Farm and Orchard Management, in ARGOS, is studied from a management systems
approach with three main areas of study; economic, social and the environment. Economics
includes production (both financial and non-financial) through to socio economics of
production systems. Social studies the ‘people’ implications of the systems, motivational
drivers, life cycles, whilst the environment objective looks at the impact/implications of the
farming system on the environment. Boundaries of the three objectives overlap, leading to
overarching research that is a transdisciplinary study of farming systems. It was recognised
that generic descriptors, of the farms under study, need to be supplied to the three objectives
and this led to a fourth ‘sub’ objective, the farm/orchard management objective. The role of
the management objective includes collecting physical and managerial style data and, where
suitable, the preliminary analysis of this data. The main purpose of this synthesis report is to
provide an overview of the type of management and production data that have been
collected and key differences between production systems (also referred to as ‘panels’)
within each sector. For kiwifruit and dairy, data up to the 2007/08 season is reported.[Show full abstract]
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