Labor constraints on choosing profitable products for part-time farmers in Swiss agriculture

Laure Latruffe and Stefan Mann ()

No 211016, Working Papers from Institut National de la recherche Agronomique (INRA), Departement Sciences Sociales, Agriculture et Alimentation, Espace et Environnement (SAE2)

Abstract: Based on a conceptual framework, we develop the hypothesis that part-time farmers invest in less profitable products than full-time farms, due to the necessary minimum labour requirements which entering and running profitable production processes require. Descriptive statistics for Swiss farms show some indications for this hypothesis, like a much lower total revenue and lower agricultural income of part-time farms, despite a comparable value of the farm’s assets. A regression analysis for the period 1996-2005 confirms that Swiss part-time farms tend to focus on products with low labour profitability. This may explain why part-time farming in Switzerland is less developed than in most other European countries, and raises the question whether part-time farming offers a solution for structural change process in small-structured agricultural systems affected by imperfections on factor markets.

Keywords: Agricultural; Finance (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 21
Date: 2008
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https://ageconsearch.umn.edu/record/211016/files/WP%20SMART-LERECO%2008-03.pdf (application/pdf)

Related works:
Journal Article: Labour constraints on choosing profitable products for part-time farmers in Swiss agriculture (2015)
Working Paper: Labor constraints on choosing profitable products for part-time farmers in Swiss agriculture (2008)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:ags:inrasl:211016

DOI: 10.22004/ag.econ.211016

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