Since the time of the Currency Reform, German agriculture has become highly motorized and mechanized. There are, however, upper and lower limits to mechanization. The lower limit for full time farms is an area of between 10 and 20 ha depending on the intensity of farming, and the upper limit is an area of several hundred ha. The contractor machine plays an im- portant part in small farms; field sizes ranging from 1,5 to 3,0 ha already suffice for its rational use. The higher investment cost of mechanizing small farms, which is about twice that for large farms is largely offset by the fact that the cost of machinery for small farms is only about half as great. Wage costs which, in large farms are strict net expenditure but in family farms, on the other hand, represent nothing but wage claims by members of the family, are a vital factor. The possibility of offsetting rising wage costs by mechanization and by reducing the labour force in large farms has its limits, and these limits have been largely reached today. Mechanization will thus not result in the creation of giant estates, since these are less efficient than family farms. However, arearrangement in the farm size structure of the West-German agriculture is going on at the present time. The number of part-time farms is falling rapidly whilst full-time farming is increasing since the small farms are getting larger.
