Purpose The paper tested the – relationship between the stock markets of the Middle East and the USA with the oil price and US dollar index as threshold variables. Research design, data, and methodology – The stock price indices of the USA, the Middle East (Abu Dhabi, Jordan), WTI spot crude oil price, and US dollar index were daily returns in the research period from May 21, 2001 to August 9, 2012. Following Hansen (1999), the panel threshold regression model was used. Results – With the US dollar index as the threshold variable, a negative relationship existed between the stock price indices of Jordan and the USA but no significant result was found between the stock price indices of Abu Dhabi and the USA. Conclusions – The USA is an economic power today:even if it has a closer relationship with the US stock market, the dynamic US economy can learn about subsequent developments and plan in advance. Conversely, if it has an estranged relationship with the US stock market, thinking in a different direction and different investment strategies will achieve good results

Recent climate change has led to fluctuations in agricultural production, and as a result national food supply has become an important strategic factor in economic policy. As such, in this study, panel data was collected to analyze the effects of seven meteorological elements and using the Lagrange multipliers method, the fixed-effects model for the production of five types of food crop and the seven meteorological elements were analyzed. Results showed that the key factors effecting increases in production of rice grains were average temperature, average relative humidity and average ground surface temperature, while wheat and barley were found to have positive correlations with average temperature and average humidity. The implications of this study are as follow. First, it was confirmed that the meteorological elements have profound effects on the production of food crops. Second, when compared to existing studies, the study was not limited to one food crop but encompassed all five types, and went beyond other studies that were limited to temperature and rainfall to include various meterological elements.