This analysis was designed to estimate the impact on crop prices and land use of producing cotton and corn with and without insecticides. A nationwide linear-programming model for a population of 280 million people in the year 2000 was employed to calculate crop costs and land-use patterns that could be expected for several different restrictions regarding land and insecticide use. Without U.S. government acreage controls (in which case, crops could be grown in regions most suited for their production), national crop production with or without insecticides was more efficient and was ca. 50% less expensive than production under a land retirement program. Without U.S. government acreage controls, the calculated costs of growing cotton and corn without insecticides were 11 and 1% greater, respectively, and required 2.1 million acres more land than with insecticide use. Based on various analyses, the conclusion was that the costs of producing crop commodities without insecticides on corn and cotton are slightly greater than the costs of producing these commodities with insecticides and without government acreage controls. However, corn and cotton commodity-production costs without insecticides are considerably less than the cost of producing the commodities with insecticides and under U.S. government acreage controls. Hence, restrictions on land use apear to have much more of an influence in causing higher crop prices than restrictions on insecticide use.