This paper investigates empirically the relationship between both farm business goals and sources of competitive advantage, and various farm and producer characteristics using new primary data collected from a survey of Ohio farmers. Results show that most farmers do not recognize sources of competitive advantage and practice strategy implementation beyond reliance on longstanding paradigms for success within the context of government farm program support and the use of traditional risk management tools. However, several key insights emerge. Farmers who engage in cost leadership strategies are more profitable. Farmers who suggest that the goal of their farming operation is to enhance profitability/efficiency use more management tools, while lifestyle farmers use fewer. Larger farmers are more apt to engage in a cost leadership strategy, while those with higher debt-to-asset ratios and those that are more livestock oriented are more likely to engage in differentiation or focus strategies. Smaller farmers and those that produce specialty or value-added crops are more likely to focus on a particular niche market. Lastly, the use of the Internet as part of the farming operation does not influence the probability of engaging in any particular business strategy. It is apparent that the government farm program has contributed to a strategic where few producers have an explicit or implicit farm business strategy beyond "working the program" and acting as price takers. Or if a strategic choice is apparent, it rests primarily with cost leadership.

摘要本文利用对俄亥俄州农民调查所得的第一手资料，实证研究了农场经营目标与竞争优势来源之间的关系，以及各种农场和生产者特征。结果显示，大多数农民没有认识到竞争优势的来源，也没有实践战略的实施，除了依赖长期的范例，在政府农业项目支持和使用传统风险管理工具的背景下取得成功。然而，几个关键的见解出现了。采用成本领先策略的农民更有利可图。认为农业经营的目标是提高利润/效率的农民使用更多的管理工具，而生活方式的农民使用更少。规模较大的农户更倾向于采用成本领先战略，而那些债务资产比率较高的农户和那些以牲畜为导向的农户更有可能采用差异化战略或集中战略。规模较小的农民和生产专业或增值作物的农民更有可能专注于特定的利基市场。最后，使用互联网作为农业经营的一部分并不影响参与任何特定商业战略的可能性。很明显，政府农场计划促成了一种战略，在这种战略中，除了“执行计划”和充当价格接受者之外，很少有生产者有明确或隐含的农场经营战略。或者，如果一个战略选择是显而易见的，它主要取决于成本领先。