Comparative analysis between the cost

of phytosanitary management and the

profitability of organic and conventional tomato
production in a protected environment
Felipe Alvares Spagnuolo; Fábio Yoshio Kagi, Rogerio Barbosa Macedo, Eliezer Ferreira
Camargo, Renan Ribeiro Barzan, Ernestina Izumi Muraoka, Leandro Aparecido de Moura

Revista de la Facultad de Agronomía, La Plata (2021) Vol 120(1): 1-12

Introduction

The adoption of low-impact agricultural systems that are able to obtain

lower yields to be competitive is a major challenge today. In this sense, an analysis
of the composition of production costs is an important tool in evaluating the
conditions of efficiency of production processes, inferring on profitability,
perspectives and decision recovery in the activity.
Objective
To characterize and analyze the cost between organic and conventional
phytosanitary management of tomato cultivation in a greenhouse in northern
Paraná, as well as its impacts on the profitability of the activity..
Theoretical framework
Agriculture is an activity that consists of adopting cultivation systems that
minimize losses, ensuring product competitiveness, and cost containment in the
production chain. Furthermore, it is constantly looking for production processes
where technologies are less environmentally aggressive, maintaining an adequate
production-product relationship (Assad & Almeida, 2004).
Therefore, the analysis of production costs allows the assessment of the
economic conditions of the production processes, inferring on various aspects such
as profitability of the resources used, conditions for recovering these resources,
and prospects for future decisions on the enterprise.
Methods
The study covered five certified organic properties in the northern region of
Paraná, in the municipalities of Nova Fátima, São Jerônimo da Serra and Uraí, in
addition to an area of conventional production in Primeiro de Maio. Five organic
tomato plantings carried out in 2018 and one conventional planting in 2017 was
analyzed.
Thus, based on the cost of production methodology proposed by Matsunaga
et al. (1976), it was possible to determine indicators such as Total Gross Revenue
(RT), Total Operating Cost (TOC), Residue, the Benefit Cost Ratio (B/C) was
determined according to the procedure adopted by Araújo et al. (2003) and the
productivity of each crop, represented by the values of kilograms of tomato per
plant and boxes produced per 1,000 m².
Therefore, the profitability and costs of each management were defined,
making possible a more detailed analysis of organic and conventional phytosanitary
management through the following parameters: Total Phytosanitary Control Cost
(CFT) per box produced, Pest Control Cost ( CCP) per box produced, Cost of
Disease Control (CCD) per box produced, Impact of the Cost of Phytosanitary
Control on Activity Profitability (ICRA), Impact of the Cost of Phytosanitary Control
on the Total Cost of Activity (ICTA).
Results
In terms of profitability, Table 1 shows that in all cases analyzed the activity
was shown to be profitable, with conventional cultivation (P6) obtaining the highest
net income amounting to R$ 34,080.60. This value was 26% higher than the
average of the waste obtained by the 5 organic producers. Consequently, P6
presented the highest Benefit/Cost ratio among the studied crops, reaching the
value of 2.86 followed by P1 with 2.67. Luz et al. (2007) and Souza & Garcia (2013)
observed situations different from those found in this study, as they obtained
profitability of 113.6% and 94% higher in organic tomato crops compared to
conventional ones.
The average expenditure on pest control among organic crops was
R$3.04 per box, higher than the conventional one, which was R$2.04. In
relation to disease control, although P5 spent R$2.19 per box on total
phytosanitary control, only behind P1 with an expenditure of R$1.80, the P5
area was the one that spent the most on phytopathological control , reaching
R$0.28 per box. With the exception of P5, all organic areas had a cost of
protection against diseases lower than the conventional area analyzed, and P2
did not perform any application during the crop cycle, and P1 had a cost of
R$0.01 per box, similar values those obtained by Luz et al. (2007) who spent
only R$0.02 per box for organic disease management. The same authors
arrived at the number of R$0.89 for the control of plant pathologies in
conventional management.
Thus, it is observed that there is a great variability of phytosanitary
protection costs between the type of agriculture adopted, and in the
comparisons analyzed, the highest cost varies between the managements.
However, for the reality analyzed by the study, the CFT results for P1 and P5
(Table 6) show that it is possible in organic agriculture to guarantee good
yields and profitability with cheaper phytosanitary control than in conventional
agriculture. However, it is clear that the cost is still high compared to
conventional management in other works presented. Probably, this fact is due
to the high volumes of syrup used in the recommended organic management,
thus requiring technical adjustments to reduce the consumption of inputs.
Conclusion
From the results obtained, it is inferred that organic crops of P1 and
P5 had the lowest cost of pest control and total phytosanitary control
compared to other organic areas and to the conventional crop analyzed. With
the exception of P5, the cost of disease control per box in organic crops was
much lower than the value obtained by conventional (P6).
In addition, the conventional area had the highest profitability among the
crops, however in the organic area P1 the impacts of the total phytosanitary
management cost on the crop profitability and on the total cost of the activity
were the lowest among all the studied crops.
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