Main Content
Syllabus
AGBM 102 (GS) Economics of the Food System
Introduction to topics designed to develop an understanding of how the food production, processing, and marketing system works and evolves.
Overview | Goals | Materials | Technical Requirements | Course Requirements and Grading | Course Schedule | Academic Integrity | Policies
Overview
We will examine the economic forces that make the U.S. food and agricultural marketing system work. This system assembles, transports, stores, and transforms a wide range of food and agricultural products and delivers them to us - the consumers - on a consistent basis.
The U.S. food and agricultural system is complex and highly dynamic. If you understand the economics of the food system, you can understand how just about any other sector of the U.S. (or world) economy works.
No matter what career path you follow, you will interact with the food system, if only as a consumer.
In this course you will be expected to solve simple equations and graph functions. Note that the axes of economic graphs do not follow the conventions used by graphing calculators. The use of such calculators can be confusing and is not recommended. A ruler, pen or pencil, and a sheet of graph paper provide the best package of technology for handling homework problems in this course.
Course Goals
In completing AG BM 102 you will have a solid understanding of the U.S. food system and the economic forces that drive it.
By the end of this course you will be able to:
- Describe the different components of the food system and how they work together to deliver food and agricultural products to consumers at home and abroad.
- Explain how prices are formed in the food system.
- Describe how food markets deal with time, place, product form and risk.
- Use basic economic concepts and tools, such as supply and demand curves and price flexibilities and elasticities, to examine market characteristics and behavior.
- Explain how public policies in such areas as agricultural prices, international trade and competition affect the food system.
Required Course Materials
There is no textbook for this course. All course material will be provided to you either via the course modules or through links within the course modules to external sources. All materials, be they in the modules or external sources, are fair game for quizzes, assignments, and tests.
A scanner or other device capable of taking high-quality pictures of your work will be required to complete the homework assignments in this course. If the instructor deems the quality of your pictures insufficient, it's up to you to provide a higher resolution image. If this isn't done within 24 hours of the notice given by the instructor, the assignment may be given a zero.
For information on what's going on in U.S. agriculture and agribusiness, check out the following:
Other online sources, such as Business Week and the Economist magazine, have information on agribusiness issues from time to time. Also the New York Times and USA Today sometimes contain news about the food system.
Using the Library
Many of the University Libraries resources can be utilized from a distance. Through the Libraries website, you can
- access magazine, journal, and newspaper articles online using library databases;
- borrow materials and have them delivered to your doorstep—or even your desktop;
- get research help via email, chat, or phone using the Ask a Librarian service; and
- much more.
You must have an active Penn State Access Account to take full advantage of the Libraries' resources and service. The Off-Campus Users page has additional information about these free services.
Technical Requirements
| Operating System | Canvas, Penn State's Learning Management System (LMS), supports most recent versions of Microsoft Windows and Apple Mac operating systems. To determine if your operating system is supported, please review Canvas' computer specifications. |
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| Browser | Canvas supports the last two versions of every major browser release. It is highly recommended that you update to the newest version of whatever browser you are using. Note: Cookies must be enabled, and pop-up blockers should be configured to permit new windows from Penn State websites. |
| Additional Canvas Requirements | For a list of software, hardware, and computer settings specifically required by the Canvas LMS, please review Canvas' computer specifications. |
| Additional Software | All Penn State students have access to Microsoft Office 365, including Microsoft Office applications such as Word, Excel, and PowerPoint. |
| Hardware | Monitor: Monitor capable of at least 1024 x 768 resolution |
| Mobile Device (optional) | The Canvas mobile app is available for versions of iOS and Android. To determine if your device is capable of using the Canvas Mobile App, please review the Canvas Mobile App Requirements. |
Student Education Experience Questionnaire (SEEQ)
During the semester you will receive information for completing the Student Education Experience Questionnaire (SEEQ). Your participation is an opportunity to provide anonymous feedback on your learning experience. Your feedback is important because it allows us to understand your experience in this course and make changes to improve the learning experiences of future students. Please monitor email and course communications for links and availability dates.
If you need technical assistance at any point during the course, please contact the Service Desk.
