Macroeconomic strategies, agriculture and rural poverty in post ...

workers in this subsector has increased, or remained steady, in the face of sharp declines in
overall agricultural employment levels. Horticultural farmers employ more labour at higher
wage rates than field crops and animal products, the other two main agricultural sub-sectors
(Abstract, Agricultural Statistics 1995). Indeed, irrigated agriculture requires five times more
labour than for field crops (Standing et al 1996). Citrus farmers currently employ upwards of
100,000 workers (Dixie 1995) and employment in the deciduous fruit sector is over 330,000
(de Klerk 1996). Many of these farm workers are rural women, a category that most poverty
studies identify as being the poorest and most vulnerable group in South Africa. One of the
reasons why employment levels have not declined as rapidly is because harvesting, planting
and maintaining horticultural crops is less vulnerable to mechanisation. In contrast, the
impact of mechanisation of field crops like maize, which has been well documented, has had
far reaching impacts on employment structure and overall levels of employment (de Klerk
1984; Marcus 1989). Increasing levels of mechanization, particularly in the period after the
late 1960s, led to a sharp decrease in the overall workforce on maize farms. Casual and
seasonal workers, most of whom were women, were disproportionately affected by
mechanization: while the numbers of permanent employees decreased by 20%, the number
of casual employees dropped by as much as 50% on some farms. Although the labour
process in horticulture is not immune to labour saving devices, many tasks, notably
harvesting soft and easily bruised fruit and vegetables, cannot be performed using a machine.
Since export agriculture depends on irrigation, production levels - and by implication
employment levels - are less vulnerable to periodic droughts which devastate other sectors of
agriculture. While the value of maize exports in 1994 - a year of exceptionally high rainfall -
was far higher than for all other crops, the value of maize exports varied wildly in the period
between 1989 and 1994 (Figure 1). Citrus and deciduous fruit exports, in contrast, were far
more stable and both experienced comparatively steady gains through the 1990s. The
dislocation that farm workers experience when maize and other field crops fail due to
drought, is less likely for farm workers on fruit, vegetable and citrus farms. The organisation
of fruit, citrus and grape product marketing also places industry in a strong position to
expand exports. Marketing is organised by several large interconnected monopolies which
control the sophisticated infrastructure required to transport the crop from the farm to an
overseas supermarket. Although the statutory monopoly these organisations have had over
exports has been questioned or repealed, they have the resources and expertise to open new
overseas markets in an extremely competitive international environment.
9
Figure 1: Value of exports for selected
(constant rands)
1800
1600
1400
1200
1000
800
Rand
600
400
200
0
1989 1990 1991 1992 1993 1994
Maize
Citrus
Deciduous fruit
Year