Nonlinear Effects of Weather on Corn Yields

摘要

This paper examines the reduced-form relationship between weather and yields using a unique data set of corn yields and daily weather records covering the eastern United States for 1950-2004. Since weather variations in a fixed location are exogenousand random, the reduced-form relationship constitutes a viable natural experiment and is therefore clearly identified. Understanding the precise link between heat and crop yields could have implications for the effects of climate change on food supply. It may also facilitate the creation of financial instruments that may be used to insure crop yield risk without inducing moral hazard.