The household labour base is also being eroded by the ill health of household members (due to HIV/AIDS, malaria, tuberculosis and other debilitating diseases) and the time spent caring for them by others. Prolonged sickness and death are usually accompanied by a loss of income and an increase in expenditure on medical care and funerals. In resource-poor households, these additional expenses are frequently covered by selling household assets, including draught animals, tools and implements. This is often an irreversible step from which households are unable to recover.
Meanwhile, many aspects of rural life remain very time and energy intensive, from fetching water and firewood and preparing food, to clearing and tilling the land, cultivating crops, planting trees, creating conservation structures, rearing livestock, building houses and repairing rural roads. In this setting, many households are extremely vulnerable to shortages of labour and the loss of draught animals and other sources of power (Box 1).
The amount of power (time and energy) and the knowledge base a household can raise has a major influence on the household's livelihood strategies and is a major determinant of livelihood outcomes.
The challenge is to identify, promote and support opportunities to relieve the burden of labour shortages and enable households to become more resilient.
| Box 1: Vulnerable Households |
the poor, food insecure, and those whose asset base is deteriorating
households headed by women, the elderly, young orphans and single men.
households caring for the chronically ill or fostering young orphans
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Traditional sieving of grain.©
FAO/2002/Tanzania.
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What are Labour Saving Technologies and Practices?
There is a new sense of urgency to revisit labour saving technologies and practices (LSTPs) which can reduce the burden of rural living, particularly for households and communities which are under severe labour stress. It is recognised that many LSTPs have been developed and are already in the public domain (Box 2). For example, draught animals save time tilling land or relieve the burden of carrying heavy loads; conservation agriculture reduces the time spent on tillage and weeding; roof water harvesting reduces the need to carry water home; and mills save time and energy pounding maize.
However, the gains made in reducing time and energy inputs are often offset by higher requirements for operator skills and knowledge.
| Box 2: Examples of Labour Saving Technologies and Practices |
tools and equipment which reduce the drudgery and/or improve the efficiency of performing various farming or household activities, such as using draught animals for land preparation and rural transport, cooking on fuel efficient stoves, or harvesting roofwater for domestic purposes.
other potentially labour saving inputs, such as herbicides.
labour saving practices, for example growing crops which require less labour than traditional crops, practicing minimum tillage, inter-cropping leguminous cover crops to suppress weeds, planting woodlots close to home, or zero grazing livestock.
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How can LSTPs be introduced successfully?
What is required is a means of enabling rural communities to access this information, develop appropriate skills, and adopt and adapt the technologies to their own circumstances.
However, there has been a long history of failed agricultural projects to increase labour efficiency and it is important that lessons are learnt. Of key importance is the cost effectiveness of the LSTP, with the benefits to farmers outweighing the costs, and the absence of undue financial risks. If farmers are fully aware of these advantages, they are more likely to make effective use of the LSTP, value it and operate it with care and properly maintain it. In order to do this, they need an effective supply and service infrastructure and training on operation and maintenance. In turn, suppliers and service providers must consider that it is in their financial interests to support the products. This requires farmers, suppliers and service providers to be fully involved from the outset of the process to ensure labour constraints are addressed effectively and in a sustainable manner.
Promoting change and technology transfer in the context of HIV/AIDS gives rise to new challenges. In addition to the usual barriers faced when disseminating new technologies, many households impacted by the epidemic have no spare labour, have no spare cash, and have little capacity to undertake risks. Their priority is to secure their immediate food security. Hence different approaches may be necessary to reach highly vulnerable groups.
