RESEARCH PAPER
SMALL FARMS IN POLAND AND CZECHIA: DEVELOPMENT PATHS
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1
Poznan University of Economics and Business
2
Mendel University in Brno
Submission date: 2023-11-13
Final review date: 2023-12-09
Acceptance date: 2024-04-18
Publication date: 2024-06-27
Zagadnienia Ekonomiki Rolnej / Problems of Agricultural Economics 2024;379(2):19-48
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ABSTRACT
The aim of this study was to identify the long-term tendencies regarding the land use in farms of different
sizes in Poland and Czechia, with special focus on small-scale farms. The article answers the question
about functioning of small farms in Poland and Czechia, as they represent different structures of land use
among farms. On the one hand, the land fragmentation in Poland, and on the other hand, domination of
large farms in Czechia, with a lower share of small farms. To achieve the aim, the study used data from
the Farm Structure Survey (FSS) and Agricultural Census (2010, 2020) from Eurostat for six periods
(2005, 2007, 2010, 2013, 2016, 2020) and selected data for recent years from the World Bank database. In the period under analysis, it can be observed that there is a significant decline in the number of small
farms both in Poland and Czechia, while the decrease in utilized agricultural area was smaller. Hence,
the average area of farm increased which helped them to improve the land productivity, while increasing
the standard output per hectare of utilized agricultural area. The analysis showed that there are two
different models of the position of small farms in the Polish and Czech agricultural sectors, however,
some positive and desired tendencies occur in both systems.