환경농법에 의한 사과생산 실태 및 경영개선

Current Situation of Environment-Friendly Production of Apples

In this study, questionnaire were made to environment-friendly producers of apples regarding farm management methods in low-input production method. utilizing organic materials, production and marketing of apples with lower agricultural chemical residues. Besides, five apples farms were visited to find out their management situation by employing the low-input production method in order to protect the environment as well as consumer's health. Those five low-input apple farms were scattered in Kyungbuk, Chungnam, and Chonnam Provinces, There were not many low-input apple farms across the nation from the beginning and, as a result, increasing the sample size was basically very difficult. Most of these farms were using 140hrs of labor per 10a, of which 30hrs in pre-season management, 25hrs in plowing and weed control, 15hrs in disease and pest control, 20hrs in harvest and marketing and 50hrs in miscellaneous activities. Relatively, pest control takes much time in that they would spray pesticides 7-10 times a season to control the apple disease, 9 times on the average. The average gross revenue of low-input apple farms was about \2,000,000/10a, and their average yield was 2,000kg/10a, which are 25% and 13% lower, respectively, than the ordinary apple production case. This means the low-input farmers are inefficient in marketing their products. On the other hand, their production costs were 20.4% higher than the ordinary apple farms on the average. Since the imported foreign fruits including apples must use various agricultural chemicals on their way to the export markets, the domestic low-input apples have competitive edge over them in therms of food safety. In order to improve the low-input apple industry, active cooperation is needed among the producers, government and researchers more than ever. Among other things, production cost reduction and quality improvement with lower chemical residues are part of the urgent matters to be done.