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Farm Tourism: A Question of Gender and Competence
Get PDF-This article focuses on farm-tourist hosts and who they are in terms of education and competence. Gender is a central variable in the analysis. The analysis is based on an on-line survey of 448 farm tourist businesses conducted in spring 2009. In addition, a sample of women and men hosts on 19 farm tourism enterprises is interviewed. Women are more likely to be managers of farm tourism businesses, and have higher levels of formal education than men. Men are more likely to have vocational education,
local attachment and competence obtained by growing up on a farm. Level of education does not have any significant impact on turnover, profitability and expected profit. As the businesses are small-scale and developed from the farms’ material resources, the
competence required is the ability to transform the farm resources into a tourist product. This competence might be achieved not only through formal educational, but also through previous work experiences, courses, networks, advisory services and daily experience.
Interviews show that the hosts refer to their vocational backgrounds as important and relevant, and they refer to their practically obtained competence rather than to their educational backgrounds.The Research Council of Norway, Agricultural Agreement Research, SpareBank1-SMN and Norwegian Rural Tourism and Traditional Food (HANEN)
Good Farmers, Good Neighbours? The Role of Cultural Capital in Social Capital Development in a Scottish Farming Community
Get PDF-Recent decades have seen a gradual erosion of farming incomes across the UK due to
falling commodity prices and changes to the subsidy regime. This study examines what
resources farmers are able to access informally and how this ‘social capital’ is generated
and maintained in farming communities. Using a conceptual framework based on
Bourdieu’s conceptualisations of social and cultural capital, this study explores the
evolving informal exchange relationships between farmers in a case study of Upper
Deeside, Scotland. We find that although cultural capital is important for accessing social
capital, the technological treadmill characteristic of ‘good farming’ creates a disincentive
for informally sharing machinery amongst large-scale farmers. However, social capital
remains an important resource for smaller scale farmers, particularly in terms of their
access to labour. We conclude by suggesting that, far from being a low-cost means of
facilitating community economic development, increasing the level of social capital will
be difficult in communities where labour is a scarce or expensive resourceScottish Government Rural and Environment Research and Analysis Directorate
EU Framework Programme 6 New and Emerging Science and Technology Pathfinder Initiative on Tackling Complexity in Scienc
Doing Farm Tourism: The Intertwining Practices of Gender and Work
Get PDF-Drawing on the perspective of doing gender, Berit Brandth and Marit S. Haugen explore how women and men do gender in farm tourist work. On the basis of five case studies of farms that have shifted from farm production to hosting tourists, the expectation is that the new occupation of tourism may create conditions for (un)doing gender at the interactional level and reshuffling power within the couple. The segmented work and unequal work statuses of men and women known from research on family farming seem to be less distinct in farm tourism as women are managers and men do cleaning, catering, and caring. However, the symbolic meaning of the indoor‐outdoor dichotomy plays a defining role. And even if women and men have changed their performances, gender and work are still interpreted and perceived according to the heterosexual matrix.Research Council of Norway, Agricultural Agreement, Norwegian Rural Tourism and Traditional Foods, and Sparebank1 SM
Visitors to Farm Tourism Enterprises in Norway
Get PDF-In Norway, as in many other countries, rural and farm tourism is becoming an important activity for promoting the vitality and sustainability of rural communities. This paper focuses on the analysis of visitors to Norwegian farms, which offer various tourism activities and services. The countryside has increasingly become a place of consumption and recreation, and as such, farm tourism is part of the shift in the economic base of rural societies. Moreover, in building appreciation for the distinctive features of local places and people, farm tourism represents a counter-trend to homogenisation and mass tourism. In this paper we focus on the Norwegian domestic market. Based on data from ten representative national Norwegian surveys conducted by Synovate Norway between 1991 and 2007, our analysis shows significant increases in the proportion of the population visiting farm tourism enterprises since 1991. In addition to describing who the visitors are, the paper also characterises potential visitors within the domestic tourism market.The Research Council of Norway, Agricultural Agreement Research Fund (Forskningsmidler over jordbruksavtalen), SpareBank1-SMN and Rural Tourism and Traditional Food in Norway (HANEN
The structural disempowerment of Eastern European migrant farm workers in Norwegian agriculture
Get PDF-Since the 2004 EU enlargement established one European common labour market, a large number of Eastern Europeans have taken up seasonal employment as hired farm workers in Norwegian agriculture. Much attention in the public has been given to the potential for ‘social dumping’ of these migrating workers, as they are considered prone to exploitation by farmers looking for cheap and docile labour, and subject to low-wages and poor labour conditions. In response to these threats, Norway implemented labour regulations (‘transitional rules’) that established minimum standards for wage levels and labour conditions, combined with registration and supervision of the incoming labour force. Nevertheless, reports from the field indicate that many of the westward migrating labour force experience work conditions that are far poorer than prescribed by the labour regulations, as these are not implemented at the farm level. In this paper, we discuss the social processes that result in this mismatch between state regulations (e.g. transition rules) and the actual experiences of migrant workers building on dual labour market theory. Analysing qualitative in-depth interviews with 54 farm migrants, we argue that there are two sets of factors underlying the poorer working conditions observed on the farms: Firstly, the structural disempowerment of migrant workers, which gives them weak negotiating positions vis-à-vis their employers (farmers); and secondly, the migrant workers' frame of reference for wage levels, in which poor payment levels by Norwegian standards are found acceptable or even good when judged by Eastern European wage levels. While a number of works have described the exploitation of farm migrant labour, we demonstrate in this paper how national immigration and agricultural histories, structures and present policies configure the labour–capital relations at farm level in the Norwegian case
Hvordan serveres genmodifisert mat til avisleserne?
Get PDF-The discourse on genetically modified food is open, situation-dependent and contradictory, and is positioned at the crossroads of nature, science and society. Through quantitative and qualitative content analysis, this article presents the discourse in three Norwegian newspapers in the period 1996 to 2008. Political issues and issues surrounding risk and uncertainty are the main topics in articles. The analysis shows that media coverage has varied, and in 2008 was almost absent. With declining newsworthiness and topicality among the general public, it seems that GM food has become a black box – a scientific fact that is no longer discussed but taken for granted