Gender, Contracts and Wage Work: Agricultural Restructuring in Brazil's São Francisco Valley

Abstract

Brazil̂s São Francisco Valley provides an example of the ways in which agro‐food firms are attempting to mobilize and control labour as they expand production of fruits and vegetables for domestic and global markets. In crops where cost reduction is a primary concern, firms choose highly ‘flexible’ forms of labour mobilization, drawing on the casual labour of migrants from the Brazilian Northeast. In crops where the quality and timing of produce are of great importance, firms use either subcontracting arrangements that mobilize family labour, or the labour of local women and children. In this way, firms involved in the production of fruits and vegetables show many similarities to their counterparts in certain branches of industry: they are actively experimenting with labour arrangements that tap the most vulnerable segments of the international workforce, and that appropriate unpaid family labour.

Food Security, Productivity, and Gender Inequality

“…Lack of secure land rights and other resources can exclude women farmers from contract farming arrangements, as research in Kenya and Senegal shows (Dolan 2001, Maertens andSwinnen 2009). And in family farms where men hold the contracts, women tend to face heavier workloads while men control the cash generated (Collins 1993;FAO 2011). Women are also less able to adopt high yielding crop varieties and improved management systems due to poorer access to extension services (see Doss 2001, for Africa).…”

Reverse leasing and power dynamics among blue agave farmers in western Mexico

“…Agricultural production processes are becoming progressively more industrialized, and the increased scales of production that are required for technology adoption both require and facilitate the concentration and centralization of capital (Magdoff et al, 2000;van der Ploeg, 1999). Increasingly, small farmers are integrated into agro-industrial sectors through the use of contract arrangements, particularly in the production of high value crops (Little and Watts, 1994;Collins, 1993;Raynolds, 2000;Dolan, 2001;Singh, 2002). These arrangements have been promoted in developing countries as ''dynamic partnerships'' between small farmers and capital (Williams and Karen, 1985;Eaton and Shepherd, 2001;USAID, 1994).…”

“…Other negative effects of contract farming include increased social differentiation among farmers (Collins, 1993;Singh, 2002;Watts, 1994), a devaluing of farmer knowledge (Wolf et al, 2001;Raynolds, 2000), loss of farmers' independence (Collins, 1993;Clapp, 1994), and increased gender inequity (Dolan, 2001). Clapp (1994) states that although contract farming is promoted as preserving farmers' autonomy, under contract arrangements farmers are forced to surrender direct control over the inputs, product, and labor process.…”

“…These arrangements have been promoted in developing countries as ''dynamic partnerships'' between small farmers and capital (Williams and Karen, 1985;Eaton and Shepherd, 2001;USAID, 1994). Contract arrangements are increasingly adopted by agroindustrial firms because they allow firms to maintain control over the production process while increasing flexibility and reducing labor costs (Raynolds, 2000;Collins, 1993). States and development agencies promote contract arrangements primarily because of their ability to redistribute the risks of producing crops in highly volatile markets and because of the assumption that they help to provide resource-poor growers with the capital-intensive inputs necessary for ''efficient'' production (Williams and Karen, 1985;USAID, 1994).…”

What do we mean when we say casualisation of farm work is rising?: Evidence from fruit farms in the Western Cape

“…As a result, the employment status of farm women was changed from temporary to permanent. This is more evidence that the jobs considered suitable for women are often just an excuse to maintain a flexible labour supply (Collins, 1993).…”