Siddhartha Bora

Siddhartha Bora is a Ph.D. candidate in the Department of Agricultural, Environmental, and Development Economics (AEDE) at The Ohio State University. Siddhartha currently serves as a Research Assistant for the Farm Income Enhancement Program led by Dr. Ani Katchova. His current research topics include forecast evaluation, farm income forecasts, and agricultural baseline projections. His recent paper, “The Rationality of USDA Forecasts under Multivariate Asymmetric Loss,” was published in the American Journal of Agricultural Economics (AJAE). This study shows that the asymmetric loss of the forecaster may explain bias in USDA forecasts on farm income and commodity prices. For this work, Siddhartha received the William E. Krauss Director’s award for Excellence in Graduate Research from the College of Food, Agricultural and Environmental Sciences (CFAES), The Ohio State University, and the Outstanding Research Award from the Agricultural Finance and Management (AFM) Section, AAEA for 2021. His job market paper examines the accuracy of USDA long-run baseline projections and investigates if the projections stay informative beyond a certain year. Another paper published in the Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics (JARE) investigates how the USDA farm income forecasts published in February may be improved using the baseline projections published in the same month. 

As a member of the Farm Income Enhancement Program, Siddhartha has contributed to several outreach reports and conferences on issues such as farm income forecasts, agricultural baselines, farmer bankruptcy, and delinquency rates. In addition to his research and outreach activities, Siddhartha has also completed multiple teaching assignments as a teaching assistant, most recently serving as a lab instructor for Applied Quantitative Methods I (AEDECON6110) in Fall 2020. He is the recipient of the Bernie Erven Outstanding Teacher Award by the Dept. of AEDE for 2021.

Advisor: Dr. Ani Katchova

Select Research Papers:

• Bora, S. S., A.L. Katchova and T.H. Kuethe. “The Accuracy and Informativeness of Agricultural Baselines.” American Journal of Agricultural Economics, Revise and Resubmit, 2021
• Bora, S.S., A.L. Katchova, and T.H. Kuethe. “The Rationality of USDA Forecasts under Multivariate Asymmetric Loss.” American Journal of Agricultural Economics (2021) 103, 3:1006-1033. https://doi.org/10.1111/ajae.12142
• Kuethe, T.H., S.S. Bora, and A.L. Katchova. “Improving ERS’s Net Cash Income Forecasts using USDA Baseline Projections.” Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics (2021). https://doi.org/10.22004/ag.econ.310528