Agroproductive situation of farms in two municipalities of Matanzas province

Abstract

In order to characterize the agroproductive situation of 10 farms, belonging to three agricultural entities of the Perico and Jovellanos municipalities, in Matanzas province, the diagnosis and evaluation of their animal and plant components were performed. A survey was applied and the farmers were interviewed. In addition, the floristic composition of the pastureland was determined and the incomes by the end of 2018 were recorded. From the statistical point of view, to describe the data principal component analysis was used. To group the farmers and select those farms with similar characteristics, cluster analysis was applied, from the results of the principal components. The statistical package SPSS®, version 15. When performing the principal component analysis, the existence of high variability, accumulated in the first three components,
was observed based on the variables included in the study. In component 1, the variance reached a value of 38,3 % and in component 2, 24,7 %; while in component 3 it was 10,6 %. The variables social object (0,705), total area (0,802), pasture area (0,774), floristic composition and stocking rate (0,693) were the ones with the highest influence on the variance extracted in component 1. In component 2, the variables quantity of agricultural practices, presence of agricultural crops and number of crops present in the farms appeared as the most influential. When making up the groups, three different ones were detected. It is concluded that the farmer in group III was the one who showed better performance for the evaluated indicators and had
the highest values in the use of agroecological practices and incomes of the farm. The farmers in group I were dedicated mainly to animal husbandry. The studied farms do not use agroecology in their system.