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Styles of Pig Farming and Family Labour in the Netherlands

Posted on: Tuesday, 5 July 2005, 12:00 CDT

INTRODUCTION TO THE RESEARCH

The concept of styles is multidimensional. With respect to farming, the concept of styles entails the whole of farming practices, including strategies on labour, scale and intensity, recruitment of supplies, and sales of commodities. In Hofstee's research (1946, 1985), styles of farming were related to the production of commodities in different production branches and in different areas, that is dairy production versus arable farm production. In this perception of styles, the agricultural branch specialisation and the type of market integration were all incorporated in the contrasts amongst styles of farming. In the research work of Van der Ploeg and his group (1994, 1996, 2003), the concept of styles was often studied within a specific agricultural branch and within a certain type of market integration. They often focussed specifically on the process of farm production practices within a certain commodity branch in reflection to labour, scale, and intensity, just like in the current study.

Pig farms in The Netherlands are family based, and from a social perspective are largely comparable to dairy and arable farms. Pig breeding is quite often a second, and equally important, branch on dairy farms and arable farms, especially in the study area. The strengths of the Dutch pig farming business are the low costs and high efficiency of production (Kearney, 1994; Wijffels, 2001).

The research reported here focuses on the farm labour aspect of the various styles of farming in the multiplication branch of pig production. Though the current study focuses on the specialised bulk production of feeder pigs (young pigs of 25 kilograms ready for fattening), on several farms there were mixed activities. These mixed activities and the styles of farming that might be related to these mixed activities could have interfered with the classification of styles of farming in the current study.

The aim of studying the division of labour on the farms was to see to what extent the types of labour division could be linked to styles of farming. Such links would be expressed in the foundation for the farming activities with respect to the approach toward farm labour and farm production, in the economic ambitions of the farmer, and in the expressed rationale of the farming practice.

MATERIALS AND METHODS

A survey was conducted using the outlines of Nooij (1990). In the survey conducted in 1998, 82 pig producers in Twente and The Achterhoek (eastern region in The Netherlands) were interviewed at their farms by means of a questionnaire. In the questionnaire, pig producers were invited to choose from suggested answers adopted from information obtained in an initial study (conducted in 1996; Commandeur, 1998). The survey was conducted of pig producers who participated in a management support programme. About 75-80% of all pig producers in the research area participated in such a programme in 1998.

Information about farm activities was obtained through questions about farm size, combinations of farm branches and production types, farm income, availability of labour, and labour division amongst family members. Farms were also typed as to styles of farming by means of factor analysis of the coherence in responses to the questionnaire as a whole (involving many technical and social aspects of farming practices) (Commandeur, 2003).

RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

Many farms in the study are mixed farms in which the activities of pig production are embedded in a range of activities involving other on-farm and off-farm activities (the type and amount of other activities varied amongst styles of farming). Occasionally the demands of these other activities conflict with pig production.

In the survey, five styles of farming were distinguished: entrepreneurs, craftsmen, stewards, stockmen, and shifters. The coherence in responses to the questionnaire was found in difference in orientations on access to labour, on the role of production, and on the ambitions for farm economy. Labour input, ambition, and income together determined the farm size. All vary amongst styles of farming. The following issues are important for the division of labour on the farm: the input of successors, the input of women, hired labour, help from various family members, and assistance in farm administration.

Interviewees were asked to specify who on the farm performed particular activities in the feeder pig production division. For the most part, the men aged between 30 and 60 years were involved with all aspects of farming practices. Most women in this age group were also involved with the farming practices, though usually part-time and often for specific tasks (like administration).

It seems that in families with young children, the women spent fewer hours in farm work and performed activities that were relatively easy to combine with childcare (like administration). This was consistent across all styles of farming. In households with older children, the role of the women varied, and differences amongst styles of farming were more evident.

The farm activities performed by women on some farms were generally the same activities performed by hired labour on other farms. This was particularly the case with regard to feeding and cleaning activities (done by women and/or hired labour) and administration of manure and tax declaration (done by women and/or external services). The exceptions to this rule were management administration and building maintenance. Management administration was often done by women, but seldom by hired labour. Building maintenance was rarely done by women, though oftea through external input such as hired labour. If a decision making process was strictly technical (for example the choice of a boar for artificial insemination), the choice was often made by the husband on his own. If a decision concerned the whole farm as an enterprise, the husband seldom made a decision alone. His wife was often involved in the decision making process, and usually also other people concerned- other family members and sometimes even hired labour workers. If a decision concerned the whole farm, external advice was also often consulted.

The involvement of each family member as well as others in specific activities is described more closely in order to examine the activities and the involvement in relation to styles of farming. The division of specific activities by family members and other labourers is only slightly different amongst the various styles of farming. This is even the case involving activities with a close correlation to productivity, intensity, and/or scale, like tax administration and building maintenance. The survey results were closely examined for combinations of the distribution of labour and activities on the farms. This examination reveals that farms can be categorised into four general groups.

