Market integration

  Describes how efficiently the market functions in moving goods

and services through the different stages in the production process to the final destination

  the consumer of the end product (see spatial integration).

Market structure

  the number of buyers and sellers, their size distribution, the degree of

product differentiation, and the ease of entry of new firms into an industry.

Nominal

  An adjective which describes the measurement of an economic magnitude in

current prices. The opposite of real.

Normal good: 

This is a good or service on which more money is spent on as one's level

of income increases.

Price

  The price of a good or service shows what has to be given up in order to obtain a

good or service. Prices act as signals that coordinate the actions of market participants.

Supply and demand conditions are thus reflected in market prices. When market supply is

large compared to demand prices are low. When demand is great relative to supply,

prices are high.

Security stock

  Government managed food reserves also referred to as  strategic grain

reserves   SGR. 

Spatial average

  Average across space.

Spatial integration

  The degree to which price signals are transmitted between the

different hierarchical levels (processing, transport, and storage), i.e., the different

economic actors of a subsector (consumers, small scale retailers, wholesalers, collectors,

and producers). Common indicators of spatial integration are price margins between pairs

of markets (the more constant these margins the more integrated the markets) and the

coefficients of price correlation between markets (a strong degree of integration is

implied by high coefficients).

Subsector: 

This is all aspects of the production through consumption of a particular

commodity (including all aspects of marketing).

Temporal average

  Average through time.

Thin market

  Markets that do not have large volumes of trade.  The implication is that

there can be large swings in prices (up or down) as a result of increases in supply or

demand.  Prices obtained from thin markets are less reliable or informative about market

conditions.

Transactions costs

  Those costs other than price which are incurred in trading goods and

services, for example the cost of information and the cost of legalizing transactions.

These costs can be substantial.

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