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A New System of Labour Management in A frican Large‐Scale Agriculture?
Author(s) -
Gibbon Peter,
Riisgaard Lone
Publication year - 2014
Publication title -
journal of agrarian change
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.63
H-Index - 56
eISSN - 1471-0366
pISSN - 1471-0358
DOI - 10.1111/joac.12043
Subject(s) - agriculture , scale (ratio) , sample (material) , returns to scale , economics , production (economics) , value (mathematics) , convention , agricultural economics , business , geography , microeconomics , mathematics , sociology , social science , statistics , chemistry , cartography , archaeology , chromatography
This paper applies a convention theory ( CT ) approach to the analysis of labour management systems in African large‐scale farming. The reconstruction of previous analyses of high‐value crop production on large‐scale farms in Africa in terms of CT suggests that, since 1980–95, labour management has moved from a ‘domestic’ to a ‘market’ system. However, data collected by the authors from a sample of 11 large‐scale rose farms in K enya in 2011 (covering around 20% of national output) points to the adoption of systems that, in CT terms, combine ‘industrial’ and ‘civic’ elements. The paper concludes by suggesting a series of hypotheses that might explain this trend.