Abstract
Recently farming succession has become an important topic in agriculture in order to secure agricultural manpower in response to the aging of farming households and declining population. This study investigates farmers and agricultural college students' perception of farming succession in Korea, especially of farming succession to a third party. Farmers and agricultural college students are potential farming transferors and successors, respectively. We surveyed 146 farmers and 95 students who graduated or were studying at the Korea National College of Agriculture and Fisheries. The questions of the survey are largely divided into four categories: 1) the will and scope of farming transfer and succession, 2) the requirements for the successors of farming, 3) the perception on the succession to third-parties, and 4) the farming succession policy. According to the survey results 41.4% of farmers and 46.3% of potential farming successors have willingness to accept a farming succession to a third party. When farming succession was carried out through the Farming Succession Exchange, 46.8% of farmers and 54.7% of successors said they are willing to carry out third-party farming succession. This means that a third-party farming succession could be activated if the reliability issue that may arise during the farming succession is resolved through the Farming Succession Exchange. Other implications for farming succession are suggested at the end of this study.
