Chin-Tai Ku*

Miaoli District Agricultural Research and Extension Station, Council of Agriculture, Executive Yuan

ABSTRACT

    This research investigated the basic characteristics of the trainees who attended beekeeping courses and their risk attributes for farming. Then we used the cluster analysis method to divide them into active, robust and conservative types, and the results correct classification rates were 98.2 % and 96.3% by discriminant analysis and cross-validation, respectively. In the case of production method, how many months the capital can last to cover the expenses, acceptable price fluctuation, acceptable investment loss ratio, expected rate of return, the numbers of farmers’ associations the farmers join in and their reasons of joining, sharing information with other farmers, farming experience, previous agricultural related experience, and the main purpose of engaging in agriculture were all significantly different. On the whole, the active type of respondents showed a higher degree of risk tolerance in most of the items, followed by the robust type, and finally the conservative type. The results of this study can be used as a reference for the selection of trainees and farmers’ counseling plans.

Keywords: beekeeping course, agricultural risk assessment, trainees

*Corresponding author email: anii.cc@mdais.gov.tw