Studies on Economical Meaning of Mechanization of Agriculture. : VII. Economical Analysis of the Utilization of Small Tractors using Data-Processing Machnies.

The seminer on Analysis of Farm Management using Data-Processing Machines was held in Tokyo with the cooperation of the Council on Economic and Cultural Affairs and the National Institute of Agricultural Sciences in 1960. We participated to this seminar and since then we are using the IBM machines of the Okayama Prefectural Office for our works. The opportunity for using this machines were provided from the Prefectural Office because our object in surveying had the aim to give practical advices to individual farms. (Also this survey have been done with the aide of the Agricultural Improvement Section and Statistcs Section of Okayama Prefectural Office.) In this studies, we selected two villages, i. e. Kojo and Fujita Villages both locating in the new reclaimed land of Kojima Bay near Okayama city. These villages are located in one of the most progressive area of agricultural mechanization not only in Okayama Prefecture but also in Japan. There are 2,131 farms in these villages raising mainly rice, wheat and rush. We selected 708 farms by random sampling, however, the number of farms utilizing small tractors was only 490 as some of them had no small tractors. The obtained basic data of utilization of small tractors were rearranged for our purposes, and were classified into four types. According to this classification, there are four types of small tractors; first is the rotary type small tractor, second is the crank type, third is the tiller type and fourth is the screw type. The following problems were dealt based upon these data: (1) Consideration of the cost per 0.1 ha. and the cost per unit products by each type of small tractor used, (2) On the replacement of machines on different sizes used on different areas. But in this report only a part of the results of using Data-Processing Machines are dealt. In this studies, we made analysis of the problems through actual survey based upon the useful suggestions from Dr. A.B. Lewis. Associate in Agricultural Economics, the Council on Economic and Cultural Affairs, Inc.; Dr. C.A. Bratton, Professor of Farm Management, Cornell University; Dr. J.W. Mellor, Professor of Agricultural Economics, Cornell University.; and the members of the National Institute of Agricultural Sciences