Fuel occupies a significant share in the structure of an agricultural enterprise’s operating costs, especially during periods of intensive field work. Therefore, fuel cost control should cover every refueling, specific machine, engine hours, operation performed, and area. Even a small systematic deviation from the established norm when working on thousands of hectares during the season turns into a significant amount.
Part of these costs is directly related to cultivation technology: soil tillage, sowing, fertilizer application, spraying, harvesting, and crop transportation. At the same time, a farm can lose diesel fuel every day due to long idling, unnecessary travel, incorrect implement hitching, technical malfunctions, wheel slip, refueling errors, or unauthorized siphoning. A systematic comparison of planned indicators with actual ones allows for the detection of such losses.
What do fuel costs in an agricultural enterprise consist of?
The consumption structure depends on the farm’s specialization, land bank, field location, crop cultivation technology, and machinery fleet. Significant volumes of diesel fuel are used by tractors during soil tillage, sowing complexes, sprayers, and combines. Additionally, resources are spent on grain transportation, moving materials between warehouses and fields, the operation of loaders, grain dryers, generators, and other equipment.
It is advisable to evaluate fuel costs in an agricultural enterprise separately for each technological operation. For example, a tractor’s performance during disc harrowing can be calculated in l/ha and l/engine hour, for freight transport use l/100 km, and for a generator or stationary equipment, keep records in l/hour. Such detail allows you to see exactly where the deviation is formed.
Conventionally, all costs can be divided into technologically justified and unproductive. The first group includes fuel actually required to perform a given operation under specific conditions. The second includes extra liters that arise due to downtime, additional passes, incorrect implement settings, malfunctions, and internal accounting violations.
Comparing machines only by the number of liters used is not enough. A tractor that spent 300 liters per shift and processed 30 hectares has a completely different efficiency indicator than a machine with the same consumption that performed work on 20 hectares. That is why fuel must be linked to actual output.
Main Causes of Unproductive Fuel Losses
Fuel cost control begins with identifying the places where deviations most often occur. Some problems are noticeable after just a few shifts, while others can accumulate throughout the season.
The most common causes:
- exceeding established fuel consumption standards for a specific operation;
- prolonged engine idling during waiting or downtime;
- suboptimal routes between fields, warehouses, the base, and refueling points;
- malfunctions of the engine, injectors, fuel system, or cooling system;
- incorrect tire pressure, excessive ballasting, and unnecessary load;
- lack of precise control over refueling and tank residues;
- unauthorized use of equipment or siphoning of diesel fuel;
- incorrect selection of tractor and implement power for specific work.
Ordinary accounting of fuel often shows the total number of liters received and written off, but does not explain the reason for the deviation. For example, exceeding the plan by 100 liters may occur due to greater tillage depth, tractor wheel slip, additional travel, or several hours of engine operation without a productive load.
Iowa State University Extension research shows that diesel consumption during field operations is significantly affected by tillage depth, engine load, gear selection, ballasting, and tire pressure. For partial load operations, using a higher gear with reduced engine speed under appropriate conditions can yield about 10% fuel savings, although the specific result depends on the tractor and type of work.
How to Organize Fuel Accounting and Control?
An effective system begins with linking every liter to the machine and the work performed. To do this, the farm needs to record the receipt of fuel at the warehouse, issuance to a specific unit of agricultural machinery, refueling time, tank residue, engine hours or mileage, area, and type of technological operation.
For a tractor during field work, a basic data set might look like this: 250 liters refueled, 10 engine hours worked, 35 hectares processed. Based on these indicators, you can get an actual 25 l/engine hour and about 7.1 l/ha. Next, the result is compared with the standard for the corresponding machine, implement, and working conditions.
Modern fuel control can be supplemented with GPS monitoring, fuel level sensors in the tank, CAN bus, and telematics systems. GPS shows the route, speed, and location of the machine. Sensors help track sharp changes in fuel levels. CAN data can include information about engine speed, load, engine hours, speed, and other parameters depending on the equipment model.
It is advisable to distribute control by periods. Daily, you can check refueling, mileage, engine hours, processed area, idling, and sharp changes in the tank level. Weekly, it is worth comparing actual consumption between similar machines and operations. After the end of the season, the data is used to adjust standards and the budget for the next campaign.
Fuel consumption standards should be established taking into account the actual work of the farm. The indicator is affected by the type and power of the machine, the implement, tillage depth, speed, soil condition, terrain, and load. Industry standards can be a starting point, and the accumulated statistics of a specific enterprise make it possible to plan future seasons more accurately.
How Does the Technical Condition of Agricultural Machinery Affect Fuel Consumption?
Increased consumption is sometimes one of the first signals of a technical problem. A dirty air or fuel filter, faulty injectors, problems with the cooling system, transmission, or implement working parts increase the load on the engine.
