关于发展家庭农场的对策研究

家庭农场与种养大户、农民合作社、农业产业化龙头企业都是农业经营主体,但这些经营主体功能不同、各有优势,它们是互补关系,而非取代关系。上海市松江区和吉林省延边州的家庭农场在我国具有典型意义。松江区、延边州为了避免在工业化、城镇化快速推进过程中,可能出现农业被边缘化、农地粗放经营等问题,探索发展了家庭农场。目前,各地发展家庭农场的积极性很高,但认识上还存在一些误区,这些认识如得不到及时澄清,可能使家庭农场培育偏离健康发展的轨道。     

Neither ‘family’ nor ‘corporate’ farming: Australian tomato growers as farm family entrepreneurs

For the past two decades there has been much debate about the future of family farming. The basic question on which this debate has turned is whether current pressures on family farm systems should be understood as symptomatic of a terminal condition, in which farmers are replaced progressively by corporate ownership; or whether family farms will persist as a social formation, albeit increasingly subsumed by off-farm interests. Using evidence from the Australian processing tomato sector, this article documents the changing social and economic formation of ‘family farming’. We argue that in this industry, the appropriate way to describe farmers is through the deployment of that a new category of farming; farm family entrepreneurs. This phrase is coined to describe the situation where family units remain at the social and economic heart of farm ownership and operation, but in the context where they relate to their land-based assets through legal and financial structures characteristic of the wider economy. As this article explores, this formation seems to represent an accommodating modus operandi for farm units within neo-liberal agricultural governance. Nevertheless, however, this duality of family-based structures and capitalist entrepreneurialism inevitably provokes a series of tensions, whose resolution requires a variety of organizational strategies to be put in place.     

Shifting values in agriculture: the farm family and pollution regulation1

It has long been acknowledged that the notion of family continuity of farm occupation through succession is one of the central tenets of the ethos of ‘family’ farming, but recent evidence suggests that it is being called into question by family members. Farming practices are being pursued in a rapidly changing world, an important feature of which is a greater level of public and political concern for protecting the rural environment. This paper examines a range of new influences affecting farming practice and environmental consciousness and the implications these have for farming values, particularly that of family succession. Using evidence from a study of dairy farm families and pollution regulation in Devon in South West England, it suggests that rural social change is providing new routes through which environmental values can flow through farm households, influencing the ways farmers understand the environmental implications of their practices, and the ways they and their families think about their long-term futures.     

Rural change in Prince Edward Island,Canada: an interactive of directive economy?

Galeski's work on rural social change and organisation provides the framework for an examination of recent change in the Canadian province of Prince Edward Island. The Island is a classic rural community, with its agriculture dominated by the potato. A variety of forces are promoting rural change, particularly those of an economic, political and social nature. The processes of change common to all developed capitalist rural economies — urbanisation, autonomous change, and agribusiness — are present, but there is also the PEI Development Plan, a fifteen-year federal-provincial program for the comprehensive economic and social advancement of the Province. The Plan has highlighted the obstacles to rural change. The family farm is central to the traditional Island way of life, but it is seen as being threatened by the growth of agribusiness and the increasing land purchases by non-residents. Other threats to the Island way of life are seen in the growth of tourism and the centralised school system. Paralleling these changes is the increasing level of direction in the Island's economy, particularly from the federal government and agribusiness. The response is seen in political change at the Provincial level, opposition to the Plan, and the tightest restrictions on non-resident and corporate land ownership in Canada. Rural change per se is not opposed, but there is a growing desire to preserve what is best in PEI and its traditional way of life.     

