契作效益之評估──以台灣稻米市場為例

The Effects of Forward Contracting on Spot Market in Paddy Rice Industry in Taiwan

台灣農業屬小農型態，經營規模小且生產成本高，勞動力老化，政府補助有限，農民愈趨弱勢。眾多文獻證實，農民與農企業簽訂農業契約，是改善農民生活、扶植農作產業的可行制度。雖然政府長期推動各項農業契作制度但成效不一。本文藉由理論模型及實證模擬分析探究政府稻米契作成效不彰的原因。模擬結果顯示：現貨價格的波動，隨著契約交易提高而增加。這是因為契約交易增加使得現貨市場萎縮、淺碟化，遇到預期外的衝擊時價格即明顯波動。本文建議政府農業契約政策應回歸契約本質，尊重市場機制，以收入穩定為誘因，提高農民參與契作的意願。 This research contributes to the understanding of the role of forward contracting, market structural features, and product characteristics as determinants spot price levels and volatility. In the theoretical model setting, we analyze the optimizing behavior of agents who produce and purchase commodities by using contract, and derived the individual supply and demand functions under price uncertainty and risk aversion. Stochastic simulation is further used to generate price series from which inferences are drawn concerning price levels and volatility associated with each scenario. Past studies have been empirical and found mixed evidence that the spot price is either inversely or not related to the incidence of contract use. Given the mixed empirical evidence, we re-examine the implications of contracting on cash (or spot) market price level and price volatility in this research based on Taiwan paddy rice market. Our results is that contracting can lead to reduced farmer prices received in spot market, not only due to the residual nature of spot markets that operate in conjunction with forward contracting, but also due to the adjusted spot demand by retailers. We find that as contracting increases, spot price levels decrease and spot price volatility increases.