Timely replacement of air and fuel filters according to the manufacturer’s schedule can provide about 3-4% fuel savings. Correct tire pressure and ballasting also affect traction efficiency, wheel slip, and diesel consumption. University of Minnesota Extension specifically points to correct tire pressure adjustment as one way to increase tractor efficiency.
For a farm, the practical algorithm is quite simple. If the actual consumption of a certain machine systematically exceeds the established range, it is necessary to check its working conditions, implement settings, load, and technical condition. A comparison of two similar tractors performing the same operation in fields with similar conditions is particularly revealing.
Technical maintenance also needs to be considered during seasonal financial planning. Filters, lubricants, tires, injectors, bearings, repair of working parts, and spare parts require a separate budget. Planned service costs help reduce the risk of emergency repairs and long-term operation of equipment with increased diesel consumption.
How to Reduce Fuel Consumption During Field Work?
The answer to the question of how to reduce fuel consumption begins with an analysis of the machine’s route and its operating mode. A GPS track allows you to see unnecessary travel, repeated passes, long stops with the engine running, and suboptimal logistics. Parallel driving systems additionally help reduce overlaps between passes.
Iowa State University Extension notes that navigation systems reduce overlaps in the field, and with them the number of passes, fuel consumption, and working time. For traction operations, correct implement configuration, working speed, tillage depth, ballasting, and allowable wheel slip are also important.
A separate reserve is provided by idling control. If telematics shows that a tractor worked without a productive load for a significant part of a 10-hour shift, the reason must be established. This could be waiting for loading, poorly synchronized work with other machines, delays at refueling, or shift organization.
The scale of even small fuel savings is clearly visible in a hypothetical calculation. Suppose that after optimizing routes, setting up implements, and controlling idling, the farm reduced consumption by only 1 l/ha. For example, let’s take a hypothetical diesel fuel price of 55 UAH/l:
| Area | Consumption Reduction | Potential Savings |
| 1,000 ha | 1,000 l | 55,000 UAH |
| 3,000 ha | 3,000 l | 165,000 UAH |
| 5,000 ha | 5,000 l | 275,000 UAH |
This is a hypothetical calculation to demonstrate the scale. The actual result will depend on the price of diesel, the number of passes, cultivation technology, the composition of the machinery fleet, and the initial level of consumption. If the same area undergoes several energy-intensive operations during the season, the potential for reducing total costs may be greater.
Practical Checklist for Fuel Cost Control on the Farm
Individual sensors or GPS trackers alone do not solve the problem of overconsumption. The farm needs a consistent system in which data is regularly analyzed and used for management decisions.
Follow this algorithm:
- Determine consumption standards for each machine and main technological operations.
- Record every refueling, indicating the equipment, driver or operator, time, and number of liters.
- Correlate fuel used with engine hours, hectares, mileage, and work performed.
- Monitor idling duration and unproductive movements.
- Compare actual indicators with standards and determine the allowable deviation range.
- Check the technical condition of machines in which fuel overconsumption is systematically recorded.
- Use GPS, telematics, and sensors to check routes, operating modes, and refueling.
- Analyze data by shift, week, individual operation, and season.
- Form a seasonal budget for diesel fuel and regularly compare planned costs with actual ones.
For analysis, it is desirable to use the same methodology throughout the season. Then the farm gets its own database of actual consumption for different crops, fields, tractors, and implements. After several seasons, such data becomes the basis for more accurate resource planning and calculation of the cost of field operations.
How to Combine Fuel Control with Financial Planning?
Reducing unproductive losses solves only part of the task. The farm also needs to understand how much diesel fuel will be needed for future operations, when to purchase it, and what load the purchase will place on working capital.
The basis of such a plan can be the actual area, a list of technological operations, and average consumption in l/ha for previous seasons. Transport work, internal logistics, generator operation, and a reserve are added to the calculation. You can read more about working with a budget under changing prices in the article “How Agribusiness Can Plan Costs if Resource Prices Change Monthly“.
Advance purchase of fuel can also be part of seasonal financial planning. WEAGRO presents a scenario for purchasing fuel with deferred payment, described in more detail in the article “Fuel from UPG and WEAGRO in Installments for Agro“.
Effective fuel management today covers accounting for actual consumption, procurement planning, and financial load control. The ecosystem of embedded financial solutions for agribusiness WEAGRO combines online services for agro-installments, bill payment, and deferred payments; WEAGROMARKET works as a marketplace for agribusiness with the possibility of purchasing goods in installments; WEAGROBANK expands farmers’ access to financial products. For the farm, this provides additional tools for resource planning and seasonal purchases.
A systematic approach allows you to see how much fuel each machine actually consumes, in which operation a deviation occurs, and how much it costs the farm. The combination of telematics, technical maintenance, standards, correct organization of field work, and financial planning helps control the cost price throughout the season.
