This practical guide for the agribusiness manager (the farmer, rancher, and other agribusiness people who work with agricultural commodities, supplies, and services) gives a basic understanding of modern management practices. It provides guidelines that can help them make practical business decisions. Chapter 1 is an introduction that highlights farm management efficiency, decision making, and goals and objectives. The following 11 chapters discuss recordkeeping (importance and purposes of keeping records, types of systems, record book components), financial analysis (cash flow, net worth, income statements and their ratios; whole farm and enterprise analysis; relationships of various analyses), budget analysis (introduction to types and uses of budgets, how to use and analyze a partial budget, enterprise budget and whole farm budget, production principles, cost components), cash flow analysis (projections and analysis, repayment capacity, credit needs, credit types and sources), marketing (principles of supply and demand, marketing functions, strategies), investment analysis (time value of money, methods of investment analysis, investment financing, risk management, assets), taxes (particularly income tax management), business organizations (advantages and disadvantages of sole proprietorships, partnerships, corporations, cooperatives as organizations for doing business), agricultural law (legal rights of farmers and ranchers and pertinent laws), computers (use in farm and ranch decision making), and whole farm case study (analysis of a farm situation). Appendixes include a glossary, bibliography, and index. (YLB)