Comments on the farming situation in the new Lander.

摘要

This paper first outlines the agricultural production patterns in the new Lander before and after the fall of the Berlin Wall. Around 5000 ha of large socialist crop production farms that were formerly in place were mostly transformed into cooperative successor farms of an average size of 1500 to 2000 ha, which are managed according to the principles of the free market economy. The paper highlights that the two manpower cutbacks, to around half of all workers, respectively, posed the most serious problem in the reorganization process. Based on data from Saxony, a detailed description is given of the three key groups of holdings: individual farm enterprises (100-300 ha), partnerships (200-660 ha) and legal entities (1100-1600 ha), with an emphasis on their efficiency and competitive capacity. The comparison is then extended to cover all other new Lander and the five largest old Lander. "Economies of scale" obtained by the larger holdings, i.e. partnerships and legal entities, could clearly be proven in comparison with the smaller peasant farm holdings. The paper finally presents impressions from farm tours conducted in the summer of 2003, which took place on several large holdings (approx. 2000 ha) as well as on one 7000-ha large agricultural holding. The outlined impressions provide indications of the future, where large agricultural holdings will able to compete with peasant farm holdings.