IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/ags/afbmau/121470.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

A whole-farm investment analysis of some precision agriculture technologies

Author

Listed:
  • Knight, Brad
  • Malcolm, Bill

Abstract

This study used information about a farm in the Victorian Mallee during the period 1998 – 2005 to analyse the profitability of investing in Precision Agriculture and Site-Specific Crop Management technology and farming systems. Two equipment guidance systems were evaluated. Both guidance systems earned more than 8 percent real return p.a. on the extra capital invested. A Real-Time Kinetic (RTK) guidance system with a precision of 2 cm and a capital cost of $50,000 was less profitable than a Sub-Metre guidance system with 20 cm accuracy and costing $20,000. Producers investing in RTK guidance technology would be well-paid to also adopt supporting management practices that enhance crop gross margins or provide other benefits. The capital cost of GPS technology has to be spread over sufficient hectares. Investment in Zone Management technologies to fine-tune applications of nitrogen within paddocks did not meet the required return on capital of 8 percent p.a. With the spatial variability on this farm, 1670 hectares of crop were required for the investment to break-even with alternative uses of the capital. Alternatively, with 900 hectares cropped on this case study farm, spatial variation of at least 2.5 t/ha in yield across paddocks was required to justify the investment in the Zone Management technology.

Suggested Citation

  • Knight, Brad & Malcolm, Bill, 2009. "A whole-farm investment analysis of some precision agriculture technologies," AFBM Journal, Australasian Farm Business Management Network, vol. 6(1), pages 1-14, October.
    • Handle: RePEc:ags:afbmau:121470
    DOI: 10.22004/ag.econ.121470
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://ageconsearch.umn.edu/record/121470/files/Knight%20and%20Malcolm%2004.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.22004/ag.econ.121470?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. David J. Pannell, 2006. "Flat Earth Economics: The Far-reaching Consequences of Flat Payoff Functions in Economic Decision Making," Review of Agricultural Economics, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 28(4), pages 553-566.
    2. Michael D. Weiss, 1996. "Precision Farming and Spatial Economic Analysis: Research Challenges and Opportunities," American Journal of Agricultural Economics, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 78(5), pages 1275-1280.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Georgios I. Papakonstantinou & Nikolaos Voulgarakis & Georgia Terzidou & Lampros Fotos & Elisavet Giamouri & Vasileios G. Papatsiros, 2024. "Precision Livestock Farming Technology: Applications and Challenges of Animal Welfare and Climate Change," Agriculture, MDPI, vol. 14(4), pages 1-17, April.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Asci, Serhat & Borisova, Tatiana & VanSickle, John J., 2015. "Role of economics in developing fertilizer best management practices," Agricultural Water Management, Elsevier, vol. 152(C), pages 251-261.
    2. Sapino, Francesco & Pérez-Blanco, C. Dionisio & Gutiérrez-Martín, Carlos & García-Prats, Alberto & Pulido-Velazquez, Manuel, 2022. "Influence of crop-water production functions on the expected performance of water pricing policies in irrigated agriculture," Agricultural Water Management, Elsevier, vol. 259(C).
    3. Pede, Valerien O. & McKinley, Justin & Singbo, Alphonse & Kajisa, Kei, 2015. "Spatial Dependency of Technical Efficiency in Rice Farming: The Case of Bohol, Philippines," 2015 AAEA & WAEA Joint Annual Meeting, July 26-28, San Francisco, California 205456, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association.
    4. Mandrini, German & Pittelkow, Cameron M. & Archontoulis, Sotirios V. & Mieno, Taro & Martin, Nicolas F., 2021. "Understanding differences between static and dynamic nitrogen fertilizer tools using simulation modeling," Agricultural Systems, Elsevier, vol. 194(C).
    5. Kerry J. Stott & Brendan Christy & Malcolm McCaskill & Kurt K. Benke & Penny Riffkin & Garry J. O'Leary & Robert Norton, 2020. "Integrating crop modelling and production economics to investigate multiple nutrient deficiencies and yield gaps," Australian Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics, Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society, vol. 64(3), pages 655-676, July.
