An Analysis of Factors Influencing Sweet Potato Production

Karanganyar Regency is one of the sweet potato producers in Central Java Province, which often utilizes sweet potatoes for processing into traditional foods and industrial raw materials. The availability of sweet potato production is important to meet the raw material needs of these food products. This study aims to determine the factors that influence sweet potato farming production in Karanganyar Regency. The study was conducted through a survey using an interview method using a questionnaire to 50 sweet potato farmers in Karanganyar Regency in 2020, with snowball sampling. The method used was Ordinary Least Squares (OLS) with Cobb-Douglas production function. The results showed that input production factors that significantly influence sweet potato farming production are land area, seedlings, and labor, while fertilizers have no significant effect on sweet potato farming in Karanganyar Regency. Furthermore, sweet potato production farming in Karanganyar shows that there is Decreasing Return to Scale, as indicated by a return to scale value is 0,978. Optimizing land use for sweet potato farming in Karanganyar Regency by using superior seeds is a priority for farmers to increase sweet potato farming production, followed by efficient labor allocation with mentoring and training from agricultural extension workers for farmers.