The knowledge cultures of changing farming practices in a water town of the Southern Yangtze Valley, China

Abstract

This paper presents an oral history of farming in the Southern Yangtze Valley in China, covering the period from pre-liberation to recent market liberalization. Using the stories and observations of 31 elderly residents of a small water town, the paper describes the hard labour of traditional farming practices and the acquiescence of many when, post-liberation, they could leave farming for better-paid factory work.However, in a departure from conventional analyses, these oral histories suggest that the co-dependency culture of traditional farming has broken down, and farmers are unwilling to return to the land and continue farming. The changes in knowledge cultures of local farmers in recent decades are not likely to lead to pathways to working with incoming modern 'outsider farmers' on the one hand, nor able to be blended with potential new 'urbanite' knowledges of those who might wish to increase organic farming.The current knowledge cultures of these farmers has shifted as needed to the optimization of family unit needs, naturally leading them to urbanization and the relinquishing of their ties to the land. For cultural rather than economic reasons, these farmers see themselves as the last peasant farmers of Tianshanzhuang.

The spaces and times of community farming

“…In the UK, CSA is an established, if still relatively novel, form of agricultural organisation that is largely counter-cultural in reifying small farms and local food (Saltmarsh et al 2011;Ravenscroft et al 2012Ravenscroft et al , 2013. This is not the case in China, where CSA is very much in the start-up phase and is utterly dominated by consumers (Si et al 2015) despite there being increasing recognition of the need to protect small farms and traditional farmers (Schneider 2015;Liu et al 2016).…”

The Use of Oral Histories to Identify Criteria for Future Scenarios of Sustainable Farming in the South Yangtze River, China

“…Activities began in winter, often during the Chinese Spring Festival, about three months before planting the rice. Once the river mud had been collected, farmers would lay it down and leave it to dry for 15 to 30 days to reduce its weight, and then transport it to the farm [9]. Even then, however, the weight of the river mud made transportation to the farms an arduous task: " .…”

“…Before Liberation, the shadow price of farm labour was almost inexistent; labour was considered "free", more a way of life than a job, and the best, most honoured farmers were those with most knowledge of farming practices [9]: "There was little difference between the past and nowadays that the rich are always of prestige. However, in the past, those with more farming experience and knowledge tended to be of more prestige."…”

“…While at the beginning non-farm work in factories and cities was not much better paid than farming, these new opportunities demonstrated how much more could be earned from non-farm work, and what kind of lifestyle could be achieved away from farming. Thus, more people wanted to move away from farming [9]. After the Open and Reform Policy, the opportunity cost of rural labour increased dramatically.…”

“…Liu's recent work on knowledge cultures [9] provides some insight into this question, arguing that it is not so much a question of "failure" to pass on agricultural knowledge as one of "unwillingness" to do so as local farmers are replaced with professional workers, and they can find higher income work elsewhere.…”