CORPORATE TAX LAWS, CORPORATE RESTRUCTURING, AND SUBSIDIARIZATION OF CORPORATE FORM, 1981–1995

Between 1981 and 1995 the dominant form of Fortune 500 firms changed from the multidivisional form to the multisubsidiary form (Zey and Camp 1996). The explanation for the movement toward subsidiarization originates in changes during the late 1970s and 1980s in the political economy, the relationship between corporations and capital, and the regulation of corporations. As a result of the declining capital accumulation of the 1970s, the federal government instituted two measures of corporate welfare, the Tax Reform Act of 1986 (TRA86) and the Revenue Act of 1987 (RA87), that provided corporations with nontaxable ways to restructure their acquisitions and divisions as subsidiaries. Thus, by the process of subsidiarization, corporations were able to continue capital flows. We examine the increase in subsidiarization from 1981–1995 as a means of assessing the utility of four theoretical perspectives to explain change in corporate form. A one-way random effects panel analysis demonstrates how corporate financial conditions, national business laws, and organizational characteristics combine to affect the rate of subsidiarization of U.S. corporations. Separate panel models for 1981–1985 (pre- TRA86) and 1986–1995 (post- TRA86) reveal that changes in corporate tax laws affect capital accumulation and result in significant change in corporate form. This analysis supports the structural political economy contingency theory arguing that change in capital accumulation, brought about by macro changes in political legal conditions of corporations, leads to the transformation of corporate form.     

Political culture and monopoly price determination

In this paper we study the endogenous determination of monopoly price. Our proposed game of endogenous monopoly-price setting extends the literature on monopoly-price, monopoly rent-seeking contests and monopoly rent-seeking rent-avoidance contests by (i) determining the monopoly price such that it maximizes a composite utility function that depends on two components: expected social welfare and lobbying efforts. The welfare component has a positive or no effect on the utility while the lobbying efforts have a positive, negative or no effect on the utility (ii) introducing the political culture of the government and clarifying its role in the endogenous determination of monopoly price. In the proposed model the single parameter representing political culture is the weight assigned to the enhancement of social welfare. Our main concern is with the study of the relationship between this parameter and the proposed monopoly price and, in turn, the rent-seeking rent-avoidance efforts of the potential monopoly and the consumers and their aggregate expected benefit. We are grateful to the referees for their constructive and helpful comments.     

Farm restructuring in the ex-GDR: towards a new farm model?

This article examines farm restructuring in the ex-GDR since reunification in 1990. In particular, attention is focused on four types of farm businesses that can be grouped into two broad groups: family farms and farm partnerships (both private farm business types) and corporate and cooperative farms. Both groups have attracted interest and comment because of the contrasting farming models that they represent, the former reflecting the West German family farm model and the latter with its similarities to the GDR large farm model. The article considers the starting point for restructuring, the framework in which it has occurred, with special reference to the privatisation of nationalised farmland, and examines the geographical outcomes in terms of the emerging farm structure and the competitiveness of different farm types. It is concluded that family farms and farm partnerships have been the main ‘winners’ of the restructuring process, but that corporate/cooperative farming has proved to be a resilient part of the farm structure. As a result, a varied farm structure has emerged that has the potential to be highly competitive within Germany and Europe. However, over-regulation by the government, especially in the case of privatisation of nationalised farmland, has delayed completion of the process, and may hinder competitiveness.     

Corporate support mechanisms for families: An exploratory study and agenda for research and evaluation

Based on telephone interviews with representatives from 16 corporations in the Baltimore-Washington area, this article explores the awareness of corporate officers of the linkages between work and family systems, their perceived responsibility for implementing policies and services that lend support to the family circumstances of employees, and the types of actions they had initiated in their corporations to help employees better balance work and family demands. Study results demonstrate limited awareness among corporate officers toward the work and family interface, employer uncertainty about corporate responsibilities for the family situation and demands of employees, and limited corporate development of family-oriented policies and services. These results are discussed in the context of recent federal initiatives to encourage greater corporate response to the family circumstances of employees. Implications are suggested for further research and evaluation.     

The politics of pluriactivity in Britain

This paper examines the political context to policies promoting farm diversification in Britain, in an attempt to understand both the fundamental contradictions which lie within these policies and the particular emphasis placed upon on-farm diversification in Britain. The paper begins therefore with an analysis of the politics of British agriculture in the 1980s, and then focuses in detail on policies which promote farm diversification. Finally, the paper compares these policies with evidence of trends and characteristics of pluriactivity in Britain, and suggests three major contradictions between government policies and observed farm household behaviour. A majority of farm households see little need to diversify and have even less inclination to do so. Any redeployment of on-farm resources is most likely to occur on the sale or transfer of the farm, and is unlikely to offer a source of alternative income for poor farmers.     

