In the last three decennia there has been a sizable shift of labour out of Brazilian agriculture in response to the higher returns to be gained in non-farm employrnent . The shift has not been rapid enough to equalize the income differences between the farm and non-farm sectors. Nonetheless, it has contributed in some respects to narrowing the gap, and in others to avoid its growing larger. On the other hand there is concern with the increase in the flow of rural people to urban areas, where many of them are unable to obtain jobs. In order to attempt an explanation of these phenomena, and to gain the basic knowledge necessary to design the economic policy for coping with the problems of adjustment of the agricultural labour force, the present study attempts to identify and estimate the basic behavioral equations describing the agricultural labour market. This  market is divided  in two sectors : the subsistence sector and the commercial sector. For the first sector only an employment equation is estimated. For the second, two- or three-equation models of the market are specified and estimated.