The impact of farm size on sustainability of beef cattle farms: A case study of the Samsun province, Turkey

Figures & data

Figure 1. Study area in the Province of Samsun, Turkey.

Figure 2. Procedure of indicator development.

Table 1. Descriptions of selected sustainability indicators.

Indicators	Measure	Mean or %	Factor loadings	Explained variance (%)	References
Economic sustainability indicators*
Income	₺	106,155.7	–	–	Sajadian et al. (2017)
Net profit	₺	69,784.37	–	–	SAFA (2013)
Relative profit	%	1.23	–	–	FAO (2015)
Yield	Kg/head	273.58	–	–	FAO (2015)
Cost	₺/kg	21.89	–	–	SAFA (2013)
Economic rentability	%	8.67	–	–	Chand et al. (2015)
Financial rentability	%	9.62	–	–	Chand et al. (2015)
Debt-asset ratio	%	0.13	–	–	FAO (2015)
Economic efficiency	%	0.25	–	–	Gunduz et al. (2011)
Social sustainability indicators**				49.30
Indicators of the future and investment				15.41
Do you think to invest in your farm in the future?	0.No 1.Yes	72.26	0.770		FAO (2015)
Do you want to increase the number of animals in your farm?	0.No 1.Yes	68.97	0.677		FAO (2015)
Have you invested in your business in the last 2 years?	0.No 1.Yes	54.55	0.613		FAO (2015)
Do your children want you to be a farmer?	0.No 1.Yes	67.88	0.564		FAO (2015)
Education, agricultural extension, and collaboration indicators				13.63
How many years of formal education did you take?	Year	7.25	0.741		Sajadian et al. (2017)
Have you taken agricultural extension and education training?	0.No 1.Yes	15.13	0.632		Latruffe et al. (2016)
Do you cooperate with local organizations or institutions?	0.No 1.Yes	17.65	0.593		SAFA (2013)
Are there local rural development services in your village or area?	0.No 1.Yes	7.10	0.460		FAO (2015)
Institutional and social behaviour indicators				11.50
Are educational institutions in the village or district sufficient?	0.No 1.Yes	96.48	0.796		Sulewski and Kłoczko-Gajewska (2018)
Do you have any problems with the people in your village?	0.No 1.Yes	87.66	0.636		FAO (2015)
Can you spend money for social activities?	0.No 1.Yes	75.16	0.375		FAO (2015)
Indicators on migration and improvements activities				8.76
How many people have migrated from your farm in the last 10 years?	Person	0.63	–0.662		FAO (2015)
Do you have activities to improve the quality and yield of beef?	0.No 1.Yes	61.84	0.645		FAO (2015)
Environmental sustainability indicators**				54.19
Indicators on soil and environmental hygiene				11.59
Do you have soil analysis?	0.No 1.Yes	41.20	0.847		Sulewski and Kłoczko-Gajewska (2018)
Do you apply fertilizers based on soil analysis?	0.No 1.Yes	24.20	0.694		SAFA (2013)
Do you know the soil organic matter content?	0.No 1.Yes	60.70	0.818		IDEA (2006)
Do you know the pH of the land?	0.No 1.Yes	11.30	0.617		Terano et al. (2015)
How far is the manure from your house?	Metric	67.60	0.382		FAO (2015)
Indicators on environmental protection awareness				10.39
Do you take care to protect nature?	0.No 1.Yes	96.80	0.854		Sulewski and Kłoczko-Gajewska (2018)
Do you take care to protect biodiversity?	0.No 1.Yes	93.40	0.809		Sulewski and Kłoczko-Gajewska (2018)
Do you take care to protect places such as streams and lakes?	0.No 1.Yes	94.80	0.638		Sulewski and Kłoczko-Gajewska (2018)
Do you take precautions for animal disease?	0.No 1.Yes	97.40	0.595		Sulewski and Kłoczko-Gajewska (2018)
Indicators on the usage of pesticides and water				10.03
Do you follow the instructions for the use of pesticides?	0.No 1.Yes	95.20	0.809		FAO (2015)
Do you follow meteorological conditions for the use of pesticides?	0.No 1.Yes	99.30	0.642		FAO (2015)
Do you clean the equipment after the use of pesticides?	0.No 1.Yes	96.60	0.607		FAO (2015)
Do you take precautions (mask, glove, etc.) for use of pesticides?	0.No 1.Yes	83.60	0.574		FAO (2015)
Do you take precautions to protect and conserve water?	0.No 1.Yes	83.90	0.395		SAFA (2013)
Indicators on awareness of input usage				8.61
Do you use environmentally friendly pesticides?	0.No 1.Yes	28.70	0.816		SAFA (2013)
Do you do organic farming?	0.No 1.Yes	11.30	0.595		Sajadian et al. (2017)
Have you been trained for pesticide use?	0.No 1.Yes	26.40	0.518		FAO (2015)
Have you been trained for fertilizer use?	0.No 1.Yes	8.60	0.465		FAO (2015)
Do you know the active substances of the drugs you use?	0.No 1.Yes	32.00	0.355		SAFA (2013)
Indicators for erosion				6.97
Have you been trained to prevent erosion?	0.No 1.Yes	3.20	0.800		FAO (2015)
Do you take precautions against soil erosion on your land?	0.No 1.Yes	9.04	0.755		SAFA (2013)
Indicators for manure management				6.60
Is there a cesspool in your farm?	0.No 1.Yes	37.00	0.824		Sulewski and Kłoczko-Gajewska (2018)
How do you keep animal manure?	0.Out 1.Semi 2.Full	57.10	0.804		Sulewski and Kłoczko-Gajewska (2018)

