*2.3. Variables Selection*

#### 2.3.1. DEA Variables

Referring to the method of Qian and Li [4], and considering the actual situation of family farms in Wuhan and Langxi, from the perspective of considering the land, labor, and capital, this paper selected land input, labor input, and capital input as the input variables, and selected family farm operating income, which includes plantation income, livestock income, agricultural service income, and government subsidies, as the output indicators.

The land input refers to the actual land area operated by the family farm, including the area of self-owned land and circulation land. The question in the questionnaire is: "How much is the total area of the land operated by the family farm in 2016?", and the

actual area filled in by the farmer is the land input indicator. The labor input refers to the total number of household laborers and hired laborers in the family farm's production activities, which is calculated according to the number of household laborers and the number of long-term employees of the family farms in 2016. The capital input refers to the operating expenditures of the family farm in 2016, including the expenditures on fertilizers, agricultural (livestock) medicines, seedlings, feeds, vaccines; expenditures on water, electricity, oil, gas, and coal; small mechanical tools, equipment and infrastructure maintenance expenses; specialized agricultural services expenditures; interest, housing rent, transportation and other productive expenses.

The family farm output indicator is measured by the operating income of the family farm, including the income from planting-and-breeding industries, agricultural service income and government subsidies. The descriptive statistics of the input and output indicators of the family farm are shown in Table 1.


**Table 1.** Descriptive statistics of the input and output indicators of family farms.

As shown in Table 1, the average land operating area of all family farms is 20.85 hectares, indicating that the scale operation among family farms has been initially achieved. The average land area operated by mixed-type family farms is 24.71 hectares, higher than that of all the family farms, while the average land area operated by breeding family farms is 15.35 hectares, lower than that of all the family farms. Meanwhile, the standard deviation of the land operating area for all types of family farms is relatively large, indicating that the land area operated by family farms varies. From the perspective of considering the labor input, the number of household laborers is similar to that of hired laborers, which is 2.59 and 2.54 people, respectively. The labor input of all types of family farms is similar, and the average of the household laborers and employed laborers for mixed family farms is slightly higher than that of the other types. From the perspective of considering the capital input, the average input of breeding and mixed family farms in most aspects is higher than that of all family farms, except in the expenditures for specialized agricultural services, in contrast to the input of planting family farms. As for the total income, the average income of all family farms is CNY 1.1504 million, and the income for the planting industry is similar to

that for the breeding industry (CNY 557.8 thousand and CNY 570.2 thousand, respectively). Relatively speaking, mixed family farms have the highest income, followed by breeding family farms, and planting family farms receive the lowest income.
