Farmers' preferences and allocation of funds for rural development – an attempt at optimisation

Basing on the opinions of farmers the authors have constructed a linear programming model to analyse the possibilities of altering the allocation of means allocated for the development of rural areas and ventures increasing the competitiveness of Polish agriculture. The conducted analyses have indicated that the preferences of small and medium-sized farms differ from the preferences of the large farms. Therefore, different activities create opportunities for the development of these three types of farms. Consequently, the optimal allocation of means for the development of rural areas is different in the opinion of the owners of small and medium-sized farms and in the opinion of the large farm owners.