No 1/2015, March | Agris on-line Papers in Economics and Informatics

Technical Efficiency of Pineapple Production in Osun State, Nigeria

O. Adegbite I. B. Adeoye No 1/2015, March
pp. 3 - 12

ABSTRACT

Pineapple is one of the most important fruits in Nigeria and it had been identified that the country has comparative advantage in its production. However, there is need for empirical studies on the technical efficiency of its production. This paper presents the analysis of technical efficiency of pineapple production in Osun state, Nigeria using stochastic frontier production function and resource use efficiency. Primary data was collected from 120 pineapple farmers using multi stage sampling technique. Results revealed that quantity of suckers and labour used in pineapple production was positive and significant at 5% while farm size was significant at 1%. The returns to scale indicated that a unit increase in all the specified production inputs will lead to a more than proportionate increase in pineapple yield by 2.1%. The mean technical efficiency of the pineapple farmers indicated that an average farmer could obtain about 93% of output from a given mix of inputs. The estimated gamma parameter revealed that 81.4% of the variation in output among the pineapple farmers was due to disparities in technical efficiency. Resource use efficiency indicated underutilization of suckers and overutilization of other specified production inputs. The study therefore recommends that farmers should cut down the use of resources that were over utilized and increase the quantity of suckers used in the production of the commodity for optimal productivity.

KEYWORDS

Pineapple productivity, technical efficiency, stochastic frontier, Osun state.

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Web Interface for Education of Mentally Disabled Persons for Work in Horticulture

P. Benda M. Šmejkalová No 1/2015, March
pp. 13 - 19

ABSTRACT

This paper deals with the development of a suitable web interface for the education of persons with mental disabilities to work in horticulture. The research is based on the testing of several forms of web navigation by the group of mentally disabled persons. Testing was performed for seven weeks in a model course which acquainted the participants with working activities in horticulture. A partial research has also identified a suitable device and the form of control the web part of model course. Formulated results were retroactively applied to the model course and utilized for the purpose of a real support for education of mentally disabled persons for work in horticulture.

KEYWORDS

Accessibility, web interface, mental disability, horticulture.

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Several Comments on Creation and Use of PSE Indicator within Measuring of Financial Transfers to Agricultural Producers

I. Boháčková No 1/2015, March
pp. 21 - 31

ABSTRACT

The paper deals with problems of a PSE indicator. The aim is to delimit the EU position in the framework of selected OECD countries (countries of a comparable economic level). In this connection not only development tendency of this indicator is evaluated, but above all the attention is paid to the PSE structure. Further, the paper analyzes problems of the PSE in relation to incomes of agricultural producers and a profit of agricultural farms because the connection between these categories is considered significant. The methodology corresponds with set aims (a horizontal and vertical analysis, a comparison). Conclusions are presented in the sense: evaluation of development trends of the PSE, the PSE structure, suitability of the methodology of determination of indicators, analyses of the relation of the PSE, incomes and a profit.

KEYWORDS

Agriculture, financial transfers, estimation of production supports, incomes and profit of agricultural farms, European Union.

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Geomatic Concepts in Agriculture Thesauri

O. Čerba K. Jedlička No 1/2015, March
pp. 33 - 40

ABSTRACT

The agriculture thesauri (e.g. AGROVOC or NAL Agriculture Thesaurus) represent very large and robust systems of formalized knowledge. They are primarily focused on information related to agriculture. But they also use fragments of geomatic information and knowledge in a form of concepts and their terms. These concepts include general terms of all parts of geomatics as well as data instances (such as particular methods). Even though these concepts are not the main component of above-mentioned thesauri, the concepts from geomatic domain play very important role in a process of detail description of agricultural and other concepts (including processes of their measurement, observation or mapping) contained in thesauri.This paper assess geomatic concepts in AGROVOC and NAL Agriculture Thesaurus from the view of geomatics (but with a respect to methodologies of thesauri development and maintenance). It means evaluation of the subset of concepts related to geomatics and close scientific disciplines such as cartography, photogrammetry, GIS science or remote sensing. Authors look into definitions of concepts, their hierarchy, relations and links to other information resources. As the result there is a short list of recommendations how to improve and enrich the above-mentioned thesauri from the view of concepts from geomatic domain. It can enhance the quality of thesauri and their information value.The paper introduces the fundamental terminology (terms thesaurus, geomatics and concept) and related researches. Then a description of mapping of concepts in particular tools follows. The results of mapping are summarized in the part focused on the most frequent imperfections. The last section (with the exception of the final conclusion) presents the set of recommendations concerning usage of concepts from geomatic domain in agricultural thesauri.

