Energy use for rape production in Adana province

The aim of this study was to examine energy input and output for winter rape production in Adana province of Turkey. The data used in this study were collected through a questionnaire by face to face interviews in the 2010 production year. The rape farmers were surveyed in Adana plain of Adana province. Taking actual farm size as the variable, the total 40 farms was randomly selected by using stratified random sampling. In the study, the inputs in the calculation of energy use in the winter rape production include human, labor, machinery, diesel oil, fertilizers, chemicals and seeds were included in the output total. Energy values were calculated by multiplying the amounts of inputs and outputs by their energy equivalents with the use of related conversion factors.The output/input ratio was determined by dividing the output value by the input. The total energy used in various farm inputs was 7662.5 MJ/ha for the winter rape production. The fertilizers energy input of the rape production was the highest in the total energy consumption with the value of 2929.1 MJ/ha followed by fuel energy (2734,2 MJ/ha). The share of machinery energy including fuel, lubricant and manufacturing energy of farm machines inputs was 35.8% for the winter rape production. The results showed that the average yield in seed rape was 2578.6 kg per hectare. The energy output/input ratio was found to be 8.92, if rape seeds are only taken into account. The specific energy was 2.97 MJ/kg, while the energy productivity and net energy yield were found to be of the order of 0.34 kg/MJ and 60669.6 MJ/ha, respectively for the winter rape production.