Winter 1991 // Volume 29 // Number 4 // Research in Brief // 4RIB3
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Evaluation of County Agent Use of Enterprise Budgets
Abstract
How much county agents are using enterprise budget information to help farmers save money in crop planning is the focus of this study. An enterprise budget lists actual or projected costs and returns related to a specific agricultural venture.
How much county agents are using enterprise budget information to help farmers save money in crop planning is the focus of this study. An enterprise budget lists actual or projected costs and returns related to a specific agricultural venture. For example, a farmer wanting to know how much it would cost to raise alfalfa could accurately use an enterprise budget to determine those costs. These budgets are helpful tools in marketing and breakeven analyses.
No previous study has examined the use of budget information this way. It was done by analyzing data from a national survey of Extension farm management specialists and county agents by regression techniques.
County Agent Surveys
Data for this study were obtained by two telephone surveys during August and September 1989. The first survey contacted Extension specialists primarily responsible for constructing budgets in each of the 50 states.
Information gathered from the specialists' survey included the data sources and methods used to construct enterprise budgets in each state, the number of budgets constructed, frequency of updating, geographic units used to construct budgets, and the forms in which the state Cooperative Extension Service distributes budgets.
The second survey was a random sample of 100 agricultural county agents. This survey was stratified by the number of agricultural producers in a particular geographical region.
Conclusions
We found the Cooperative Extension Service is primarily or partially responsible for providing funding for enterprise budget development in most states. Also, Extension specialists construct the enterprise budgets in almost every responding state.
About 75% of the specialists surveyed had a 50% or higher time commitment to Extension. Also, nearly half of the surveyed specialists had worked in Extension 10 years or less. This indicates that young Extension specialists are usually the ones assigned to construct enterprise budgets.
The survey also revealed that more than 80% of the states update their enterprise budgets at least every two years and most specialists rely on local sources for price information. It also showed that the average number of agricultural producers in each county survey was 590. The average farm had sales of $102,250.