Family patterns and the politicization of consumption relations

There has been little sociological research on the processes of exploitation and the politicization of relations of consumption. This study examines the role that family structure plays in the development of a class‐based politicization of consumption relations in a community. I compare communities of the Lake Superior region at the turn of the 20th century that were settled largely by the male immigrants living without families with structurally‐similar communities from the same region and time that were settled larged by married workers and their families. Using local newspapers, corporate reports and federal and state investigations, I compare the level of politicization of consumption relations in family‐settled communities with those settled by male workers. I find some relationship between family settlement patterns and the politicization of consumption in a community, but the relationship is not constant across communities. Family‐based communities do have a greater ability to organize alternatives to corporate‐controlled consumption than do non‐family based communities.     

Contrasts and Commonalities: Hispanic and Anglo Farming in Conejos County,Colorado

Abstract The San Luis Valley farming systems' project sought to identify improved technologies and better decision-making capabilities for modest-sized and limited-resource farms. Characteristics of limited-resource farms operated by Hispanic and Anglo families, which may or may not be associated with differential rates of social participation and/or institutional discrimination, were examined. To determine characteristics of client farms, data were collected and stratified on farm resources, farm operations, goal hierarchies, and operational management strategies. Hispanic and Anglo farmers differed significantly in several respects. Key among these differences were crop and livestock enterprise mixes and the importance of off-farm income to households. For many farming parameters, farm size, age of farmer, and full-time/part-time characteristics overshadowed ethnicity as a determinant of decision-making. However, an important subset of the farm population is composed of Hispanic farmers who operate below median farm acreage on a part-time basis and for whom few technological developments or assistance programs are specifically designed or delivered.     

Farm labour in South Africa: A review article

Farm workers are among the lowest paid in the South African economy. Unprotected by statutory minimum wage fixings, denied access to collective bargaining processes or to elementary political rights, their conditions are often set by farmers whose only constraint is the need to keep enough workers on the land to farm comfortably. Regional shortages of labour do occur ‐ and provide upward pressure on wages ‐ but on the whole Black farm workers are prevented by lack of schooling, lack of skills and an apparently chronic shortage of urban housing from seeking alternative employment in the towns. In addition, the system of legislative controls over the movements of African workers operates to ‘trap’ them on the farms. Under these circumstances it is not surprising that wages and working conditions differ widely from region to region and even from farm to farm. At a recent conference on farm labour, in Cape Town, these regional differences (and some of the reasons for them) were described, the questions of general shortages or surpluses of labour were discussed and the historical development of capitalist agriculture was traced. This article is an attempt to summarise the main points in the 55 papers presented at the conference, by academics, farmers and others.     

Bottom-up childcare in a top-down welfare state: explaining cooperative organization among Swedish parents

Almost all children in Sweden spend at least some part of their early childhood in organized childcare, primarily in the form of preschools. About 10% of all preschools in Sweden are parent cooperatives, which make the childcare area an anomaly in the Swedish welfare state; no other service area has such a significant proportion of cooperative service providers. The parent cooperatives are initiated by the parents themselves, they are social enterprises created from the bottom-up. Why do parents decide to start a parent cooperative preschool in a welfare state where childcare is considered a social right and a responsibility for the state? This article will explore several different motives for starting parent cooperatives in Sweden, with special attention to the role of the public sector and political decisions. The findings are based on an extensive empiric study performed between the years 2003 and 2007.     

Understanding the Nature and Extent of Farm and Ranch Diversification in North America*

Abstract Pressure to adopt enhanced production technologies, changing government support policies, increasing and more diverse competition, and changing markets have posed economic challenges to North American farmers over the past two decades. As a response, farmers are adjusting their production model by incorporating agricultural related enterprises. Although there is evidence that farm diversification is occurring throughout North America, there is a dearth of scientific information regarding the types of enterprises being developed and used in this context. This study aims to fill this void by exploring the extent of farm diversification by identifying and describing eight types of enterprises that farmers and ranchers are using. It was found that levels of diversification are often dependent on operating and management attributes and owner characteristics, such as the number of family members working on the farm and the number of days that the farmer's spouse works off the farm.     

