Economische aspecten van het bedrijfsgrootte-vraagstuk als onderdeel van het structuurprobleem in de landbouw

It was studied whether an increase in farm size might improve the farm income and if so, to what extent and on which conditions. The background for this theme is given in the first section, emphasizing the forces which determine the trend of farm income. Inadequacy of farm size is thought to be the core of the parity problem in agriculture.

Section two deals theoretically with definitions and measures of farm size. Two measures are proposed, 'effective' size (= net value added per farm in one year) and 'normative' size (costs of the factor input involved). In section three the conventional theory of production economics is used to elaborate a scheme for the analysis of empirical data.

In the fourth section the author studies records of dairy farms over the period 1952-1958. The question of how size of dairy farms depends upon fixed factors such as area, labour and equipment could be reasonably clarified. The optimum size of dairy farms at that time was clearly outside the range of observations. Similar relationships are deduced in section five from studies on farm size made by other students or from earlier studies by the author.

The study concludes with an evaluation of the economic importance of several alternative ways of increasing farm size, both for the farmer and society.