Sylwia Kierczyńska

Abstract. The total costs of apple production in the high density dwarf orchards and multi-row orchards were significantly higher than in the traditional orchards and low density dwarf orchards. More than half of the apple production costs constituted the special costs (the sum of materials costs, labor costs, services costs and costs of using tractors and machines). The depreciation of orchard determined the diversity of total apple production costs. The depreciations of high density dwarf orchards and multi-row orchards were nearly three times higher than the depreciation of the traditional orchards.

Summary

The aim of this paper was to present and compare the amount and the structure of apple production costs in the different orchard management systems: single-row orchards: the traditional orchard (type 1T – less than 1000 tree/ha), the low density dwarf orchard (type 2K – 1000-2000 tree/ha), the high density dwarf orchard (type 3K – more than 2000 trees/ha) and multi-row orchard. The data were collected from the private farmers – apple producers.

The special costs (the sum of materials costs, labor costs, services costs and costs of using tractors and machines) made up more than a half of total apple production costs and they didn’t differ between the orchard management systems. The direct costs (the sum of the special costs and orchard depreciation) were 13% higher in type 2K and were 37% higher in type 3K and 4K than in the traditional orchards because of the orchards depreciation. Mainly because of this, the total costs of apple production in the dwarf orchards were significantly higher than in the traditional ones. They were significantly higher in the high density dwarf orchards and multi-row orchards than in the low density dwarf orchards.