Investment analysis

“It is useful to be able to think marginally – to think in terms of the little bit more and the little bit less” K. E. Boulding (Boulding was a British economist, educator, peace activist, poet, religious mystic, devoted Quaker, systems scientist, and interdisciplinary philosopher. He was also nominated for the Nobel Prize for both peace and economics.) The processes of analysis implemented in the Investan program are underpinned by the economic principles of diminishing returns, complementary, supplementary and competitive, and marginal effects encountered when producing beef. These principles are applied to answering questions such as: if we change the feeding program to increase weaner production, is it worth doing; or if we use that paddock to grow steers instead of heifers will we be better or worse off? Analysis, in this form, relates the technical knowledge of production to the costs and returns associated with production. Production economic thinking provides a framework for rational decision making and the reasoning behind the process will point roughly which direction to go.