NEWS for North Dakotans
Agriculture Communication, North Dakota State
University
7 Morrill Hall, Fargo, ND 58105-5665
February 12, 1998
Biological methods of controlling leafy spurge with insects could cut spurge infestation by about two-thirds and provide an economic benefit of nearly $60 million annually in the upper Midwest by the year 2025, according to a study by agricultural economists at North Dakota State University.
These long-term estimates are founded on the premise that biological control methods now being tested will turn out to be as effective as their developers hope—a premise that may be tenuous, given the past history of attempts to deal with leafy spurge.
Still, even if scientists are twice as optimistic as they ought to be in their guesstimate—that is, even if only about a third of the leafy spurge can be suppressed by biological methods—the yearly benefit would come to $25 or $30 million annually in the four-state region comprising the Dakotas, Montana and Wyoming, according to the report.
These estimates are based primarily on the estimated amount of land that will be recovered from leafy spurge by biological measures, how many more cattle will be able to graze that land (which would otherwise have been unavailable for grazing) and how much business activity the additional grazing will generate, both directly and indirectly.
"Also, about 10 percent of the economic benefit will come from increased expenditures in outdoor activities due to improved wildlife habitat, and from offsite soil and water conservation benefits," says Dean Bangsund, agricultural economics researcher who is one of the authors of the report.
Direct economic impacts include, primarily, income and expenditures of cattle producers; indirect impacts include the effects in the economy as the money spent and earned by the cattle producers is spent and respent by others in the four-state region.
A free copy of the report is available from Department of Agricultural Economics, P.O. Box 5636, NDSU, Fargo, ND 58105; (701) 231-7441. Ask for "Predicted Future Economic Impacts of Biological Control of Leafy Spurge in the Upper Midwest," Agricultural Economics Report No. 382-S. The report is also available at http://agecon.lib.umn.edu/ndsu.html on the World Wide Web.
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Source: Dean Bangsund (701) 231-7141
Editor: Barry Brissman (701) 231-7866