*Expert decision.

**Factor Analysis results.

Table 2. General characteristics of the beef cattle farms.

Characteristics	Small farms (69)		Medium farms (68)		Large farms (18)		All farms (155)
	Mean	S.D.	Mean	S.D.	Mean	S.D.	Mean	S.D.
Age (year)	47.31	11.08	46.29	10.31	42.94	11.21	46.35	10.79
Experience (year)**	17.35^a	6.32	20.88^b	9.09	19.67^b	11.25	19.17	8.39
Household size (person)	5.11	2.76	5.49	2.70	6.00	2.89	5.38	2.75
Education (%)
Elementary school	59.10	–	63.60	–	33.30	–	58.00	–
Secondary school	18.20	–	15.20	–	16.70	–	16.70	–
High school	12.10	–	15.20	–	27.80	–	15.30	–
Vocational school	7.60	–	1.50	–	16.70	–	6.00	–
University	3.00	–	4.50	–	5.60	–	4.00	–
Social security (%)	95.70	–	97.10	–	100.0	–	96.80	–
Main profession as farmer (%)	65.20	–	66.10	–	77.80	–	67.10	–
Number of cattle***	8.62^a	5.58	26.40^b	11.62	113.14^c	69.94	28.56	40.35

Notes: *, **, *** significance at the 10%, 5% and 1% level, respectively. a, b and c show statistically significant differences among the farm groups.

Figure 3. Economic sustainability index results with a radar chart (1 is more sustainable, 0 is less sustainable).

Table 3. Economic sustainability index (ESI) results.

