. However, not all design principles are significantly different for active and inactive cooperatives (e.g. sanctions, legal rights). Considering our results, we perceive opportunities to formalise the conceptualisation of farmer cooperatives as common property institutions with both internal and external design principles. Our results also have policy implications in terms of top-down initiatives to spur collective action by Ghanaian farm producers.

Farmer cooperatives have been portrayed in the literature as flawed and complex organizations with ambiguous objectives. However, research on the observed survival of farmer cooperatives in spite of their weaknesses and limitations is scarce, in part because academic attention to cooperative performance has been static and introspective. Using evidence collected from case studies and print media publications, this paper contributes to the literature with a qualitative study of farmer cooperatives which spurred survival and longevity by means of strategic adaptation in response to four current developments in the external environment: industry consolidation, consumer segmentation, price volatility, and policy change. The qualitative study concludes farmer cooperatives in general respond to such developments by means of organizational growth. Common strategies are vertical integration, geographic expansion, and portfolio diversification. While survival and longevity are promoted in theory, strategic adaptation also often facilitates the pursuit of investor-oriented as opposed to user-oriented objectives. In some scenarios, member ownership and control may become burdensome to the business and prompt conversion to another structure if further adaptation to internal and external developments is unsuccessful. More research is therefore needed to explore the dynamic and variable impact of strategy on cooperative survival.

PurposeThis study analyzes the long-term effect of merger and acquisition (M&A) activity on the profitability, efficiency and liquidity of the largest 500 farmer cooperatives in the United States.Design/methodology/approachSecondary data from the U.S. Department of Agriculture are complemented with primary data collected from print media publications about M&A activity by US farmer cooperatives. The analysis is based on group comparisons of means and distributions to study the effect of M&A activity on financial performance.FindingsFarmer cooperatives with M&A activity generally have lower profitability, efficiency and liquidity than farmer cooperatives without M&A activity, both at the time of the merger or acquisition as well as afterward. Marketing cooperatives in particular perform worse following M&As. Also, the post-merger performance of farmer cooperatives with M&A activity is not affected by the profitability, efficiency or liquidity of the target.Originality/valueResearch on the post-merger performance of farmer cooperatives is both scarce and dated. This study analyzes the effect of M&A activity for a relatively large sample and a relatively long time period (2005–2020).

Climate change and its associated weather extremes pose a threat to agriculture. To slow down climate change and reduce its associated risks, governments around the world are currently developing policies to encourage farmers to engage in adaptation and mitigation efforts. The aim of this study is to assess the adoption and intensity of use of extreme weather adaptation and mitigation strategies among a sample of Missouri farmers and to identify the factors that influence adaptation and mitigation behavior. Of particular interest is the influence of the 2019 Missouri River flooding on adaptation and mitigation efforts. An econometric hurdle model that separates the decision on whether to adopt adaptation/mitigation strategies from the decision on how many strategies to employ was used to achieve the study’s purpose. Improving field drainage or soil water retention capacity for potential flooding was found to be by far the most used adaptation. The most used mitigations were increasing use of minimum tillage, managing fertilizer, and planting cover crops. Types of crops grown, farm income, and opinions on extreme weather events were the most important determinants of both adaptation and mitigation decision. Direct experience with the 2019 Missouri River floods is found to only influence adaptation decision. Adaptation and mitigation intensity were found to be strongly influenced by opinions on government support for adaptation and CRP involvement, respectively. Directions for policy and outreach that can promote adaptation and mitigation efforts among farmers are discussed.

We study spatial competition in the agricultural input procurement sector by explaining variability in corn cash price offers from grain merchants in Iowa. While rail access, river access, size, and ethanol production exhibit the expected positive relationships to corn cash prices, the impact of ownership structure (corporate or cooperative) is complex. Taking distance-based and density-based approaches to spatial competition, we find corporate and cooperative grain merchants differ in their pricing behavior when confronted with spatial competitors. Consistent with theoretical expectations, cooperative grain merchants play a yardstick role in relation to both corporate and cooperative grain merchants.

Purpose Many farm producer organizations pursue growth and complexity in response to price volatility, industry consolidation and other external developments. Consequently, as ownership is dispersed and control is delegated, members may face increasing agency cost. In spite of the potential to impact performance and even survival, empirical attention to agency problems in farm producer organizations is limited. The purpose of this paper is to address the gap in the literature with an empirical study. Design/methodology/approach With survey responses from 365 farm producer organizations in the USA, the author uses a two-limit tobit model to estimate the relationships of six ownership and governance characteristics (i.e. board size, management size, director independence, manager independence, CEO independence and non-member ownership) to agency cost, which is proxied by the operating expense ratio. Findings While controlling for heterogeneity in scale and technology, the author finds positive relationships of board size, management size and CEO independence to agency cost. The novel result illustrates there is a significant cost to the adoption of non-traditional ownership and governance characteristics by farm producer organizations. Practical implications The presence of agency cost serves as motivation to farm producer organizations to implement new or adapt old agency mechanisms. One recommendation is to reconsider the payment structure of non-member CEOs. There may not be enough incentive to inspire an upstream bias, which is perhaps possible by linking CEO performance to price, patronage and member-oriented performance measurements. Originality/value Agency cost is rarely studied in relation to farm producer organizations. Recent contributions in the empirical literature lacked an explicit connection of ownership and governance characteristics to agency cost.

There is much empirical evidence of consumer preferences for food products with state-sponsored designations. However, the behavioral characteristics that form the foundation of such consumer preferences are unknown. Using a choice experiment, we explain preferences for the Missouri Grown state-sponsored designation from the perspective of consumer ethnocentrism. According to the results, most consumers have a significant willingness-to-pay for the Missouri Grown label. However, the price premium is substantially higher for consumers who think that products from Missouri conform with in-group preferences. These novel findings imply a strong motivation for producers and legislators to expand adoption and support of state-sponsored programs.