Les études économétriques appliquées au secteur agricole en France dans les décennies 1930 à 1960

Econometric research made from the thirties to the sixties gave a double result. First, in the field of collective behaviour, it stated precisely the way in which farmers assess economic consequences of their decisions. It confirmed King effect which is linked to a market saturation and induced by flexible farm prices. Henceforth these concepts are clear. Second, in the field of forecasting, proposed models demonstrated the influence of various factors (output fluctuations, stock and foreign trade) on farm prices, specially for wine production. Otherwise demand functions taking into account retail prices were considered. For cereals the effects of the ouput and prices of the previous year, on acreages and yields of the current year were estimated by using regression equations. These first investigations open the way to modern research in econometrics. It does not give up « classical » methods although it can now use new techniques.