2002 Annual Report
Research
Modeling Agricultural Downtime Losses Resulting from Injuries, Breakdowns,
and Other Lost Time
John Shutske, Associate Professor
Funding Source
National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health; Marshfield Medical
Research Foundation
Objective
Objectives of this project include:
- Develop methods and engineering economics models to estimate the cost of downtime in the food production industry.
- Determine the key parameters that affect the magnitude of downtime
costs resulting from injuries, machinery fires, mechanical breakdowns,
and other downtime causes.
Project Description
In most complex industrial systems where income and profit are dependent
on timeliness of production operations, downtime can be a major cost.
This downtime can result from any factor including poor scheduling decisions,
mechanical breakdowns and malfunctions, personal injuries, or even the
need to cease harvesting or planting because of the demands of off-farm
jobs. In production agriculture, downtime from any cause can result in
reduced yields, increased processing costs, greater labor and replacement
equipment costs, and other major economic losses. Over the last several
years, a linear programming technique has been developed to estimate the
financial costs associated with downtime experienced by farmers during
critical cropping periods. This information is being used in educational
presentations about farm safety and also as a tool for helping producers
make better decisions about time management, machine sizing, and other
important decisions.
Results
Based on economic conditions from 2001 and 2002, the downtime loss model indicates that a day of lost production can cost from $92 to $1,120 during harvest season and $0 to $2,875 during the planting season. Several factors impact the magnitude of downtime losses including size of the operation, the size and field capacity of machinery, and crop prices. These data are based on corn prices of $2.00 per bushel and $4.70 for soybeans. If crop prices are higher, these costs increase in a linear fashion. Also, during a season with fewer available field days as a result of wet field conditions, a day’s worth of lost time is considerably more costly than during a season with a median number of available working days. During years when the number of field days during harvest is equal to the median over the 20-year period, a day’s worth of harvest downtime costs the operator 1/3 of what it costs in a year with 25% fewer harvest field days available as compared to the 20-year median. In situations where loss of working field days during harvest season cuts into the ability to complete fall tillage operations, this cost jumped to as high as $900 per day.