The Economic analysis of mechanical cotton picking in Çukurova region

ABSTRACT MSc THESIS THE ECONOMIC ANALYSIS OF MECHANICAL COTTON PICKING IN ÇUKUROVA REGION Baran YAŞAR DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURAL ECONOMICS INSTITUTE OF NATURAL AND APPLIED SCIENCES UNIVERSITY OF ÇUKUROVA Supervisor: Assoc. Prof. M. Necat ÖREN Year:2003, Pages: 76 Jury : Assoc. Prof. M. Necat ÖREN : Assoc. Prof. Haydar ŞENGÜL : Assist. Prof. Dr. Sait M. SAY In this study, mechanical cotton picking which is alternative for hand picking in cotton farming has been analized in respects of economic, social and partly technical sides, and investigated the harvesting possibilities of cotton by machine in Turkey's conditions. For this purpose, Çukurova Region has been selected as survey area by the reason of having labour problems and decreasing cotton production in the region, gradually. However, in the region mechanical harvesting is not common enough to make analyse possible. So, data and required documents were obtained from both Ceylanpinar State Farm and Eagen region. This study shows that required conditions have been emerged to make mechanical cotton picking possible. With current state, there is a considerable decrease in both picking expenses, ranging from 33.64 % to 44.18 %, and total production expenses accounting for 4.85-6.68 %. Using new generation mechanical cotton picking machine augmenting with increase in share of new seed varities would make even further decrease possible in picking and production expenses. The social aspect problem of mechanical cotton picking, however, shouldn't be ignored and alternative income sources should be created for people who lost their job due to mechanical cotton picking. Keywords: Cotton harvesting machinery, mechanical cotton picking, cost of cotton picking, cost of cotton production, Çukurova region. n