Women as team players

Claire Braund

March 2000

Rural women the unsung heroes of agriculture in Australia.

As team players they have no peer. They drive tractors, mend fences, drench cattle, do the books, attend community meetings, study farm courses, keep house, look after children and family members, support their partners and often work off farm to make ends meet.

There are around 320,000 women over the age of 15 living on farms in Australia. Around 80% participate in farm work. Yet only 120,000 women report themselves as employed in agricultural occupations. Many rural women still write ‘housewife’ as their occupation on a survey form ⁽¹⁾.

Rosemary Burnett, President of the Queensland Rural Women’s Network and dairy farmer, says that in many cases rural women let their husbands take on the roll of manager just to preserve harmony in their marriage. A number of rural women like seeing their husbands as “the head of the family.”

Rosemary and her husband David run a 330 acre dairy farm near Gympie in Qld with their sons Andrew and Tony. The family moved from a dairy farm near Brisbane to expand the size of their family business. Rosemary describes her on -farm roles as administration and management, house-keeping and milking when required.

“We use consultants to help us in our decision making, which often removes any potential for family disagreements over who is right. We also have round-table meetings where everybody talks about what is going on and where we are headed.”

Rural women who aren’t working on farms are usually working elsewhere and are often the primary income earners for rural families.

Female participation in the labour force has increased by 2.1% across regional Australia between 1991 and 1996 ⁽²⁾. In 1996-97 more than 30% of rural women around Australia worked off farm ⁽³⁾.

Women contribute 48% of total real farm income. This was worth $14 billion in 1996 ⁽⁴⁾.

This figure is reached by adding together the value of rural women’s on-farm contribution ($4 billion), their off-farm wage income ($1 billion), the value of household work ($8 billion) and volunteer and community work ($0.5 billion).

Mary Salce, a dairy farmer from Victoria who convened the First International Women in Agriculture Conference, believes women themselves are often the ones to blame for the perception that they are not equal partners on farms. In Ros Bowden’s book, Women of the Land ⁽⁵⁾, Mary commented:

“Often to keep the peace women accept that the guy takes the credit and the benefit, just to keep everybody happy. But at the same time they are doing themselves harm and harm to their daughters and agriculture in general because people think that input is not there and it is.”

References

1. (1998), Missed Opportunities Report (Vols 1 & 2), Rural Industries Research and Development Corporation, Canberra
2. (1999), Country Matters - Social Atlas of Rural and Regional Australia, Bureau of Rural Sciences - Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries Australia, Canberra
3. Farmers at Work, Australian Bureau Agricultural and Resource Economics, Canberra
4. (1998), Missed Opportunities Report (Vols 1 & 2), Rural Industries Research and Development Corporation, Canberra
5. R. (1995) Women on the Land, ABC Books, Sydney

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