Work organization on smallholder dairy farms: a process unique to each farm.

The way smallholder farms organize and carry out work impacts their ability to secure their livelihoods and meet growing demand for agricultural products. This study investigates the way dairy family farms in Brazil manage their workforce to achieve their objectives of production and income. Fifteen smallholder farms were surveyed using the QuaeWork method to understand the work organization on each farm. A high diversity of workloads was found, but these do not appear to be strictly related to the farms' production systems. The high variability of workloads is linked to the available workforce, technical choices, and the delegation of tasks to an external workforce. Farmers can decrease their workload by adopting milking mechanization, silage, hiring labor, and increasing the duration of the work day. Work organization depends on a farmer's personal choices, rendering the whole issue of workforce management a process unique to each farm.

Relationships between work organisation and size of dairy farms: a case study based in Vietnam.

In Vietnam, livestock farming policy is designed to develop milk production to increase the country's dairy self-sufficiency. However, workload is one of the main constraints limiting the potential for increasing production and herd sizes on family-run farms. The aim of this paper was to explore the relationships connecting work organisation forms and durations to herd sizes in order to understand the impacts of rationalising work by increasing herd numbers. A work organisation survey was carried on 19 dairy farmers in two regions of northern Vietnam. Statistical analysis was run to identify relationships between herd size, work organisation forms and work durations. A cluster analysis was used to establish a typology. The results show that the volume of routine work is higher in large herds but is also more efficient. Farmers running large herds lighten their family workload by mechanising routine tasks and by employing permanent contract workers. The paper concludes on a set of guidance strategies to help dairy farms develop their activity, such as hiring farm labour and mechanising farm tasks.