Economies of scale and market structure in international grain trade
Margherita Scoppola
Agricultural Economics, 2007, vol. 37, issue 2‐3, 277-291
Abstract:
A large body of literature has examined international grain trade in imperfectly competitive models. The article develops a two‐stage duopoly model that considers a private trader and a State Trading Enterprise (STE) competing on a foreign market. The key difference between the private trader and the STE is their international organization; while the STE makes use of external agents to export, the private firm may choose to internalize international transactions. The game is solved for different modes of competition and under both assumptions of homogeneous and differentiated products, in order to assess how these assumptions affect the outcome of the game. The results of the game are examined by using numerical examples. The analysis shows that external shocks on export markets may result in a change of market structure and, consequently, of market shares. These effects depend on the initial market structure. Furthermore, the degree of product differentiation and the assumed mode of competition significantly affect the relative values of transaction and fixed costs at which the market structure changes.
Date: 2007
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (5)
Downloads: (external link)
https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1574-0862.2007.00274.x
Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.
Export reference: BibTeX
RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan)
HTML/Text
Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:bla:agecon:v:37:y:2007:i:2-3:p:277-291
Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.blackwell ... bs.asp?ref=0169-5150
Access Statistics for this article
Agricultural Economics is currently edited by W.A. Masters and G.E. Shively
More articles in Agricultural Economics from International Association of Agricultural Economists Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Wiley Content Delivery ().