Agriculture Reference
In-Depth Information
After physical crop yields were established for each of the 25 land
units in each county, 400 commodity price maps were overlaid. These
maps included both actual market prices and production subsidies. German
agriculture is supported by a variety of commodity support programs that
subsidize producers for production of specific commodities on the basis of
the commodity's competitiveness with other regions. The subsidy program
is a key determinant of what commodities are produced across Germany
because of their influence on net returns. Therefore, subsidy data maps
were overlaid on a map with the initial 25 land units to create land classes
that incorporated the influence of subsidies. The result was an expansion of
the initial 25 land units to 126 units.
Vector oriented GIS was then used in conjunction with Linear
Programming Models (LPMs) to estimate yield for hemp production.
LPMs for each production area's primary commodities were also estimated
so that hemp's competitiveness could be estimated. The analysis required
that input/price data for hemp and alternative crops conform with the 126
land units to estimate both physical yield and production value of hemp as
well as rival commodities in each production area. These production
models provide the basis for examining hemp's competitiveness with other
locally produced crops at various hemp yield and price levels. This analysis
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