Abstract

The main purpose of this paper is to address the question of whether and how farmers have tried to increase agricultural productivity after the regulatory role of governments on the agricultural industry has been reduced due to financial crises. The relationship between agricultural sowing area shifts (grain to fruit, grain to vegetables, vegetables to fruit) were explored by using geographically weighted regression model. This model showed how the decrease of grain sowing areas led to an increase of fruit and vegetable sowing area in Turkey. It was demonstrated that farmers tended to choose more productive agricultural crops in order to address agricultural sustainability problems. Geographical information system data sets regarding the years between 2000 and 2010 were obtained from 923 districts. The results of the analysis showed a strong relationship between changes in grain, vegetable and fruit areas. According to geographically weighted regression, the variation of local coefficients ranged from - 0.62 to 0.34. Because of the productivity factors, grain and vegetable areas have been replaced by fruit production. However, Turkey will be faced with food security problems in the future due to the decrease of grain cultivation. The increasing opportunity for irrigation has had a profoundly important role in shifting from grain to vegetable and fruit production.

Key words: Geographically weighted regression, geographical information system, sustainable agriculture, farm policy, food security.