Articles
TRADE OF THE HUNGARIAN FARMS
Article number
536_27
Pages
239 – 244
Language
Abstract
The Hungarian agricultural land redistribution in the early nineties and the privatisation process which followed in other sectors hit both agricultural production and trade.
Earlier, state and co-operative companies bought up the produce of big farms.
The bulk of the marketed production of small farms and household plots was sold to production and trade co-operatives.
Now the many new family farms find it difficult to sell their products.
Not only because the wholesale trade, buying agricultural produce, was not fully reorganised but because consumer demand and exports and the production of processing industries declined, as well.
With the aim of studying the production, trade and economic behaviour of both family farms and big farms of production co-operatives and companies, which still occupy 46 per cent of the agricultural area, our research group in the Department of Economic Geography at University of Szeged, carried out a representative survey with interviews and questionnaires.
A total of 309 farms were looked at, among them 248 family farms and 61 agricultural co-operatives and companies, in 11 Hungarian counties.
Farms were classified and examined according to different land sizes.
The survey showed that the land area of family farms is very concentrated.
Despite the scattered and, on average, small size of land ownership there has been a significant concentration in land use since the redistribution of land of the early nineties.
According to our survey, 23 per cent of family farms, cultivating more than 50 ha., use 72 per cent of the agricultural land and 12 per cent of them, cultivating more than 100 ha., use 57 per cent.
The bigger the farms the more efficient, profitable and capable of development they are.
The production of the farms is fairly extensive.
About 80 per cent of their land is arable land with grain on a major part of it.
The extensiveness grows with the size.
Smaller farms keep more animals per unit area than larger ones and grow more fruit, vegetables and plants under plastic.
Grain, potatoes, sunflower seed and animals are the major products sold by the farms.
Small farms sell only 40 per cent of their products on average, except those producing ornamental plants and vegetables under plastic or under glass and pig and poultry rearers which produce exclusively for the market.
However, farms over 50 ha. sell 78 per cent of their products.
The trade is not sufficiently organised.
Less than half the family farmers contract outside buyers, however about 70–75 percent of the common farms do so.
Direct market selling amounts to about half of total selling of ornamental plants, fruit and vegetables and the rest is sold to trade and processing industries.
About 40 percent of large farms, included in the survey, carry out some activity in the field of supplying inputs for, integrating production and trade of family farms.
The most viable market-oriented farms seem to be those which are over 50 or 100 ha. and among the small farms those which are intensive gardeners or animal producers.
The others are mainly subsistence farms of either part-time farmers or pensioners and unemployed people.
Earlier, state and co-operative companies bought up the produce of big farms.
The bulk of the marketed production of small farms and household plots was sold to production and trade co-operatives.
Now the many new family farms find it difficult to sell their products.
Not only because the wholesale trade, buying agricultural produce, was not fully reorganised but because consumer demand and exports and the production of processing industries declined, as well.
With the aim of studying the production, trade and economic behaviour of both family farms and big farms of production co-operatives and companies, which still occupy 46 per cent of the agricultural area, our research group in the Department of Economic Geography at University of Szeged, carried out a representative survey with interviews and questionnaires.
A total of 309 farms were looked at, among them 248 family farms and 61 agricultural co-operatives and companies, in 11 Hungarian counties.
Farms were classified and examined according to different land sizes.
The survey showed that the land area of family farms is very concentrated.
Despite the scattered and, on average, small size of land ownership there has been a significant concentration in land use since the redistribution of land of the early nineties.
According to our survey, 23 per cent of family farms, cultivating more than 50 ha., use 72 per cent of the agricultural land and 12 per cent of them, cultivating more than 100 ha., use 57 per cent.
The bigger the farms the more efficient, profitable and capable of development they are.
The production of the farms is fairly extensive.
About 80 per cent of their land is arable land with grain on a major part of it.
The extensiveness grows with the size.
Smaller farms keep more animals per unit area than larger ones and grow more fruit, vegetables and plants under plastic.
Grain, potatoes, sunflower seed and animals are the major products sold by the farms.
Small farms sell only 40 per cent of their products on average, except those producing ornamental plants and vegetables under plastic or under glass and pig and poultry rearers which produce exclusively for the market.
However, farms over 50 ha. sell 78 per cent of their products.
The trade is not sufficiently organised.
Less than half the family farmers contract outside buyers, however about 70–75 percent of the common farms do so.
Direct market selling amounts to about half of total selling of ornamental plants, fruit and vegetables and the rest is sold to trade and processing industries.
About 40 percent of large farms, included in the survey, carry out some activity in the field of supplying inputs for, integrating production and trade of family farms.
The most viable market-oriented farms seem to be those which are over 50 or 100 ha. and among the small farms those which are intensive gardeners or animal producers.
The others are mainly subsistence farms of either part-time farmers or pensioners and unemployed people.
Authors
A. Burger, C. Kovács
Keywords
Hungary, Farm, Land concentration, Fruit, Vegetable, Ornamentals, Trade
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