Q12 - Micro Analysis of Farm Firms, Farm Households, and Farm Input MarketsReturn

Due to the specific corporate structure of the agriculture sector farm households in the Czech Republic comprise not only households of self-employed persons or private farmers (similarly like e.g. in countries of Western Europe) but also households headed by employees of agricultural enterprises. Data on the size and structure of farm households according to their social and professional types were derived from the census including the census of houses and flats. Data on the income of (farm and non-farm) households were taken from the last microcensus and family account statistics. In spite of some restraints ensuing mainly from the number of farm households it was possible to acquire some concrete information. It is particularly different level, structure and use of incomes of farm households headed by self-employed persons and employees (workers and other professions) compared to their non-farm counterparts.

The average level of debts of agricultural enterprises in the CR is several times higher than in countries with established market economy. The main source is so-called transformation debts connected with the transformation of ownership and enterprise structure in the Czech agriculture after 1989. This specific form of farm indebtedness is a great debt burden with very different impacts on the particular categories of agricultural enterprises. A specific debt structure is characteristic of cooperative farms. The existence of many of them is directly endangered by bankruptcies in connection with unsettled payable liabilities from the ownership transformation towards entitled persons-non-members. Higher subsidies after the CR accession to the EU may con- siderably improve the financial situation of Czech agricultural enterprises, but the debt burden from transformation will remain a great handicap for a longer time and it will constrain the increase in competitiveness of many of these enterprises.