Economic Aspects of Precision Agriculture Systems

Abstract

The paper deals with an economic assessment of impacts of precision agriculture (PA) on crop production economy. Based on a questionnaire survey and a FADN agricultural product expense-to-revenue ratio survey, it analyses a set of agricultural businesses the structure of which essentially copies the composition of business forms in the Czech Republic's agricultural sector. The economic assessment applies economic analysis methods based on cost calculations and a calculation formula that considers the commodity and species production structure. Based on an analysis of a number of scientific studies, it determines specific cost savings and makes a quantification of the effect of precision agriculture techniques on costs. In all the production areas, the greatest effect caused by application of precision agriculture techniques was quantified for winter wheat. Conversely, the lowest financial effects are shown in the analysed production areas for spring wheat. We also identified differences in the cost savings between spring and winter barley; the greater savings occur for winter barley. Financial effects in the form of reduced production costs were also found for other analysed crops cultivated by the businesses studied. The financial savings for the pea plant are almost comparable to those for winter barley. The greatest financial savings were achieved for sugar beet.

Precision Agriculture Technologies for Crop and Livestock Production in the Czech Republic

“…It creates significant advantages over traditional farming along with a reduction in human labour and resource efficiency, as outlined in the results of this paper. Thus, the conventional approach is associated with increased costs, production's economic intensity and environmental pollution risk [10]. The main ecological problem is the excessive application of agrochemicals and poorer traceability of records of soil operations.…”

Agricultural revenue in Latvia, Lithuania, and Poland: An application of the LMDI decomposition

“…The changes in agricultural prices impact farmers' decisions on production scale and scope. The major sources of price changes are shifts in supply and demand that may occur due to natural factors (e.g., weather conditions), policy measures (e.g., support payments and taxes) or economic situation (e.g., shifts in the demand due to introduction of new technologies for bioenergy) (Pánková et al, 2020;Oláh et al, 2020). Climate change has been noticed as a factor of increased volatility in agricultural output (and, hence, prices), but agricultural support policies can be adapted to combat it (Searchinger et al, 2020).…”