Agricultural employment trends in Latin America and new requirements for statistics Fourth International Conference on Agricultural Statistics (ICAS-4) October 2007, Beijing - China

Objectives  To identify some recent trends in agricultural and rural employment in Latin America that require additional or improved information to be properly interpreted  To analyze the new requirements that policy analysis, design and implementation are imposing on statistics

Trend 1: Growing divide between agricultural and rural employment  Agricultural workers increasingly have their residence in urban areas  Rural dwellers are increasingly working in non-agricultural activities (RNFE)

Agricultural workers with urban residence are becoming more important in some Latin American countries Source: The author based on household surveys

RNFE importance has grown in most Latin American countries Source: The author based on household surveys

Trend 2: Changes in employment profile: feminization, ageing and informality  Migration and RNFE patterns, according to which more qualified workforce tends to leave agriculture first, contribute to the feminization and ageing of the agricultural workforce  So does the lack of a universal social security system in the sector  Self-employment is still predominant, even if non-paid work is decreasing and hired labour is increasing in some countries

Agriculture has the highest participation of child work and workers over age 60. Women are less represented in this sector Source: The author based on household surveys

Women participation in agriculture has increased but it is still well below women participation in non-agricultural activities Source: The author based on household surveys

Agriculture has the highest participation of workers over age 60 among all activities and it is increasing Source: The author based on household surveys

Own-account workers are still predominant in the region as a whole… Source: The author based on household surveys

… even if non-paid workers have decreased in several countries and in the region as whole Source: The author based on household surveys

Trend 3: Poverty alleviation is one of the main public concerns in the region  Policies to reduce poverty in the region must pay special attention to rural poverty  Poverty is concentrated in rural areas, even if the number of poor people have decreased more in rural areas than in urban areas  Rural poverty is concentrated in own-account workers in agriculture and, to a lesser extent, salaried workers. The average income of the first group decreased in most countries

The proportion of poor people living in rural areas in the total of poor people is much higher than the proportion of rural population in the total population Source: The author based on household surveys

The proportion of agricultural own-account workers in rural poor people is much higher than the proportion of these workers in rural employment Source: The author based on household surveys

Other kinds of income (transfers, second activity income) are probably becoming more important in fighting poverty Source: The author based on household surveys

Some implications for (and limitations of) statistics

Differences in the definition of RURAL influence trends, comparisons and policies Source: Dirven et al.

A continuous switch from one data source to another is increasingly needed: They must “talk”, that is, be interoperable  Analyzing rural employment requires working with agricultural as well as non-agricultural statistical sources  The decision-making rationale and the economic and social impacts of changes in agriculture also have to be investigated outside rural households  Analyzing the impact of employment, production or trade policies on poverty, for instance, requires information on economic and productive aspects (economic censuses) and others dealing with labour and household decisions (household surveys), both in rural and urban areas

Information is increasingly required, but not available, on some so far “invisible” agents and the informal sector Data on employment in Agricultural Censuses in Latin America Holders (employers or own-account) Permanent workersTemporary workersFamily members By sexBy ageBy sexBy ageBy sexBy ageBy sexBy age Brazil Chile Ecuador Mexico Nicaragua Panama Paraguay Peru Uruguay Venezuela Source: The author based on Agricultural censuses

Emphasis on local development policies requires disaggregated information and/or new possibilities of aggregation  Location and infrastructure play a determining role on the potentialities and limitations of agricultural and rural employment  The importance of non-agricultural rural activities in household’s income, for instance, is clearly affected by its closeness to towns and roads  The availability, quality and economic use of different assets depend on the location and accessibility of resources; cultural and productive “distances” are also crucial

Some recommendations from several studies to make new requirements operational  To widen discussions to find a concept of rural that better fits the regional reality  To make available some alternative (socioeconomic, agroecological) divisions besides official administrative or geographic divisions in relevant statistical sources  To improve georeferenced data (municipalities and levels below it) on distances, infrastructure, land use, etc

Some recommendations from several studies to make new requirements operational  In household surveys, gather information on incomes, value of goods and services and time dedicated to productive activities per household member; also gather information on reasons for not having employment, when it applies  In agricultural censuses, to collect information at least on the age, sex and educational level of permanent and temporary workers, beyond that on holders and family members engaged in agriculture

Some recommendations from several studies to make new requirements operational in Latin America  Based on international classifications, national statistical offices should work on generating status on employment categories specifics to the national market labour, trying to better capture informal work  Finally, these offices should extend the public access to the already existing information, widening its codification, tabulation and publication

Thank you! Contact: Agricultural Development Unit Production, Productivity and Management Division