Der digitale Landwirt: Die Nutzung des Computers im Betriebsmanagement

Abstract

This paper presents the results of empirical studies about acceptance and use of computer on farms in Germany. Over the last three years a questionnaire was distributed to the visitors at the "Agrarcomputertage", a fair for information technology in agriculture, in Lower Saxony (2002), Bavaria (2003) and Hesse (2004). This paper is displaying the results of the latest study. The focus of the empirical study in 2004 had been the role of the computer in farm management. The results of this study display, that farm management is a time-consuming (on average 40 hours per month) and challenging task. A computer is helpful for farm management. Many farmer also get support from specialists, e.g. for book-keeping. Farmers plan to invest especially in applications of mobile computing and field management programmes.