Study on Economic Evaluation of Cucumber Production in Turkey

Cucumber production of Turkey is 5.7 % of the world production. During the previous 10 years cucumber production has increased 46.1% in Turkey. Although it changes year by year, export of cucumber is only between 0.6 and 2.5% of production. Import of cucumber in some years from the Middle East Countries is amounted even negligible. Cucumber is grown in small plants. Average farm size is about 72 decar of which 70.6 % is own land, 25.4 % is rented and 4.0 % is operated with share cropping system. 10.7 % of farmland is allocated to cucumber production. As an average of studied farms, 116.8 hours of labour force and 2.57 hours of tractor power are used for per decar cucumber production in a production period. 66.1% of total labour is women workers. Averagely 438 gr seeds, 18.0 kg N, 8.9 kg P2O5, 4.1 kg K2O are used for one decar. NH4NO3, 20.20.0, 15.15.15 and Urea (N 46 %) fertilisers are commonly used for production of cucumber. 39.8 % of production cost is inputs while 5.7 % is land preparation, 27.7 % is fixed costs, 17.1% is harvesting, packing and remaining, 9.7 % is other cultivation’s. According to the growers, diseases, insects and difficulties in marketing are major constraints of cucumber production. Yield changes between 1.389 and 4.944 kg/da on the average it is 3.016 kg per decar. The percentage of profit is 83.1% on the average. But it changes in different areas, because of the price of labour and tractor, production techniques, yields and prices of crop.