Towards a General Theory Relating Distance between Farm and Home to Agricultural Production

Abstract

The purpose of this paper is to formulate a normative economic model relating farm output (type, quantity, and value) to the distance between field and farmstead. Concern with such a model is by no means original; but the theory described below is a refinement and extension of traditional concepts, and leads one to severely question certain conclusions commonly accepted on the basis of empirical findings. It is shown (1) that the relation between the field-farmstead distance and output of a given land use is negative and curvilinear (not necessarily "concave upwards," as has been generally accepted), with the exact relationship depending on local production functions and travel facilities; (2) that net income decreases more rapidly than gross income with increasing distance; and (3) that optimum landuse patterns change with the distance. Towards the end of the paper, data from Jamaica are used in a partial testing of the model.It is recognized that this model, like other normative economic theories, assumes perfectly predictable and rather unrealistic human behavior. It is proposed, however, that in the development of a better and more general theory there is no more useful way to begin. Current Theoretical DevelopmentVon Thunen was the first writer to consider the effects of distance between house and farm on farm economy in much detail. In The Isolated State [4] he postulated that the important effect of such distance is to alter the cost of labor, arguing that the time taken to travel between the plot and the farmstead gives rise to a cost which must be subtracted from the gross income in the calculation of economic rent. Consequently, economic rent is negatively related to the distance between the plot and the farmstead.

Land consolidation in mountain areas. Case study from southern Poland

“…Unfavorable shapes and sizes of plots signifi cantly lower possible income (Gonzalez et al, 2007), what is also true for homesteads characterized by long distances between its elements (Found, 1970). Gradual deterioration of rural areas spatial structure is a result of multigenerational changes.…”