Allocating agricultural production factors: A scenario-based modeling of wheat production in Shandong Province, China

We aim to determine the effects of agricultural factors input per hectare on wheat production, and to optimize the allocation of wheat production factors under three scenarios and in different operating modes. Data were collected from 204 farming households using a face-to-face questionnaire. The sampled farms were selected through a stratified random sampling technique. We find fertilizer cost, irrigation cost and machinery cost all positively and significantly affect the per-unit-area wheat production, indicating the labor cost is not the major driving factor on wheat yield increment. Multi-object optimization model is used to allocate the production factors per hectare. We find under the Business as usual (BAU) scenario, the irrigation cost per-hectare wheat production after optimization in 2014 grows at a rate of 24.31% and accounts for 14.9% of total input. Under the Cooperate Environmental Sustainability (CES) scenario, the fertilizer and pesticide costs after optimization drop significantly by 42.83% and 21.41%, respectively. Under the Rapid Benefit Growth (RBG) scenario, the irrigation cost after optimization increase by 2.56% and the fertilizer cost increases by 4.69% compared with the surveyed data. Comparison of optimized data among three operating modes shows that the labor costs at household farm and cooperative farm both increase significantly. Cooperative farms are more successful in production factor use efficiency and economic performance. In conclusion, wheat production at different operating modes could be improved so as to constitute more efficient and economic use of production factors.