The Influence of Scale on the Profitability of Honey Beekeeping Enterprises in Eastern Part of Turkey

Abstract

The aim of this study was to compare the profitability of 58 small, medium and large-scale beekeeping enterprises in Bahcesaray, a town in Van Province, Turkey. The data, from the 2002 production period, was updated in 2005 using the agriculture wholesale price index. Honey yield per modern beehive was 10.72 kg. The single most important cost item in the total production cost was the permanent labour costs, which represented 31.42% of the total. The economic profitability rate increased according to enterprise size being the lowest with 1.42% for small-scale and the highest with 3.77% for large-scale enterprises. The Coob-Douglas production function test showed that by increasing the major inputs one-fold, the large scale enterprsises could increase the honey quantity 1.73 times against 1.29 times of small-scale enterprises.