    6. Graeme J. Doole & David J. Pannell & Clinton K. Revell, 2009. "Economic contribution of French serradella (Ornithopus sativus Brot.) pasture to integrated weed management in Western Australian mixed-farming systems: an application of compressed annealing ," Australian Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics, Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society, vol. 53(2), pages 193-212, April.
    7. Hutchings, Timothy R., 2009. "A financial analysis of the effect of the mix of crop and sheep enterprises on the risk profile of dryland farms in south-eastern Australia – Part 1," AFBM Journal, Australasian Farm Business Management Network, vol. 6(1), pages 1-16, October.
    8. Doole, Graeme J. & Romera, Alvaro J., 2014. "Implications of a nitrogen leaching efficiency metric for pasture-based dairy farms," Agricultural Water Management, Elsevier, vol. 142(C), pages 10-18.
    9. Leen, Frederik & Van den Broeke, Alice & Aluwé, Marijke & Ludwig, Lauwers & Sam, Millet & Jef, Van Meensel, 2017. "Simulation Modelling To Provide Insights Into The Optimization Of Delivery Weights Of Finisher Pigs," 2017 International Congress, August 28-September 1, 2017, Parma, Italy 261272, European Association of Agricultural Economists.
    10. David J. Pannell & Getu Hailu & Alfons Weersink & Amanda Burt, 2008. "More reasons why farmers have so little interest in futures markets," Agricultural Economics, International Association of Agricultural Economists, vol. 39(1), pages 41-50, July.
    11. Thompson, Nathanael M. & DeVuyst, Eric A. & Brorsen, B. Wade & Lusk, Jayson L., 2014. "Value of Genetic Information for Beef Cattle at the Feedlot Stage," 2014 Annual Meeting, February 1-4, 2014, Dallas, Texas 162431, Southern Agricultural Economics Association.
    12. Kifayat Ullah & M. Tariq Majeed & Ghulam Mustafa, 2020. "Exploring Spatial Patterns and Determinants of Poverty: New Evidence from Pakistan," The Pakistan Development Review, Pakistan Institute of Development Economics, vol. 59(3), pages 439-459.
    13. Sanaz Shoghi Kalkhoran & David Pannell & Maksym Polyakov & Ben White & Morteza Chalak Haghighi & Amin William Mugera & Imma Farre, 2021. "A dynamic model of optimal lime application for wheat production in Australia," Australian Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics, Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society, vol. 65(2), pages 472-490, April.
    14. Lien, Gudbrand & Hardaker, J. Brian & Asseldonk, Marcel A.P.M. van & Richardson, James W., 2009. "Risk programming and sparse data: how to get more reliable results," Agricultural Systems, Elsevier, vol. 101(1-2), pages 42-48, June.
    15. Chai, Yuan & Pannell, David J. & Pardey, Philip G., 2022. "Reducing Water Pollution from Nitrogen Fertilizer: Revisiting Insights from Production Economics," Staff Papers 320519, University of Minnesota, Department of Applied Economics.
    16. Alford, Andrew R. & Cafe, Linda M. & Greenwood, Paul L. & Griffith, Garry R., 2007. "The Economic Effects of Early-Life Nutritional Constraints in Crossbred Cattle Bred on the NSW North Coast," Research Reports 37667, New South Wales Department of Primary Industries Research Economists.
    17. Pannell, David J., 2013. "Value for Money in Environmental Policy and Environmental Economics," Working Papers 146501, University of Western Australia, School of Agricultural and Resource Economics.
    18. Leen, Frederik & Van den Broeke, Alice & Aluwé, Marijke & Lauwers, Ludwig & Millet, Sam & Van Meensel, Jef, 2018. "Stakeholder-driven modelling the impact of animal profile and market conditions on optimal delivery weight in growing-finishing pig production," Agricultural Systems, Elsevier, vol. 162(C), pages 34-45.
    19. Anderson Jock R. & Birner Regina & Nagarajan Latha & Naseem Anwar & Pray Carl E., 2021. "Private Agricultural R&D: Do the Poor Benefit?," Journal of Agricultural & Food Industrial Organization, De Gruyter, vol. 19(1), pages 3-14, May.
    20. El-Osta, Hisham S. & Mishra, Ashok K., 2001. "Adoption And Economic Impact Of Site-Specific Technologies In U.S. Agriculture," 2001 Annual meeting, August 5-8, Chicago, IL 20593, American Agricultural Economics Association (New Name 2008: Agricultural and Applied Economics Association).

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Farm Management;

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:ags:afbmau:121470. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: AgEcon Search (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/afbmnea.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.