Optimal control of locusts in subsistence farming areas

    Authors

    A. Levy;M. R. Caputo

    Comments

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    Abstract

    Locust swarms hit subsistence-staple-crop-growing households at random and are not privately controllable. An aerialspraying optimal control model that supports the said households' livelihood at least expected cost is therefore developed. The qualitative properties of the model are analysed under economically plausible but mild assumptions. The steady state comparative statics reveal that the locust swarm size and the probability of a household's crop being destroyed by a swarm decrease with the number of households, yield per household, and the staple crop's replacement price, and increase with the marginal cost of spraying and the planner's discount rate. A local comparative dynamics analysis is also conducted, as it provides the necessary economic intuition behind other ostensibly anomalous steady-state comparative statics results. (C) 2007 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

    Journal Title

    European Journal of Operational Research

    Volume

    191

    Issue/Number

    2

    Publication Date

    1-1-2008

    Document Type

    Article

    First Page

    503

    Last Page

    515

    WOS Identifier

    WOS:000257343900016

    ISSN

    0377-2217

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