Group 1. A child (usually a son) of the farmer is in the process of taking over the farm (succession). The father and the son do (nearly) all the physical farm work together, as these two people are capable of handling it without a problem. They feed the sows and piglets, choose boars, apply inseminations, assist at farrowing (delivery), meet service people, do farm administration (or have it done externally), and do the cleaning of the pen and the yard maintenance. There is little involvement of hired farm hands or of the wife/mother in the physical daily work, though she is often involved in making decisions.

Group 2. The husband/farmer is also a manager. He does both the management and part of the physical work in the pens, assisted by significant contributions from hired labour. The hired labourers perform predominantly the daily and weekly routines, like feeding the sows and piglets, applying inseminations, assisting at farrowing, meeting service people, and cleaning of pens. There is little involvement of the wife or any other family members in the farm work.

Group 3. The farm work is done by a variety of family members, including the wife and often with the assistance of a part-time farm hand. There is usually a clear task division, especially for those who participate only a few hours per day or per week in the work, for instance in feeding, cleaning, or administration.

Group 4. The wife is well involved in all the farm work, participating in a variety of farm tasks, including administration and participation in study clubs and courses. Usually the husband and wife together run the farm, with minor involvement of other family members and usually without assistance from hired farm hands.

In the survey there were no farms run completely by hired personnel (including the manager). Those farms do exist in The Netherlands, although there are but few, particularly in the study area. The four groups are associated with styles of farming and with family stages in the cycle of succession and continuity.

Group 1 is clearly connected to the transitional stage of succession. The stage of a farm enterprise with respect to succession is not a style of farming in itself. Nevertheless, the transmission stage can especially have substantial influence on the style. Bennett (1982) identified this stage of the enterp\rise as one of four major influences on the farm management style. The other major influences are mode of production, general economic conditions, and support load of the enterprise.

When farms are taken over, the son has usually been prepared to run the business through home learning from practice and formal education from study at an agricultural school. Being prepared in such a manner makes taking over the farm seem like a natural transition and way to ensure continuity over the next generation.

The fact that the wife on the farm, other family members, and hired farm hands are hardly involved in pig production during the period of succession is explained by the fact that in the transitional stage there is temporarily a surplus in the availability of labour. In that period, there are two families available to do the work, the elder and the younger generation, and both families require an income from the farm. Both before and after the period of succession there is one family involved. Therefore, in this stage the more flexible family members focus on other activities. In this respect the women are particularly important. Nowadays the women often take advantage of the period of succession by developing new farm activities, like home sales of farm products, home processing of farm products, starting a camping ground, and so on.

Group 2 is characterised by the significant presence of hired labour. Hired labour costs money by the hour and should therefore be used as economically as possible. In this study, entrepreneurs had the most hired labour and stewards had none. If there is a lot of hired labour, the farm is not always a mutual family interest. Family members could well have offfarm interests and jobs. This is particularly the case with entrepreneurs. Entrepreneurs also set criteria about the qualifications for personnel. To them, it is an aspect of farm business competition. Stewards, on the other hand, seldom hire labour and when they do it is often a family member. Although these people are often qualified for the work through education, these qualifications are not the prime criterion for hiring.

The survey shows that all styles of farming have a certain extent of qualified hired personnel, but the criteria for hiring are different, varying from labour economy to social and family based. This holds far-reaching implications. For example, contrary to hired help, a family member cannot be "fired" from the family.

Group 3 is associated with the typical Dutch tradition. The farm is the family's collective interest and the centre of its existence. This group of farms is associated with inheritorship and in particular with stewardship. There is little or no external labour involved in this group. It is also on these farms that an extended relative or individual from the village might be accepted as an extra farm hand for social reasons only. This group reflects a specific and widespread traditional ambition in farming: the tradition of continuity.

In Group 4, the equal involvement of men and women is associated with craftsmanship and stewardship. Women with interest in physical farm work are often keen "craftsmen". The reverse is not always the case: farms with keen craftsmanship can exist without the specific involvement of the women. On farms with a particular involvement of women, there is sometimes reluctance to hire external labour (see also Group 3). This reluctance to hire labour is associated with women in both craftsmanship and stewardship styles of farming: As one indicated, "If there were hired labour here I wouldn't have to work as much. But then we wouldn't discuss that much either about all that happens".

Apart from remarkable craftsmanship, women are also known to play a key role on farms where the welfare of animals is central (tendership; see Commandeur, 1998). In this case, it is the woman's eye for detail that comes from her specific interest in this branch of farming.

SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION

There are differences athwart styles of farming concerning both the role of hired labour and the role of various family members, particularly the women on the farm. To an extent, the differences are directly linked to the situation concerning farm succession, but the differences in roles are also specifically linked to styles of farming, reflecting both the differences in foundation and in ambition of farming. The presence and personnel approach of hired labour on the farm is directly linked to the perception of family farming. This perception concerns if farming is principally a family business, or a family-headed business in which labour is a business factor, subjected to arguments of efficiency. Perceptions about the role and position of women are linked to the economic ambition of farming, competition, continuity, or independence. In a setting where the ambition of farming is competition, the women are often focused on a career of their own, which could well be off-farm. Women play particularly a role in the ambition for continuity. Within this ambition, the role of women is a flexible one depending on the stage of succession, the age of the children, and their personal interests. Their personal interests are one of the directive factors of how and to what extent women choose to take part in on-farm activities. They are often initiators of new on- farm activities. Women with particular interest in a specific farm branch (in this study, feeder pig production) are often the ones with perceptiveness for detail, leading to high production and remarkably good animal health (craftsmanship), or remarkable welfare of the animals (tendership).

This study supports the vision that the role of women family members and of hired labour should be studied within the concept of styles of farming. The coherence within each style directs the position and flexibility of the available labour. Particularly, hired labour and women often have interchangeable roles.

GENERAL DISCUSSION: THE FUTURE OF FAMILY FARMING IN THE NETHERLANDS

In The Netherlands, about 2-3% of the farms disappear yearly. Since 1950, the number is reduced from about 200 000 to less than 100 000. It is expected that before 2010-2015, another 50 000 farms will disappear. At present, only one in 75 households are regarded as "agricultural" (Schnabel, 2001). According to Van der Ploeg (2003), the present number of 100 000 is already an exaggeration of about 40%.

More than ever, a Dutch farm is a family farm, or perhaps better stated, a marriage partnership. Women do a quarter of the work in agriculture, often in a formal husband and wife partnership. This is also the most common formal farm organisation in the survey discussed in this article (see also Commandeur, 2003).

Two processes, each of which has a specific character, cause the decrease in number of farms. One process is the scale enlargement and increase in intensity, particularly in animal production. This process follows a rather predictable pattern in the last 50 years. The total area of 2 million hectares has not changed much over the last 200 years, although milk production increased by a factor of 10 and the number of pigs and chicken increased 70 fold. In the last century, the labour productivity in agriculture increased by 20 fold (Schnabel, 2001; Schot et al., 2000). This process, driven by international market economy, caused a steady reduction of farms. The process has a stimulating effect on the eagerness of farmers to continue farming. The remaining farms require an increased level of knowledge, of product quality, and (particularly) of investments.

The other process is the emergence of unpredictable new risks. The risks involve the sudden appearance, or disappearance, of EU and government regulations, disease epidemics (swine fever 1997-1998, foot-and-mouth disease 2001, and aviary influenza 2003) that implicate massive government measures and the closing of borders for export, sudden actions of consumer organisations or nature protection organisations, and regular scandals of claimed food quality problems. Since the mid-1990s, these risks seem to accumulate. The process has a deep social, economic, and psychological impact on farm families, and undermines the willingness to continue farming. Over the last five years there has been an increasing willingness of farmers to accept an offer by the government to quit.

Voluntary termination of a farm is a kind of euphemistic term (Van der Ploeg, 2003). Farmers do not terminate a farm by free will, but feel forced to do so for lack of possibilities for succession or by "accepting an offer they cannot resist". The lack of possibilities for succession are sometimes caused by a lack of relevant relatives (children), but are more often caused by a lack of perspective to get sufficient family income out of the farm for a newly starting generation. The lack of income perspective is due to the requirement of excessive investments.

These findings in The Netherlands are similar to what has been happening in the United Kingdom, where farmers have recently suffered from new and unpredicted developments, like the impact of the BSE crisis and the epidemic of foot-and-mouth disease in 2001. Reed et al. (2002) described the concept of a "vulnerability continuum" for farms and farm households, which has emerged particularly at mixed farms and livestock farms. They recommended their government to facilitate getting farmers off the farm.

In The Netherlands, the future of all styles of farming is disputable-particularly in pig production. Farms with ambition for participation (stewards, stockmen, and shifters) and spreading market risks are increasingly at risk of not managing to allocate the required investments for future continuation. Farms with ambitions for continuing modernisation and expansion are increasingly vulnerable to the unpredictable new risks.

In a survey conducted in 1998 of pig production farmers in t\he east of The Netherlands, labour division amongst family members appeared to depend on style of farming. The role of the men on the farm is connected to the attitude to hired labour: the more hired labour, the more the men become farm managers. The role of women on the farm is primarily connected to the age of their children. Women with young children perform farm activities that can be more easily combined with childcare. The role of women who are less occupied with young children varies amongst styles of farming. At the time of succession, it is often the women who initiate extra farm activities, like home procession and sales of farm products, involvement with tourism, et cetera. In the research five styles of farming were defined and given metaphoric names: entrepreneur, craftsman, steward, stockman, and shifter. Every style of farming showed a specific coherence in the organisation of the farm work.