关于上海松江区发展家庭农场的思考

上海松江区改革农村土地管理制度,规范农村承包地流转,创新农业经营主体,培育、发展家庭农场,取得了明显成效。松江家庭农场经营模式为上海乃至全国发展家庭农场提供的启示是：顺应形势发展,为家庭农场成长创造良好的外部环境;培养职业农民,为家庭农场发展提供坚实的人力保障;加强扶持服务,为家庭农场发展提供有力的政策支持。推广松江家庭农场模式,要注意把握好3方面的问题,即：家庭农场经营规模＂度＂的问题;土地如何＂流转＂的问题;政策措施＂扶持＂的问题。     

Factors Influencing the Integration of Alternative Farm Enterprises Into the Agro‐Food System*

Abstract Financial stress and general crisis in European agriculture recently have generated a widespread interest in alternative paths of farm business development and structural adjustment. One of the options suggested by policy makers and adopted by farmers was the development of alternative farm enterprises (AFEs), in which farmers recombine resources on the farm and produce a new mix of products and services in order to supplement their incomes. In the present paper we examine the factors influencing the development of AFEs. According to empirical evidence from Etolia‐Akarnania, a prefecture in western Greece that merits “less favored area” status, AFE adoption is influenced by the amount of family labor, the ratio of hired to family labor, the presence of tobacco as a main enterprise, the proximity of the farm to grade A roads, and the farmers' age. Education, management experience demonstrated by the farm manager, physical size of the farm, enterprise specialization, the use of grants, and farm location are the main factors responsible for the farmers' integration into the agro‐food system.     

Family farms in the Scottish borders: a practical definition by hill sheep farmers

The theme of this paper is the family farm and the problems of defining it. The approach taken is to recognize the difference between theoretical definitional practices of sociologists and anthropologists, on the one hand, and everyday definitional practices of family farmers on the other. The former focus upon observable behaviour and/or quantitative measures that are used to construct an analytical concept with precise boundaries; the latter are not interested in defining the boundaries of the concept of the family farm but in understanding the nature and operations of their family farms so that they can reproduce them in their everyday activities. They attend to what is most central and ideal to the family farm and this is the basis of their concept of the family farm. Through an ethnographic account of hill sheep farms in the Scottish borderlands, the paper argues that the essence of family farms is a consubstantial relation between family and farm such that the distinct existence and form of both partake of or become united in a common substance that is transmitted over generations. The analysis highlights the economic and social interdependence of family and farm, the process by which the farm becomes embodied through family labour, the strategies adopted by the family to ensure the transfer of the farm to the following generation, and the use of a genetic metaphor to transpose a legal relation between family and farm into a consubstantial one.     

Farmers and Pawns: The Role of Migrants in Agrarian Conflicts and Rural Resistance in Sumatra,Indonesia

Land grabbing in relation to boom-crop production or nature conservation triggers displacement and dispossession of local communities as well as rural resistance often culminating in violent conflicts over land. In Indonesia, company-initiated oil palm production on debatable territories also stimulates migration into these contested rural areas by individual farmers who seek to become part of the boom-crop economy. Based on discussions on land grabbing and land rights this article deals with the appropriation of land by independent migrant farmers and their role as another new party in conflicts over land. The role of rural migrants in land conflicts in Jambi Province, Sumatra is shown through two case studies. The case studies highlight the importance of customary local elites and their strategic employment of social identity and political authority to facilitate land seekers’ access to contested land. The local elites transcend conceptual boundaries to generate a profitable counter-business with a set of individual stakeholders and brokers who profit from the dispossession of the masses. The case studies reveal that the migrants’ presence is essential to rural resistance and a contested resource of economic and political benefit to various stakeholders at the same time.     

Families, work, and an aging population: developing a formula that works for the workers

This article examines the intersection of family caregiving, work, and long-term care. Supporting families who provide care in order to minimize negative work effects while enhancing the acceptability of care options is of common concern to employers, state and federal policymakers, and the homecare professionals in the community-based care system. The contribution of families to the long-term care system, how employer policies have developed, how the public policy agenda has addressed family caregiving, and the importance of a more effective partnership on the state level are discussed.