KEYWORDS

Geomatics, thesaurus, semantics, agriculture, concept.

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Social Media for Organic Products Promotion

M. Pechrová V. Lohr Z. Havlíček No 1/2015, March
pp. 41 - 50

ABSTRACT

The aim of the article is to introduce new social media as one of effective marketing tools for organic farmers. The research includes an application of recommendations proposed by Lohr (2013). In order to verify them on successfully implemented concept working with precisely defined target group the data from Facebook of the Faculty of Economics and Management of the Czech University of Life Sciences Prague were chosen. As one of the key indicators of success the reach of the published posts is examined. For its increasing we recommend to publish short posts and amusing content (such as photos). We analyse separately the influence of games and competitions on the loyalty of fans and recommend using them for better communication with users.The results of mutually done analysis of utilization of Facebook to promote organic products showed that having a lot of fans at Facebook does not necessary mean that they are active as well. The distribution of activities corresponds to the so-called “long tail”, which implies, using the theory of social capital exchange according to Emerson (2003) that the potential of social media for farmers’ pages is nowadays still high and still waits for its utilization. Social media can serve to farmers as a marketing tool, but are not fully utilized yet. One reason might be that farmers are not familiar with possibilities or lack of experiences with this new tool.

KEYWORDS

Social media, product marketing , organic products, Facebook, post.

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Towards Farm-Oriented Open Data in Europe: the Scope and Pilots of the European Project "FOODIE"

T. Řezník V. Lukas K. Charvát Š. Horáková K. Charvát junior No 1/2015, March
pp. 51 - 58

ABSTRACT

The different groups of stakeholders involved in the agricultural activities have to manage many different and heterogeneous sources of information that need to be combined in order to make economically and environmentally sound decisions, which include (among others) the definition of policies (subsidies, standardisation and regulation, national strategies for rural development, climate change), development of sustainable agriculture, harvest timing and yield estimation, crop damages detection, etc. The European project called “Farm-Oriented Open Data in Europe” with abbreviation "FOODIE", funded between years 2014 and 2017 addresses the above mentioned issues. This paper describes the scope of the project with emphasis on its pilots. The Czech pilot is then analysed in detail including its three scenarios: Improving efficiency of transport in agriculture, Telematics of farm machinery and Monitoring of in-field variability for site specific crop management.

KEYWORDS

Open data; agriculture; farming on cloud; telematics; strategic planning; farm management information systems.

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Impact of Irrigation Technologies on Rural Households’ Poverty Status: the Case of Fogera District, North-Western Ethiopia

S. Solomon M. Ketema No 1/2015, March
pp. 59 - 67

ABSTRACT

This study tries to analyze whether irrigation technologies have reduced the incidence, depth, and severity of poverty in Fogera district of the Amhara National Regional State of Ethiopia. It also assesses the possible impact brought about by irrigation technologies on households’ per capita consumption expenditure. Foster- Greer-Thorbeck (FGT) index and Propensity Score Matching (PSM) were used for analyzing the data collected from 180 farm households through formal survey techniques. The result indicated that annual per capita consumption expenditure of irrigation technology users is better than that of non-users. Among the different irrigation technology user groups, per capita consumption expenditure of diversion irrigation users is higher followed by that of motor pump users and treadle pump users in that order. Results from FGT index showed that users of different irrigation technologies are in a better position in terms of incidence, depth, and severity of poverty as compared to the non-users group. The PSM result also indicated that irrigation has increased per capita consumption expenditure of user households by 21 percent. It is, therefore, necessary to develop small-scale irrigation technologies and to encourage farm households to use the technologies in order to reduce poverty.

