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Transportation Seminar Series
Longer-Term Forecasting of Commodity Flows on the Mississippi River: Application to Grains and World TradeOct 31, 2007 (1:30 - 2:30 p.m., IACC 422) Agricultural commodities are one of the important products in world trade that are shipped on inland water ways. The international distribution of grains and oilseeds are influenced by many factors including agricultural production, consumption which is impacted by tastes, population and income growth as well as agricultural and trade policies. Relative costs of production, interior shipping, handling and ocean shipping costs all have an impact on trade and competitiveness of the interior logistical systems. Changes in the variable costs of any of these impact the international distribution of grains and oilseeds, and shipments through the US water ways. The purpose of this study is to develop a methodology and analytical model to forecast shipments through the Mississippi River system. The methodology is generally applicable to a broad range of commodities and was applied to the grain sector. The focus is on the world grain trade and expected changes in response to a multitude of evolving competitive pressures and structural changes. Emphasis is on the competitiveness of the US grain and oilseed sector that is tributary to the Mississippi River system, and to assess impacts of critical variables on its competitiveness, and to project changes in flows for 50 years. Finally, the forecasts were generated using a chance-constrained stochastic optimization model to derive explicit measures of risks. To analyze these effects, a spatial optimization model of world grain trade was developed. Important parameters are forecasted and used to evaluate changes in flows. Projected import demands are based on consumption functions estimated using income and population and accounting for intercountry differences in consumption dependent on economic development. Each of the competing supply regions and countries were represented by yields, area potential that could be used in production of each grain, costs of production and interior shipping costs. Crucial in this project is the interior spatial competition between the US Pacific Northwest and shipments through the US Gulf as well as inter-Reach competition. William Wilson, Agribusiness and Applied Economics – NDSU Dr. William W. Wilson received his PhD in Agricultural Economics from the University of Manitoba in 1980. Since then he has been a Professor at North Datkota State University in Agribusiness and Applied Economics with periodic sabbaticals at Stanford University. His focus is risk and strategy as applied to agriculture and agribusiness with a particular focus on procurement strategy, international marketing and competition. He routinely has projects and/or overseas clients and travels internationally on average 1 week per month. He currently has projects and/or clients in US, Canada, Mexico, El Salvador, Venezuela, Argentina, Brazil, China, Australia, and France. He regularly advises a number of large Agribusiness firms and several major food and beverage companies and/or governments in other countries. He served as a Board member of the Minneapolis Grain Exchange for 12 years, on the FGIS Advisory Board, and currently serves as a Board member of several regional firms. He was recognized as one of the top 10 Agricultural Economists in 1995. At NDSU he teaches Commodity Trading, Risk Analysis and Management, and Agribusiness Industrial Strategy. He is a visiting professor in Australia, France and has taught his Risk class at Purdue University. Finally, he has students who are in Senior positions in a number of the large agribusinesses including commodity companies, railroads and food and beverage companies. He is married, has 2 boys, and spends nearly all his free time snowboarding as many days as possible, and sailboat racing. |