For registration, advising, disability services, help with materials, exams, general problem solving, visit World Campus Student Services!
Course Requirements and Grading
| Assignment Type | Overall Percentage of Grade |
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| Homeworks | 35% |
| Current Event Articles | 10% |
| Quizzes | 35% |
| Discussions | 10% |
| Final Exam | 10% |
| Letter Grade | Percentage Value |
|---|---|
| A | 93.0 - 100 |
| A- | 90.0 - 92.9 |
| B+ | 87.0 - 89.9 |
| B | 83.0 - 86.9 |
| B- | 80.0 - 82.9 |
| C+ | 77.0 - 79.9 |
| C | 70.0 - 76.9 |
| D | 60.0 - 69.9 |
| F | < 60.0 |
Note: All late assignments will be given a zero unless prior permission has been granted for a late submission. All extension requests must be submitted 36 hours prior to a submission deadline. In emergency situations, this time restriction will be lifted.
Homework Assignments
In most cases, you will be prompted to download the homework assignment document for each lesson. After downloading the assignment, resave and submit as Lastname_Firstname_Lesson#_Assignment (example: Brown_Rachael_Lesson2_Assignment).
Homework assignments may include one or more of the following elements. Please review the expectations detailed below before submitting your work. These expectations will apply to all assignments in this course:
- Graphs: You are required to use graph paper for constructing all graphs. Any graphs not done on graph paper (or paper with a grid lines) will receive, at most, half credit for the question. In order to include your graph in the assignment submission, take a high-quality picture or scan of your work, and insert the image into the document under the appropriate question. Be sure the image is of readable size. Check the quality of the image to be sure everything is legible. If necessary, do the graph first in pencil, and then if lines and/or words are difficult to read, carefully trace the principal lines and labels in pen. Do not use Excel to graph your calculations—you will not receive full credit.
- Calculations: Depending on the calculation question, you may either type your calculations into the document or write them by hand on paper, following the same procedure for producing and submitting a drawn graph. All work (including formulas you use) must be shown to receive full credit for questions requiring calculations.
- Open-ended questions: For all questions that require sentence or paragraph responses, please type your response under the corresponding question in the document provided. Correct grammar is required; deductions will be made for incorrect grammar.
- Gathering of information: For some assignments you will be required to gather information from a variety of sources, including but not limited to grocery stores and web pages. All sources must be linked in your assignments with the source URL. Note: Wikipedia is not an acceptable source.
Important instructions: In order for your homework assignment to be graded, it must be submitted as a Microsoft Word document or PDF. Any pictures that you take of graphs or other work must be inserted into the Word document—not sent as separate attachments. If you don't follow these instructions for your homework, it will not be graded.
Some of the graphs in the course are complicated and can take up a lot of space in your Word document if they're in certain file formats. To keep the size of your homework manageable, save any images as JPEGs (.jpg files) or convert them to this format before inserting them into your Word document.
All elements of the assignment should be clearly marked and organized to avoid creating confusion during the grading process. Unduly messy assignments will be penalized.
Current Events and Econ Assignments
Current Event Assignments
Find one newspaper or periodical article that (1) was published less than 1 week before the due date and (2) relates to agricultural economics or agribusiness in general. This can include a range of topics: crop production, prices, climate change related to crop production, innovations in ag, buying and selling of ag companies—the list goes on. The article must appear in a reputable publication and cannot be an opinion article (this is important; don't use op-ed pieces, which will get you 0 points). Write about how the article relates to a topic (or topics) you learned about in this course. This is not a pure opinion assignment: Support your position with facts. It might help to think about these questions as you write: How does this issue relate to what you've learned? How does it affect the ag world? Based on agricultural economics, what should change in the ag sector, if anything? If nothing will (or should) change, why not?
Write one page, with a minimum of 500 words (12-point font, single-spaced, 1" margins). Write only your name at the top, and then begin your assignment; provide a link to the article in a single line at the end of your assignment. Correct grammar is required; assignments with incorrect grammar will receive a zero. Word's spell-checker is your friend, and emoticons are not correct grammar. Note: A lengthy introduction to the article will be considered fluff and will not count toward the word count of your assignment.
