FatimaMRKCH
Get Complete Project Material File(s) Now! »
Positioning the ARGOS social science approach
In the introductory document to the Social Objective of ARGOS (Rationale document – Campbell, et al. 2004), a broad distinction was made between two styles of research into sustainable agriculture. The first describes the reaction by a small group of scholars to the emerging and consolidating practices of industrial agriculture in modernity. This reaction and critique took shape over the whole course of the 20th Century (Stuart and Campbell 2004) and generally developed in the form of a critique of emerging industrial agricultural practices (focusing especially on new soil management techniques and fertiliser regimes in the first half of the century, and then shifting to include new pesticides post-WWII) and an aspirational set of prescriptions for what alternative agriculture ought to look like. These prescriptions for alternative agriculture included desirable social dimensions to farm activity and rural life. The second research narrative into the social dimensions of sustainable agriculture took shape in the 1980s. This narrative emerged in response to the development of new production-consumption linkages creating commercial opportunities for the development of sustainable agriculture. Throughout the 20th Century, there had been a small number of growers, cooperative gardens and other small-scale ventures that directly sold produce grown under the principles of organic agriculture (see Campbell and Liepins 2001). This group sold to the wider public under an ‘on trust’ basis – usually in face-to-face interactions. Often these arrangements also endorsed alternative social arrangements and discourses.
Methods of social data collection
The methods employed in the collection of social data for the ARGOS research objectives varied from those of a more qualitative, semi-structured interview to that of a formalised survey. The variety of methods were utilised in order to best collect different types of data and to facilitate the triangulation of findings within the social objective. Here, we will provide an overview of the methods employed in each study as an indication of the types of data and response that are available. The reports for each of the exercises provide a more detailed presentation and justification of the methods used in each specific case. First qualitative interview (Qual 1): a semi-structured interview designed to gather baseline data across social dimensions of interest to the social, economic and environmental objectives of the ARGOS project. This included open-ended queries of participant identity, vision (for self and farm), wellbeing and indicators thereof (for self, family, community, economic and environmental condition) and expectations of participation in the project. Participants were also asked to create a map (referred to in this report as sketch maps) of their farm/orchard that included aspects important to their management practice. For both Qual 1 and Qual 2, the interviews were transcribed and then coded by themes using NVivo qualitative analysis software.
Identified ARGOS panel differences: kiwifruit sector
As noted above, members of the each of the kiwifruit panels employ a recognisably distinct suite of orchard management practices. While it is, as yet, not completely evident if such practices can be deemed either more or less sustainable or more or less resilient, we are able to distinguish between the panels based on a set of social features exhibited by their members. These differences are evident in the range of data sources, although the extent to which these contribute to panel differentiation varies as demonstrated for the kiwifruit sector in Table 1 showing the key panel effects across the methods used and across both sectors.8 The purpose of the table is to compare results across methods within each sector and then across sectors with an emphasis on patterns in the results rather than on the results themselves. Emphasis will be given to the actual findings in the text of the report. Throughout the process of design, implementation and analysis, the data have been grouped according to the various aspects of the orchardists’ social life. In this report, we have structured our discussion to range from the personal characteristics of the participants to those elements defined through their interactions with wider social and physical environments, including their attitudes and subjectivity, the systems they manage, expressions of difference in their management practice and finally other differences that more directly involve off-farm and non-productive relationships.
Demographic characteristics
There is little to distinguish among the ARGOS kiwifruit panels based on the demographic characteristics of the participant orchardists.9 For example, each of the panels includes a statistically similar range of age and education. They also consist of a similar distribution of orchardists from the range of lifecycle stages, although there appears to be a perceptual difference noted in the qualitative data whereby the Green orchardists are more likely to emphasise the orchard’s role in their retirement planning (discussed below). The data collected in the national survey do, by contrast, indicate some distinctions based on an orchardist’s primary means of achieving ownership of the orchard. In this case, the distinctions correspond with qualitative data suggesting that the Organic orchardists include a larger number who are not from a farming background (less likely than Gold to rely on other agricultural income and more likely than Green to rely on non-farm earnings to obtain orchard). In addition, Green orchardists (being less dependent on inherited land) include a larger number who are not from an orcharding background than Gold. Interpretation of these differences is further influenced by the fact that (based on 2005 data) the Organic and Gold orchardists reported to have been on their current orchard for seven to eight years longer than their Green counterparts.
Orchardist esteem, stress and satisfaction
The esteem that participants derived in their role as orchardists largely revolved around their participation in an industry with well-established standards for determining the acceptability of given management practices and the quality of the fruit produced. In many cases, compliance with the EurepGAP audit scheme provided a re-affirmation of the orchardist’s identity as a producer of a premium product who employed practices which respected both environmental and social wellbeing. To the extent that the audit was perceived as testing the appropriateness of the individual orchardist’s management, however, the audit was also a source of potential stress. A similarly double edged assessment of kiwifruit quality – the Taste ZESPRI programme, which offers premiums on payments for fruit with higher dry matter levels – alternatively rewards orchardists able to meet standards while frustrating those (often with orchards located in more marginal production regions) who bemoan the lack of proven technologies for increasing dry matter in their own fruit
Table of Contents :
- Table of Contents
- Executive Summary
- 1. Introduction
- ARGOS Panels
- Sustainable Agriculture: The Social and Transdisciplinary Dynamics
- Positioning the ARGOS social science approach
- Framing the Question of Social Difference in Market-Audit Demarcated Production
- Systems
- Preliminary ARGOS results and Ovoid Ideal Types
- Panel integrity
- Methods of social data collection
- 2. Identified ARGOS panel differences: kiwifruit sector
- Demographic characteristics
- Orchardist subjectivity and attitudes
- Orchardist esteem, stress and satisfaction
- Sense of place; bond to orchard
- Symbolic qualities of the product
- Peer comparisons
- Environment and nature
- Positioning relative to the kiwifruit industry
- Positioning relative to society
- Learning and networks
- Expression in management actions
- Productivity/productivism
- Risk, innovation, and challenges
- Summary
- 3. Identified ARGOS panel differences: sheep/beef sector
- Demographic characteristics
- Farmer subjectivity and attitudes
- Farmer esteem, stress, satisfaction, identity
- Sense of place; bond to land
- Symbolic qualities of the product
- Peer comparisons
- Environment and nature
- Positioning relative to the sheep/beef industry
- Positioning relative to society
- Learning and networks
- Expression in management actions
- Signifiers of good farming
- Productivity/productivism
- Risk, innovation and challenge
- Summary of Sheep/Beef:
- 4. Conclusion
- Overview table of social objective results
- Relevance to potential dimensions of social differentiation
- Potential for facilitating transdisciplinary discussion
- Audit and Market Access
- Resilience
- Intensification
- References
GET THE COMPLETE PROJECT
Social Objective Synthesis Report: Differentiation among Participant Farmers/Orchardists in the ARGOS Research Programme
