THE ECONOMIC POTENTIAL OF VEGETABLE PRODUCTION FOR LIMITED RESOURCE FARMERS IN SOUTH CENTRAL ALABAMA

The objective of this study was to evaluate the potential of vegetable production to enhance the declining farm income of limited resource farmers. A survey of 60 limited resource farmers in south central Alabama was undertaken to carry out this evaluation. Results of the survey show that 95% of the farmers had an annual farm income of less than $12,000. Linear programming methodology was applied to perform a whole-farm analysis of a representative farm developed from the data. The overall results show that vegetable production will significantly increase the annual income of these farmers. Some specific conclusions are that: (a) the total return from vegetable production depends on vegetable mixes; (b) vegetable production is labor intensive and sensitive to change in labor cost, implying that an increase in minimum wage might affect the return from vegetable production; and (c) development of labor-saving technology in vegetable production could be considered as a long-term solution to increase the returns of vegetable producers.