Characterizing the changing profile of employment in Australian agriculture

Abstract

Existing methods of quantifying agricultural employment mask the changing profile of agricultural employment occurring in response to the pressures of competitive productivism, general progress in scientific and technical knowledge, an increasingly complex value chain and changing consumer expectations. This article critically reviews the traditional sources of data used to inform the quantification of the agricultural labor force data and presents a method, the Professional Agricultural Services Sector (PASS) Trident, which measures employment in the agriculture sector more fully, by including employment in professional services and capturing key demographic characteristics. Applying the PASS Trident, our analysis of the industry and occupation level data indicates that the existing method of measuring agricultural employment under-counts the contribution of agribusiness professionals. Moreover, people employed in the professional agricultural services sector are highly educated, younger than the traditional on-farm workforce and reside in urban areas. The methodology proposed in this paper provides a framework for future studies for monitoring shifts in agricultural employment.