38 The Global Food System
The Breakdown of the Social Fabric of Rural
Communities
The social costs of modernized agriculture have been widely documented. As agri-
culture has increasingly substituted external inputs and resources for internal ones,
so there has been a decline in the number of jobs for local people. Standardization
has reduced the range of management skills needed, and many decisions have been
taken out of the hands of farmers and local institutions.
Agricultural modernization has helped to transform many rural communities
in both industrialized and developing world countries. The loss of jobs, the further
shift of economic opportunity away from women to men, the increasing speciali-
zation of livelihoods, the increasing concentration of land in the hands of wealthy
villagers and urban investors, the growing gap between the well-off and the poor,
and the co-option of village institutions for the purposes of the state, have all been
features of this transformation.
Social change in rural Britain
A period of remarkably successful agricultural growth since the mid-20th century
has brought significant social change in rural areas of Britain (see, e.g. Newby,
1980). As farming has intensified its use of external inputs, so it has shed jobs,
bringing poverty and deprivation to many people. Between 1945 and 1992, the
number of farms in England and Wales has fallen from 363,000 to 184,000, while
the total area of agricultural land has remained stable at 19 million ha. Over the
same period, the number of regular hired and family workers on farms in England
alone fell from 478,000 to 135,000 (MAFF, passim). In the past decade, there have
been dramatic falls in the numbers of most types of people engaged in farming
activities throughout Britain (Table 1.8). It is expected that the number of people
Table 1.8 Changes in labour force (in thousands) on agricultural holdings in the UK,
1981–92Class of worker engaged agriculture 1981 1992
Total labour force (in thousands) 709.9 621.8
Total farmers, partners, directors 293.6 280.5
Spouses of farmers, partners and directors doing farm work 74.6 76.0
Salaried managers 7.9 7.8
Regular hired whole and part-time workers 182.2 124.9
Regular family workers 54.5 46.4
Seasonal or casual workers 97.0 86.2Source: Pretty and Howes, 1993, using MAFF Agricultural Statistics from Agricultural and
Horticultural Censuses, prepared by Government Statistical Service, Guildford