Structural strategies of Forage systems in an European disadvantaged area

The main objective of the present study was to identify the structural factors characterizing forage systems of raising small ruminants or small ruminants and cereal households in a disadvantaged area of the Ebro River Valley in Spain. Information was obtained by a direct survey and was processed across Multivariate procedures. Three factors identified three household type strategies, determining the most important organizing forage structures linkage: the presence or the absence of the land factor conditioning the access to both the Useful Agrarian Area and Forage Area, and the structural relationships between the dimension of the live capital and type of labor factor. Since a representative number of households was used in this type of approach, the main combined patterns have been identified and can be considered as strategies since they reflect modes of goal implementation in European fragile lands.