Interregional Analysis of U.S. Grain Marketing and Transportation

A U.S. grain transportation model based on a linear programming algorithm is developed to evaluate grain transportation policies associated with grain transportation capacity, alternative rate structures and waterway user charges. The objective function of the model is to minimize transportation and handling costs in shipping grain from producing regions to market destinations. The objective function- is subject to the following constraints: supply, domestic demand, export demand, inventory clearing condition at commercial storage locations, commercial storage capacity, rail car capacity and waterway capacity