FOOD PRODUCTION ENVIRONMENT AND MAIZE INTERNATIONAL PRICES: AN EVIDENCE FROM MAURITIUS POULTRY SECTOR

The paper examined the correlation between food production and environmental contamination in a small open economy by using the East African island of Mauritius as a case study. The results show that there is a significant positive correlation between food production and agricultural nitrous oxide emissions as well as CO2 emissions. Also, the paper investigates the impact of maize's world price on domestic price and quantity of chicken. The paper uses the equilibrium displacement model (EDM) to examine the impact of changes in maize's international price and domestic income on equilibrium price and equilibrium quantity of chicken. The results show that a one percent increase in maize's international price increases the equilibrium price of chicken by 0.081 percent and decreases equilibrium quantity of chicken by 0.036 percent. Income has an elastic impact on equilibrium price of chicken. A one percent rise in income increases equilibrium price by 1.601 percent and equilibrium quantity by 0.429 showing that changes in income have a greater impact on equilibrium price of chicken than changes in maize world prices.