The present research aimed to identify the main internal factors (costs, income, techno-economic feasibility and technologic innovation use) which affect the beef cattle activity competitiveness in a complete cycle production system in the state of Rio Grande do Sul. The data was collected during the year of 2008 based on monthly meetings between the months of January and December. Later the data was analyzed in eletronic spreadsheets. The costs were subdivided in disbursed, operating and total costs and the income in category and total. Among the evaluated costs, the land opportunity cost, labor force and animal supplementation with values of 19.9%, 18.3%, 13.6% respectively, can be pointed out in relation to total cost. The main financial and technical indicators commonly used in production systems analysis were calculated. The economic margins (gross, operating and net), as well as the profitability over the net worth were positive which show economic feasibility in the activity. At the same time, technical indicators as the output rate and the productivity/ha showed satisfactory values. Thus it can be concluded that the evaluated internal factors were very competitive for the studied system.
beef cattle; management; production system; costs; index