These assignments are pass/fail. As long as you complete the assignment per the instructions, you will receive the full 10 points. If you don't complete the assignment, you will receive 0 points. Completing half the assignment will not get you half credit. Late assignments will receive a zero. Submissions must be in Word or PDF format (submission in any other format will receive a zero).
The following are instructions for econ assignments:
Complete the assignments per the instructions in the individual assignments.
Quizzes and Final Exam
A quiz is assigned for each lesson of the course. Quizzes are timed and range from 20–45 minutes (about 3 minutes per question). Please be sure that you have 20–45 minutes of uninterrupted time to complete the quiz, as you cannot save your progress and come back to it later.
While taking the quiz, there is no backtracking; that is, after you select an answer and move to the next question, you cannot return to the previous questions. Once the quiz is completed, you will be able to review the entire quiz to see what you missed, but you will not be able to change any answers. The same is true with the Final Exam.
The Final Exam, given during the last instructional week of the course, is multiple-choice and is given in the same manner the quizzes are. You will have 60 minutes (an average of 2 minutes per question) to complete the exam. Please be sure that you have 60 minutes of uninterrupted time to complete the exam, as you cannot save your progress and come back to it later. All material covered in the course is fair game for the final exam. The final exam can be taken online anytime up to the due date. Note: There is no in-person final exam. The University automatically assigns this course a final exam slot, but we will not use it.
Discussion Forums
Discussions in this course will span two weeks. In the first week, you will be required to submit an initial post by the end of the week related to the given prompt. The entire second week will involve deep discussion with your classmates. This means you will be required to produce a minimum of two discussion posts in a two-week time frame. Doing the minimum does not guarantee you full credit. The quality of your replies and overall participation will be evaluated. An exemplary reply demonstrates at least one of the following attributes:
- Resourcefulness: It shares or creates resources that contribute to the discussion.
- Critical inquiry: It offers feedback, asks questions, and/or provides reflection on commentary.
- Community expansion: It leads a section of the community to a new and deeper discourse.
General rule of participation: Be active in your initial thread, in threads in which you’ve made comments, and new threads as discussions expand.
Please use the following rubric to guide your participation.
The discussion forum is locked until the assignment opens. You will be unable to access the discussion forum until Lesson 9, at which point you will be able to complete the assignment.
Discussion posts submitted late on one of the two weeks will receive, at most, 50% credit. Discussion posts submitted late on both of the assignment deadlines will receive a zero.
Course Schedule
Note: All due dates reflect North American eastern time (ET).
The schedule below outlines the topics we will be covering in this course, along with the associated time frames and assignments. Note that assignments are due based on Eastern Time (ET). This ensures that all students have the same deadlines regardless of where they live. All lesson assignments must be submitted by 11:59 PM (ET) on the last day of the timeframe indicated below for the lesson.
Lesson 1
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Lesson 8
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Lesson 9
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Lesson 10
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Lesson 11
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Lesson 12
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Week 1
These assignments must be submitted by 11:59 PM (ET) on Sunday. Week 2
The Final Exam must be submitted by 11:59 PM (ET) on Friday. |
Homework assignments and quizzes may be completed early as you are able to work at your own pace. The quizzes are graded instantly. The homework assignment will be graded within 48 hours of the due date with grades and the answer key being posted simultaneously. You are unable to complete the discussion forum posts early.
Note: If you are planning to graduate this semester, please communicate your intent to graduate to your instructor. This will alert your instructor to the need to submit your final grade in time to meet the published graduation deadlines. For more information about graduation policies and deadlines, please go to the Graduation Information on the My Penn State Online Student Portal.
Formal instruction will end on the last day of class. Provided that you have an active Penn State Access Account user ID and password, you will continue to be able to access the course materials for one year, starting from the end date of the academic semester in which the course was offered (with the exception of library reserves and other external resources that may have a shorter archival period). After one year, you might be able to access the course based on the policies of the program or department offering the course material, up to a maximum of three years from the end date of the academic semester in which the course was offered. For more information, please review the University Course Archival Policy.
