This study explores several alternative specifications of futures-based forecasting models to improve existing approaches constrained by restrictive assumptions and limited information sets. In lieu of historical averages, our approaches use rolling regressions and include current market information reflected in the deviation of the current basis from its historical average. To mitigate potential challenges arising from nonstationarity and structural changes in the relationship between farm and futures prices, we employ a 5-year rolling estimation window. We find that a rolling regression approach offers significant improvements (as evidenced by our Modified Diebold–Mariano test) in the accuracy and information content of forecasts of cotton season-average prices (SAPs) mostly at short forecast horizons.

The goal of this paper is to systematically review the literature on United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) forecast evaluation and critically assess their methods and findings. The fundamental characteristics of optimal forecasts are bias, accuracy and efficiency as well as encompassing and informativeness. This review revealed that the findings of these studies can be very different based on the forecasts examined, commodity, sample period, and methodology. Some forecasts performed very well, while others were not very reliable, resulting in forecast specific optimality record. We discuss methodological and empirical contributions of these studies as well as their shortcomings and potential opportunities for future work.

This study examines the accuracy of United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) crop Acreage and Production forecasts for corn, soybeans, and winter wheat relative to their private counterparts over 1970–2019. Our main findings suggest that USDA forecasts often had significantly smaller errors than their private counterparts. The accuracy of both USDA and private forecasts has improved over time, but the accuracy of USDA forecasts has improved more than that of private forecasts, maintaining the USDA’s relative accuracy advantage. The accuracy advantage of Prospective Plantings and Acreage reports highlights the importance of survey-based approaches used for these forecasts.

This study provides a road map for creating and operating a student-managed investment fund (SMIF) as an experiential learning opportunity in commodity market analysis. We describe the reasons for implementing a SMIF and the benefits it offers relative to traditional simulation approaches. We outline the necessary steps for starting a SMIF and explain its organizational structure. We discuss a SMIF’s operation and main activities, which include recruitment, training, trading, and interaction with the client and alumni. The implications of participating in a SMIF are reviewed within a cost-benefit framework.

This study examined how various components of the Certified South Carolina campaign are valued by participating restaurants. A choice experiment was conducted to estimate the average willingness to pay (WTP) for each campaign component using a mixed logit model. Three existing campaign components—Labeling, Multimedia Advertising, and the “Fresh on the Menu” program—were found to have a significant positive economic value. Results also revealed that the type of restaurant, the level of satisfaction with the campaign, and the factors motivating participation significantly affected restaurants' WTP for the campaign components.

The purpose of this study was to examine the impact of situation and outlook information from World Agricultural Supply and Demand Estimates (WASDE) in corn and soybean futures markets over the period 1985 to 2006. Results indicate that WASDE reports containing National Agricultural Statistics Service (NASS) crop production estimates and other domestic and international situation and outlook information have the largest impact; causing return variance on report sessions to be 7.38 times greater than normal return variance in corn futures and 6.87 times greater than normal return variance in soybean futures. WASDE reports limited to international situation information and domestic and international outlook information have a smaller impact. The results show that the impact of WASDE reports has increased over time.