M A R C H 2 0 1 8 16 POTATO GROWER Enterprise budgets are often made to project an expectation of the financial revenues and costs for the coming year, how- ever in reality, it only represents one snapshot of many possible outcomes for the farm. Some ele- ments of a budget are fairly pre- dictable and can be planned for with some degree of certainty, while others may be quite vari- able, unpredictable, and outside the realm of control of the pota- to grower. This fact makes potato production, and most other agri- cultural enterprises, financially risky to engage in. The data generated here was taken from feedback from a small group of potato growers and local grower cooperatives and operating costs from other Extension publications. The non-irrigated budget provides a generalized budget of a model farm and does not represent any single potato growing operation. This budget is only intended to be used as a guide, because there is great variation amongst potato farms. The model farm enterprise budg- et is intended to serve as a tem- plate for producers and is meant to be manipulated to suit indi- vidual conditions. The budget is organized in the following three sections: gross returns, operating inputs, and ownership costs. The organization and format is simi- lar to Patterson’s (2013) costs and returns estimate. All values or costs are calculated on a per acre basis. A detailed budget in Excel for- mat is available for download at z.umn.edu/potatobudget. Andy’s Advice: Non-irrigated Red Norland Crop Budget By Andy Robinson, Extension Potato Agronomist, NDSU/UMN, Alan Bingham, former graduate student, NDSU Ryan Larsen, Utah State University