Indicators	Small farms (69)		Medium farms (68)		Large farms (18)		All farms (155)
	Mean	S.D.	Mean	S.D.	Mean	S.D.	Mean	S.D.
ESI	0.31	0.07	0.40	0.07	0.54	0.10	0.37	0.10
Income***	0.03^a	0.03	0.09^b	0.06	0.39^c	0.25	0.10	0.07
Net profit***	0.02^a	0.01	0.09^b	0.04	0.48^c	0.25	0.10	0.08
Relative profit***	0.31^a	0.14	0.45^b	0.16	0.50^c	0.08	0.40	0.12
Yield***	0.50^a	0.15	0.56^a	0.11	0.60^c	0.08	0.54	0.10
Cost***	0.40^a	0.15	0.51^b	0.13	0.53^c	0.08	0.46	0.11
Economic rentability***	0.23^a	0.11	0.46^b	0.16	0.65^c	0.15	0.38	0.15
Financial rentability***	0.16^a	0.09	0.32^b	0.14	0.45^c	0.15	0.26	0.12
Debt/asset ratio	0.87	0.17	0.85	0.16	0.89	0.14	0.86	0.09
Economic efficiency**	0.23^a	0.22	0.26^a	0.19	0.39^b	0.30	0.26	0.07

Notes: **, *** significance at the 5% and 1% level. a, b and c show statistically significant differences among the farm groups.

Figure 4. Social sustainability index results with a radar chart.

Table 4. Social sustainability index (SSI) results.

Indicators	Small farms (69)		Medium farms (68)		Large farms (18)		All farms (155)
	Mean	S.D.	Mean	S.D.	Mean	S.D.	Mean	S.D.
SSI***	0.52^a	0.12	0.61^b	0.10	0.71^c	0.13	0.58	16.30
Indicators of the future and investment***	0.54^a	0.22	0.73^b	0.20	0.85^c	0.20	0.66	32.52
Education, agricultural extension and collaboration**	0.20^a	0.10	0.18^a	0.17	0.34^b	0.23	0.21	19.81
Institutional and social behaviour**	0.82^a	0.16	0.89^b	0.20	0.94^c	0.13	0.86	22.58
Indicators on migration and improvements activities**	0.69^a	0.17	0.78^b	0.24	0.85^c	0.21	0.75	25.87

Notes: *, **, *** significance at the 10%, 5% and 1% level, respectively. a, b and c show statistically significant differences among the farm groups.

Figure 5. Environmental sustainability index results with a radar chart.

Table 5. Environmental sustainability index (EnSI) results.

Indicators	Small farms (69)		Medium farms (68)		Large farms (18)		All farms (155)
	Mean	Std. Dev.	Mean	Std. Dev.	Mean	Std.Dev.	Mean	Std. Dev.
EnSI	0.48	0.13	0.52	0.10	0.57	0.12	0.51	12.98
Soil and environmental hygiene	0.21	0.17	0.27	0.21	0.26	0.24	0.24	29.23
Environmental protection awareness	0.93	0.10	0.98	0.10	0.96	0.10	0.95	15.11
The usage of pesticides and water***	0.85^a	0.20	0.96^a	0.09	0.98^b	0.07	0.92	19.04
Awareness of input usage	0.21	0.22	0.20	0.14	0.31	0.25	0.21	24.13
Erosion	0.08	0.20	0.05	0.18	0.03	0.12	0.06	20.25
Manure management***	0.24^a	0.25	0.34^a	0.27	0.53^b	0.33	0.32	35.50

Notes: *** significance at the 1% level. a, b and c show statistically significant differences among the farm groups.

Figure 6. Composite sustainability results with a radar chart.

Table 6. Composite sustainability index (CSI) results.

	Small farms (69)		Medium farms (68)		Large farms (18)		All farms (155)
	Mean	Std. Dev.	Mean	Std. Dev.	Mean	Std. Dev.	Mean	Std. Dev.
CSI***	0.43^a	0.08	0.51^b	0.07	0.61^c	0.08	0.49	0.10
ESI***	0.31^a	0.07	0.40^b	0.07	0.54^c	0.10	0.37	0.10
SSI***	0.52^a	0.12	0.61^a	0.10	0.71^b	0.13	0.58	0.11
EnSI**	0.48^a	0.13	0.52^a	0.10	0.57^b	0.12	0.51	0.11

Notes: **, ***significance at the 5% and 1% level. a, b and c show statistically significant differences among the farm groups.

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