KEYWORDS

Ethiopia, poverty, irrigation technologies, propensity score matching.

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Position of Agriculture in Sub-Saharan GDP Structure and Economic Performance

K. Tomšík L. Smutka J.-P. E. Lubanda H. Rohn No 1/2015, March
pp. 69 - 80

ABSTRACT

Africa is a continent with specific problems differentiating this part of the world from other regions. Low economic performance ranks most of African countries among the poorest. On the other hand, African resources and unexploited opportunities offer a potential for a considerable economic development. Agricultural sector plays a specific role in African economic development because its share in total employment and GDP formation is enormous high. The aim of the paper is to analyze main changes in area of GDP structure formation (agricultural, industrial and services sector) which have occurred in selected African (Sub-Saharan) countries during a twenty-year period. The GDP and GDP per capita in Sub-Saharan countries are compared with the world GDP and GDP per capita. The comparative analysis is performed through logarithmic regression and elasticity analysis. The idea is to analyse the relationship existing between GDP and GDP per cap in relation to the GDP value generated by agriculture, industry and services sectors. The special attention is devoted to the position of agricultural sector in relation to the other sectors. The results indicate main trends in economic development and point to the specifics that while many Sub-Saharan countries have reached the modern type of economy with prevailing services in GDP composition, agriculture still dominates in most countries in terms of employment. From the economic point of view it is worth noting that the transformation process in Sub-Saharan Africa still has not reached the level of the global economic transformation. A significant reduction of agriculture’s share in total GDP is to be expected in the future, it is also possible to expect an increasing role of processing industry and especially of services in the regional GDP.JEL classification: E

KEYWORDS

Sub-Saharan Africa, economic development, agriculture, industry, services, gross domestic product.

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Evaluation of Elements Uptake in Soil and Different Plants

L. Várallyai B. Kovács No 1/2015, March
pp. 81 - 88

ABSTRACT

The applied informatics undergone a significant development at the end of XXth century, which is allowed analyzing of soil pollution by computer controlled system. On account of opening of the pollution we can process the experimental data fast and exactly so we can get such a large number of new information. The environmental pollutant affect of the molybdenum was studied by elements load experiment in Nagyhörcsök Experimental Station. The relation was analyzed between the uptake of molybdenum and other micro-elements and its effect on plant organs (loaf, seed) using by different statistical methods. The aim of our investigations to search for answers on how to arable crops respond to a possible soil contamination. It is also important to determine the extent of mobilized elements from the soil into the plants, which type of effect on them, and how leach the harmful substances into deeper layers (groundwater). A computer programme based on Visual C# was developed to process of the large amount of data. The MySQL was applied to prepare the database, since we want to allow access to the newly developed database via internet technology. The data was filled up to the data tables mainly from the Excel tables. Data in internet-based databases must be properly protected. The program can provide access for two types of users at present: the database administrator who is authorised to do everything in connection with the database, and the user who is authorised to make queries only.

KEYWORDS

Multidisciplinary science, micro-elements, pollution, molybdenum, food chain, data-processing, Hungary.

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Basic Outline of the Problem of the "Ageing Population of Farmers" in the Czech Republic

L. Zagata Š. Hádková M. Mikovcová No 1/2015, March
pp. 89 - 96

ABSTRACT

The problem of the ageing population of farmers is often mentioned in European discussion on the future sustainability of Agriculture and is addressed by several policy measures including those belonging to the new CAP reform. The goal of this paper is to conceptualise and empirically map the problem of ageing in the Czech Republic. Using secondary data analysis, the paper outlines the basic trends related to changes in the age structure of farmers, including the main parameters of the young and older farmers' holdings. Findings of the study suggest that the Czech Republic belongs among the group of countries which is not so much affected by the problem of ageing and that the differences between farms run by young and older farmers are not as large as in other European countries. Evaluation of the problem is partly distorted by the survey methods used by Eurostat.

KEYWORDS

Young farmers, secondary analysis, Eurostat, social sustainability, CAP reform.

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