Market Trends of North America Plowing and Cultivating Machinery Industry
Scarcity of Low Cost Labor influencing Increased Adoption of Farm Mechanization
During the period between 2002 and 2014, the population of field and crop workforce in the United States saw a decline of 22.9%, on average. Increase in wages is a clear indication of the labor shortage on US farms. In 2014, more than half of all hired farmworkers, or roughly half a million workers in the United States were immigrants. The increasing shortage of labor is encouraging farmers, mainly large-scale, to adopt farm mechanization. Anticipation of the shortage of labor, specifically skilled labor, may drive higher demand for farm mechanization, which may result in higher demand for agricultural machinery, including plowing and cultivation machinery, in North America.
United States dominates the Regional Market
The US plowing and cultivating machinery market accounted for 44.4% market share in the North American region in 2017, despite the growing popularity of no-till farming in the country. Plowing and tillage are the primary causes of soil erosion, and thus, there is an increasing demand for no-till farming- a type of soil conservation farming that prepares the land for plowing without mechanically disturbing the soil. In the United States, in 2015, nearly 35% of cropland was under no-tilled cultivation and more than 10 million acres of cover crops were seeded across the country. The no-tillage farming technique is gaining immense popularity in the country, owing to significant economic benefits, including low soil erosion, high soil biological activity, and improved soil organic matter. Moreover, these benefits are expected to provide additional economic gains to farmers over time. Thus, the widespread no-tillage farming practice is expected to hold back the US plowing and cultivating machinery market’s growth during the forecast period.
