IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/ags/aare99/123803.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Sense and Nonsense in Dairy Farm Management Economic Analysis

Author

Listed:
  • Ferris, Alexandria
  • Malcolm, Bill

Abstract

The standard analytical approaches and methods of farm management economics are simple, sensible and powerful. Still, examples of inappropriate nonsensical, approaches to farm management economics questions proliferate. In this paper, the focus is on some inappropriate, nonsensical, approaches to socalled management analysis of dairy farming operations. Included in the analytical eccentricities which abound are such things as trying to evaluate farm performance and changes but not distinguishing between cash (financial feasibility) and profit (economic efficiency), nor considering the time value of earning of capital invested; trying to estimate the cost of pasture; trying to show to lift productivity on one family farm by having a good hard look at the average performance of other farms; and the folly of inventing measures of performance such as Economic Farm Surplus, that are designed and adjusted to facilitate comparisons between farms, and then trying to use such measures for something mostly different, farm management analysis. It is as easy to get it right as it is to get it wrong; so more sense and less non-sense is the call.

Suggested Citation

  • Ferris, Alexandria & Malcolm, Bill, 1999. "Sense and Nonsense in Dairy Farm Management Economic Analysis," 1999 Conference (43th), January 20-22, 1999, Christchurch, New Zealand 123803, Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society.
    • Handle: RePEc:ags:aare99:123803
    DOI: 10.22004/ag.econ.123803
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://ageconsearch.umn.edu/record/123803/files/FerrisMalcolm.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.22004/ag.econ.123803?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. Mauldon, Roger G. & Schapper, Henry P., 1971. "The Sensitivity of Interfarm Comparisons to Inaccuracies of Measurement and Valuation," Review of Marketing and Agricultural Economics, Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society, vol. 39(02), pages 1-13, June.
    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. Chudleigh, Fred & Cox, Howard W. & Chapman, Veronica J., 2002. "Modelling profitable and sustainable farming systems in Central Queensland," 2002 Conference (46th), February 13-15, 2002, Canberra, Australia 125070, Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society.
    2. Kingwell, Ross, 2002. "Issues for Farm Management in the 21st Century: A view from the West," Australasian Agribusiness Review, University of Melbourne, Department of Agriculture and Food Systems, vol. 10, pages 1-28, September.
    3. Malcolm, Bill & Sinnett, Alex, 2007. "Future Productivity and Growth in Dairy Farm Businesses in New Zealand: the Status Quo is Not an Option," Papers 234175, University of Melbourne, Melbourne School of Land and Environment.
    4. Ronan, Glenn & Cleary, Gordon, 2000. "Best Practice Benchmarking in Australian Agriculture: Issues and Challenges," 2000 Conference (44th), January 23-25, 2000, Sydney, Australia 123728, Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society.
    5. Kingwell, Ross S., 2002. "Issues for Farm Management in the 21st Century: A view from the West," 2002 Conference (46th), February 13-15, 2002, Canberra, Australia 173982, Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society.
    6. Derham, Peta & Welsh, Pam, 2006. "Trial recommendations for the amelioration of a degraded chromosol landscape: Duri District, Northern NSW," 2006 Conference (50th), February 8-10, 2006, Sydney, Australia 139520, Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society.
    7. Finlayson, John & Bathgate, Andrew & Nordblom, Tom & Theiveyanathan, Tivi & Farquharson, Bob & Crosbie, Russell & Mitchell, David & Hoque, Ziaul, 2010. "Balancing land use to manage river volume and salinity: Economic and hydrological consequences for the Little River catchment in Central West, New South Wales, Australia," Agricultural Systems, Elsevier, vol. 103(3), pages 161-170, March.
    8. Rauniyar, Ganesh P. & Parker, W.J., 1999. "Longitudinal analysis of dairy farm income and expenditure in New Zealand: A review of 25 years of adjustment," 1999 Conference (43th), January 20-22, 1999, Christchurch, New Zealand 124540, Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society.
    9. Gyles, Oliver, 2001. "Water Use Efficiency at the Farm and Regional Level: The Economics of Response and the Furphy of Excellence," 2001 Conference (45th), January 23-25, 2001, Adelaide, Australia 125647, Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society.
    10. Gyles, Oliver, 2002. "Estimating benefits for dairy production systems from sustainable irrigation practices: Intervention and adjustment in Victorian Land and Water Management Plans," 2002 Conference (46th), February 13-15, 2002, Canberra, Australia 125094, Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society.
    11. Sefton, Clive A. & Cox, Rodney J., 2005. "A business performance index model that measures wealth change in Australian farm businesses," AFBM Journal, Australasian Farm Business Management Network, vol. 2(2), pages 1-13.
    12. Fraser, Iain & Hone, Phillip, 2001. "Farm-level efficiency and productivity measurement using panel data: wool production in south-west Victoria," Australian Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics, Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society, vol. 45(2), pages 1-18.

    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. Herrmann, Roland & Anderson, Jock R. & Godden, David P. & Davenport, Scott V. & Pannell, David J. & Trapnell, Lindsay N., 2001. "Book reviews," Australian Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics, Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society, vol. 45(1), pages 1-14.
    2. Mullen, J. D., 2002. "Farm Management In The 21st Century," 2002 Conference (46th), February 13-15, 2002, Canberra, Australia 174072, Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society.
    3. Malcolm, Bill, 1990. "Fifty Years of Farm Management in Australia: Survey and Review," Review of Marketing and Agricultural Economics, Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society, vol. 58(01), pages 1-32, April.
    4. Mullen, John D. & Vernon, Don & Fishpool, Ken I., 2000. "Agricultural extension policy in Australia: public funding and market failure," Australian Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics, Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society, vol. 44(4), pages 1-17.
    5. Mullen, J.D., 2002. "Farm Management In The 21st Century," Australasian Agribusiness Review, University of Melbourne, Department of Agriculture and Food Systems, vol. 10, pages 1-18, September.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Livestock Production/Industries;

    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:aare99:123803. 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/aaresea.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.