SUSTAINING SMALL AND MEDIUM CATTLE PRODUCERS BY EVALUATING AND DEVELOPING INNOVATIVE PRICE RISK MANAGEMENT TOOLS

The long-term goal of this project is to improve United States (US) beef cattle producers' economic sustainability through research on and education of price risk management, especially for small- and medium-sized producers. Specifically, we propose conducting a US survey of cattle producers and use the survey data to create a free, user-friendly mobile application to help cattle producers manage price risk and avoid losses from price declines. The specific supporting objectives are:Survey US beef cattle producers about price risk management tools (e.g., futures, options on futures, forward contracts, and LRP) to determine:Barriers to adopting these tools,Perceived effectiveness of these tools,How producer risk preferences impact their adoption of these tools,Relevant information needed to assist producers in using the tools, How hypothetical changes to LRP would affect the adoption of this tool, andHow to create and deliver effective Extension education to producers on using these tools; and translate these data into the Data-driven development of a free, user-friendly mobile application containing information for price risk management decisions.