This is a semester-based course with deadlines. Students are expected to complete work by posted deadlines. Please check the course schedule for the times and dates that assignments are due in this course. Contact your instructor to discuss legitimate and unavoidable situations that may cause lateness (such as illness, injury or family emergency). If you know that you are going to miss a deadline, please contact your instructor in advance of that deadline to discuss an extension (or if you are not able to contact the instructor before the deadline, as soon as you are able). Decisions regarding extensions will be made at the discretion of the instructor on a case-by-case basis.
Academic Integrity
According to Penn State policy G-9: Academic Integrity , an academic integrity violation is “an intentional, unintentional, or attempted violation of course or assessment policies to gain an academic advantage or to advantage or disadvantage another student academically.” Unless your instructor tells you otherwise, you must complete all course work entirely on your own, using only sources that have been permitted by your instructor, and you may not assist other students with papers, quizzes, exams, or other assessments. If your instructor allows you to use ideas, images, or word phrases created by another person (e.g., from Course Hero or Chegg) or by generative technology, such as ChatGPT, you must identify their source. You may not submit false or fabricated information, use the same academic work for credit in multiple courses, or share instructional content. Students with questions about academic integrity should ask their instructor before submitting work.
Students facing allegations of academic misconduct may not drop/withdraw from the affected course unless they are cleared of wrongdoing (see G-9: Academic Integrity ). Attempted drops will be prevented or reversed, and students will be expected to complete course work and meet course deadlines. Students who are found responsible for academic integrity violations face academic outcomes, which can be severe, and put themselves at jeopardy for other outcomes which may include ineligibility for Dean’s List, pass/fail elections, and grade forgiveness. Students may also face consequences from their home/major program and/or The Schreyer Honors College.
How Academic Integrity Violations Are Handled
World Campus students are expected to act with civility and
personal integrity; respect other students' dignity, rights, and
property; and help create and maintain an environment in which all
can succeed through the fruits of their own efforts. An environment
of academic integrity is requisite to respect for oneself and
others, as well as a civil community.
In cases where academic integrity is questioned, the Policy on Academic Integrity indicates that procedure requires an instructor to inform the student of the allegation. Procedures allow a student to accept or contest a charge. If a student chooses to contest a charge, the case will then be managed by the respective college or campus Academic Integrity Committee. If that committee recommends an administrative sanction (Formal Warning, Conduct Probation, Suspension, Expulsion), the claim will be referred to the Office of Student Accountability and Conflict Response.
All Penn State colleges abide by this Penn State policy, but review procedures may vary by college when academic dishonesty is suspected. Information about Penn State's academic integrity policy and college review procedures is included in the information that students receive upon enrolling in a course. To obtain that information in advance of enrolling in a course, please contact us by going to the Contacts & Help page .
Accommodating Disabilities
Penn State welcomes students with disabilities into the University's educational programs. Every Penn State campus has resources for students with disabilities. The Student Disability Resources (SDR) website provides contacts for disability services at every Penn State campus. For further information, please visit the SDR website.
In order to apply for reasonable accommodations, you must contact the appropriate disability resources office at the campus where you are officially enrolled, participate in an intake interview, and provide documentation based on the documentation guidelines. If the documentation supports your request for reasonable accommodations, your campus's disability resources office will provide you with an accommodation letter. Please share this letter with your instructors and discuss the accommodations with them as early in your courses as possible. You must follow this process for every semester that you request accommodations.
Additional Policies
For information about additional policies regarding Penn State Access Accounts; credit by examination; course tuition, fees, and refund schedules; and drops and withdrawals, please see the World Campus Student Center website.
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- Anywhere in the United States: Call the Penn State Crisis Line at 1-877-229-6400 or text LIONS to 741741. You can also contact your local crisis services or hospital for emergencies.
- Outside the United States: Please contact emergency services in your current location. You can also use the International Crisis and Emergency Services listings.
- At University Park: Assistance is available at Counseling & Psychological Services (CAPS) locations on campus.
- At a Penn State branch campus: You can search for counseling information at your campus.
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