Annual use to economically justify the ownership of some high price agricultural machines

Abstract

In order to establish the annual use (hr) that justifies the ownership of a tractor, no till seeder and grain harvester the concept of minimum intensity of economical use was utilized with data from a VI region fruit production farm and a VIII region Andean foothills wheat production system.
The results showed that for tractors about 440 hr/year and 470 hr/year are needed in the fruit and wheat production scenario, respectively. For the no till drill and grain harvester the minimum reaches 167 and 316 hr/year, respectively; no important differences were found between a high-priced tractor made in the West and a lower price tractor made in Eastern Europe.
The figures obtained are similar to the average annual use of tractors in the fruit production farm; this means there are many fruit producers that do not economically justify the ownership of a tractor. In the wheat scenario the average annual use is higher than the minimum established in this study.