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Estimating Draft Horse Power, Human Labor Requirements and Equipment Costs for Crop Production on Amish Farms

Published by the American Society of Agricultural and Biological Engineers, St. Joseph, Michigan www.asabe.org

Citation:  Paper number  041106,  2004 ASAE Annual Meeting . (doi: 10.13031/2013.16161) @2004
Authors:   Randall E. James
Keywords:   Amish farms, draft horse power, horse drawn equipment

Small highly diversified Amish farms relying on draft horse powered equipment have remained competitive even in a market dominated by huge farms with massive machinery investments. Studies conducted in the fourth-largest Amish settlement in the world estimated the major equipment costs, human labor requirements, and draft horse hours needed for various farm operations. Information from the studies was used to produce crop enterprise budgets allowing for direct comparisons between Amish and non-Amish farming systems. The total equipment inventory needed for crop production on an Amish farm, including five draft horses, was found to be less than 10 percent of the cost needed to equip a 400 ha conventional crop farm. Operator labor/ha was consistently higher on the Amish farms compared to non- Amish farms. However, the Amish farm far less hectares and total crop labor requirements can easily be less than those of a conventional farm. Per hectare return to labor and management (net return above all costs except labor in management) was found to be consistently higher in Amish farming systems.

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