08.06.2021 NaDiMa Dialogue #10 | The Effects of Weather Related Shocks on Commodity Price Dynamics | 25 & 27 June | Workshop

On behalf of the Economics of the Middle East Research Group of Center for Near and Middle Eastern Studies (CNMS) & the Natural Disaster Management (NaDiMa) academic exchange project, we cordially invite you to our tenth online NaDiMa Dialogue on

The Effects of Weather Related Shocks on Commodity Price Dynamics

Climate change is becoming increasingly apparent in different economic sectors. In 2018, the whole world struggled with extreme weather shocks which substantially affected the agricultural sector. In this sense, the weather-related event is the primary contributory factor behind food market volatilities. There is strong evidence that weather-related shocks significantly threaten the agricultural sector and food security. Supply shocks and price spikes in the agri-food markets are triggered by weather variabilities. Formal reports suggest that high temperatures are behind cyclical production patterns in food product markets. At the farm level, weather variabilities may affect farmers' decisions regarding agricultural activities. Further, the extreme weather events affect the cost of processing which can be passed through to the final product price. An increase in (transaction and transport) costs, driven by extreme weather shocks, reduces the gap between price and costs, which is referred to as an indicator of market functioning (i.e. market power). Hence, this shock may have significant effects on the market performance and price level. Cost pass-through analysis provides a useful approach to analyze the potential effects of temperature in this context.

The workshop is designed to understand how to investigate the economic effects of climate change and weather-driven shocks on the agri-food sector. The first part of the workshop will introduce participants to a general framework for assessing the economic effects of climate change at different stages of agri-food value chains. We will start by presenting the climate change dynamics at the farm level. However, the main part of the workshop focuses on the pass-through of weather-related shocks along the value chain using panel data (e.g. panel cointegration and threshold panel models). The workshop will focus on training participants in the art of identifying proxies of weather variabilities and estimating their effects using Stata.

Day 1 (25 June): Theory
• Climate change and the agricultural sector
• Cost pass-through analysis
• Empirical model estimation

Day 2 (27 June): Theory, Group work and presentation
• Modeling temperature variabilities
• Supervised group work
• Group presentations

The workshop is aimed at Master & PhD students from the fields of Economics, Disaster Management, Human Geography and similar fields. Basic knowledge of microeconomics and panel data econometrics is required.

Workshop Instructor: 

Dr. Omid Zamani, Senior Researcher, Thünen-Institut Braunschweig
Dr. Omid Zamani is a Senior Researcher working for the Market Analysis Institute of Thuenen, Germany. He holds two PhDs in agricultural market analysis and applied economics. His research interests include policy analysis, market asymmetries, agri-food trade policies, and water economics.

Registration and Technical Requirements:

Time and Place: 
25 June 2021, 1:00 pm - 7:00 pm (CET), and 27 June 2021, 10:00 am - 4:00 pm (CET), Online via Adobe Connect

How to join: Click here to register for the event.
You can find the poster to the event here.