REFERENCES

Bennett, J. W.

1982 Of Time and the Enterprise. North American Family Farm Management in a Context of Resource Marginality, Based on a Decade of Research in the Province of Saskatchewan, Canada. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.

Commandeur, M. A. M.

1998 Gesloten bedrijven; verscheidenheid in de zeugenhouderij [Closed Farming Systems: Diversity in Pig Production]. CERES Studies van Landbouw en Platteland 26. Wageningen University, The Netherlands.

2003 Styles of Pig Farming. A Techno-Sociological Inquiry of Processes and Constructions in Twente and The Achterhoek. Unpublished thesis, Wageningen University, The Netherlands.

Hofstee, E. W.

1946 Over de oorzaken van verscheidenheid in de Nederlandse landbouwgebieden. Rede uitgesproken bij de aanvaarding van het ambt van hoogleraar aan de (toenmalige) Landbouwhogeschool te Wageningen [About the Causes for Diversity amongst Dutch Agricultural Regions: Inaugural Speech at the Acceptance of the Office of Professor at the (then) Agriculture College of Wageningen]. Wageningen University, The Netherlands.

1985 Groningen van grasland naar bouwland, 1750-1930. Een agrarisch-economische ontwikkeling als probleem van sociale verandering [From Pasture to Arable Land in Groningen, 1750-1930. Agricultural-Economic Development as a Problem of Social Change]. PUDOC, Wageningen, The Netherlands.

Kearney, A. T.

1994 De markt gemist? Door beperjcte marktgerichtheid dreigt somber perspectief voor Nederlandse agrosector [Have We Missed the Markets? Because of Limited Market Focus a Gloomy Perspective is Imminent for the Dutch Agricultural sector]. A. T. Kearney Management Consultants, Amsterdam, The Netherlands.

Nooij, A, T. J.

1990 Sociale Methodiek. Normatieve en beschrijvende methodieken in grondvormen [Social Methodology. Normative and Descriptive Methodologies in Basic Modes]. Leiden, NL: Stenfert Kroese.

Ploeg, J. D. Van der

1994 "Styles of farming. An introductory note on concepts and methodology." Pp. 7-30 in J. D. Van der Ploeg and A. Long (eds.), Born from Within. Practices and Perspectives of Endogenous Rural Development. Assen/Maastricht, NL: Van Gorcum

1996 Labour, Markets and Agricultural Production [student edition]. Wageningen University, CERES, The Netherlands.

2003 The Virtual Farmer. Assen/Maastricht, NL: Van Gorcum.

Ploeg, J. D. Van der, and A. Long (eds.)

1994 Born From Within. Practices and Perspectives of Endogenous Rural Development. Assen/ Maastricht, NL: Van Gorcum.

Reed, M., M. Lobley, M. Winter, and J. Chandler

2000 Family Farmers on the Edge: Adaptability and Change in Farm Households (Final Report for The Countryside Agency). University of Plymouth, University of Exeter, UK. URL [www.ex.ac.uk/crr/pdf1/ mattreedl/final_report_vl3.pdf].

Schnabel, P.

2001 Waarom blijven boeren? Over voortgang en bee'indiging van het boerenbedrijf [Why Do Farmers Stay? About Progress and Ending of Farming Businesses]. The Hague, NL: Sociaal Cultureel Planbureau SCP.

Schot, J. W., H. W. Lintsen, A. Rip, and A. A. Albert De La Bruheze (eds.)

2000 Techniek in Nederland in de twintigste eeuw III. Landbouw en voeding. Stichting Historic der Techniek [Technology in the Netherlands in the Twentieth Century (Volume III). Agriculture and Nutrition. Council for the History of Technology]. Eindhoven, NL: Walburg.

Wijffels, H. H. F. (and others)

2001 Toekomst voor de veehouderij. Agenda voor een herontwerp van de sector. Rapport van de denkgroep Wijffels [A Future for Livestock Breeding: Agenda for Redesigning the sector. Report of the Think Tank Presided by Wijffels, Ministry of Agriculture, Nature Management and Fisheries]. The Hague, NL: Ministerie van LNV.

MONICA A. M. COMMANDEUR*

* Departments of Rural Sociology and of Animal Science, Wageningen University, Hollandseweg 1 (bode 50), 6706 KN Wageningen, The Netherlands. Email: monica.commandeur@wur.nl

Copyright University of Calgary, Department of Sociology Summer 2005

Source: Journal of Comparative Family Studies

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