FEM-Vida: an innovative vision on the socio-economic viability of small agroecological farms

Conventional definitions of viability, which focus on monetary elements and productive work, are not enough to fully explain how agroecological farm's function and are able to reproduce and sustain themselves in a socioeconomic context that is adverse for small and diverse projects. Feminist economics allows us to widen the definition of viability, by integrating reproductive work and non-commodified resources and tasks into the definition of labor and economic systems. Furthermore, taking an ecofeminist perspective, akin in many ways to agroecology, entails that in a holistic definition of viability, the measure is not the accumulation of profit, but the reproduction and sustenance of a dignified life. With this as a starting point, the “Socioeconomic viability of small-scale agroecological production: diagnosis and tools from the feminist economics framework (FEM-VIDA) projects aims to develop a holistic understanding of the viability of agroecological farms that accounts for their reproduction even when their financial statement would deem them unviable. The goal of the project is to create a system of indicators to self-evaluate agroecological viability. This indicators’ tool should adapt to the changing and evolving reality of farm projects. To respond to this objective, we got in touch with four small agroecological farms in three distinct regions in Spain: Galiza, País Valencià and Catalunya. As criteria for the selection of the cases we used the following: farms that are self-defined as agroecological, farms led by women or with a strong presence of women in the farm and that they show an interest in the objectives and topics addressed in the research project (interest in engaging in the self-assessment of their farm’s viability, “good-life” in the center...). Within the category of small agroecological projects, we looked for a diversity of farms, both in terms of production, including livestock farms and horticulture farms among other, and in terms of the social organization of the farm, including families, cooperatives and individual farms. The goal of data gathering was not to compare farm typologies, but to build a diverse and comprehensive data set. After building a connection with the farmers, fieldwork consisted of an initial interview at each farm, to characterize the study cases, and two weeks of participant observation in different seasons, to observe all the tasks, social relations and nuances of their daily life. As a novel approach, we focused on gathering data on time uses, organization of tasks and satisfaction of the different members of the twelve farms participating in the project to examine and assess viability and as the starting point of the indicator system. We analyzed how each farm member allots their time throughout the day and week, putting special focus on issues such as workload, overburden or simultaneity. In terms of tasks, following an ecofeminist approach, we considered the productive and marketing aspects of the project as well as management, personal, environmental and family activities. This comprehensive approach is well suited for agroecological farms, particularly those that are family projects, in which the indivisibility between the farm, as an economic project, the social group that manages it and the agroecosystem becomes apparent. To properly grasp and assess agroecological viability, we need to move beyond the distinction between reproductive and productive work; even though, one the novelties of FEM-Vida's approach is the incorporation of care work and aspects such as wellbeing and satisfaction, as elements often overlooked and under-explained in more conventional examinations of farm viability. Thus, tasks observed are classified in eleven categories: formal and informal networking activities, agricultural work, income diversification, commercialization, manufacturing, knowledge exchange and acquisition, project management tasks, self-care, care of the home and project, care of others and basic needs. This allows for the analysis of task distribution and roles among farm members and its organization, highlighting issues such as flexibility or support networks. These elements are further explored by contextualizing them within farmers’ priorities, worldview and perceived enjoyment. The entire methodological process, including fieldwork, data collection and the subsequent analysis, has been developed by a transdisciplinary work team. This research team includes not only researchers from different disciplines, but the farmers themselves, as well as members from organizations and social movements linked to agroecology and social and solidarity economy. This allows the project to have a strong and comprehensive approach to the data collected and the issues at hand, but more importantly, it means that the farmers at the center of the project are not only research objects, but subjects that accompany the research project from start to finish. Basing the project in an interdisciplinary team of farmers, researchers and activists leads to making the research project and process a participatory one. Within the Fem-Vida calendar, several workshops are scheduled to encourage dialogue between agroecology and the social and solidarity economy to contribute to the development of a shared indicator tool, that builds on already existing work. The first workshop, already held, served to share the first results of the research and contrast the viability factors that we have already begun to extract through the data collected. The FEM-Vida team has recently finished the fieldwork and data gathering period and we have started with data analysis, using a combination of descriptive statistics, qualitative analysis and participatory tools, in which both farmers and researchers are engaged. As part of the participatory approach, the last step of fieldwork was to share with the farmers of the project the data gathered in terms of time uses, so they could validate it and start reflecting on it towards the creation of an indicators’ system. These first steps in the analysis also allowed for the identification of a set of viability factors, elements both internal and external, that have an impact on the viability of agroecological farms. Moving forward and in continuous dialogue with the twelve in the project, FEM-Vida is going to focus on identifying the dimensions that need to be included when examining viability from an ecofeminist and agroecological perspective and on designing an assessment tool that accounts for the needs and circumstances of agroecological farms, understanding them as complex socio-ecological systems in which reproductive (both human and ecological) and productive spheres are indivisible.