DETERMINATIONS OF THE AREA NEEDED FOR THE FAMILY FARM TO REACH A VIABLE ECONOMIC SIZE

DUMITRU EDUARD ALEXANDRU¹, STERIE CRISTINA MARIA²

RESEARCH INSTITUTE FOR AGRICULTURAL ECONOMICS AND RURAL DEVELOPMENT^1,2

Cor­re­spond­ing author e‑mail: sterie.cristina @ iceadr.ro

Abstract:

The high num­ber of sub­sis­tence and semi-sub­sis­tence farms is due to their small eco­nom­ic size, main­ly due to the low effi­cien­cy of the crops grown in rela­tion to the small area they cul­ti­vate. Using the Sim­plex method, the areas that fam­i­ly farms would need to farm in order to ensure a nor­mal liv­ing for all fam­i­ly mem­bers were deter­mined. The aim of this study is to iden­ti­fy the eco­nom­ic size of fam­i­ly farms and to cre­ate sce­nar­ios that indi­cate to farm­ers the cat­e­gories of crops they can cul­ti­vate in order to reach the deter­mined eco­nom­ic size, thus ensur­ing a normal/optimal stan­dard of liv­ing for fam­i­ly farm mem­bers.

Key­words: fam­i­ly farm, rur­al devel­op­ment, Roma­nia, sus­tain­able.

JEL clas­si­fi­ca­tion: Q10, Q12, Q14, Q19