Harare — Many farmers have found themselves failing to meet their pre-set yield targets and have therefore found the farming business making very little sense despite buying the required machinery, fertilizer, certified seed and setting up irrigation facilities to mitigate drought effects.

The answer actually lies in the understanding of labour- resource management and its relatedness to net farm productivity.

Labour "is the group of productive services (and not necessarily the people themselves or their number), provided by human effort, skill and mental power". It is the work input of people. Labour is the key resource that drives other resources and therefore requires special attention.

Farmers and farm managers need to understand the following;

Labour is not inert. It has life and hence special needs compared to other production requirements. It therefore requires special treatment for it to perform optimally.

Labour needs resources and development of competences if output at highest potential is to be achieved.

Labour needs supervision.

Labour not used goes to waste, that is, it can not be stored or recycled if poorly used.

Labour deserves special communication skills. With good communication, potential strikes can be averted.

Most important however, is the fact that labour has needs and therefore responds to practices which attract and retain, for example, timeous wages, advance payments, loans and monthly or seasonal allocations and other related incentives. In other words labour needs motivation.

Workers in the agricultural sector have been the worst paid yet our economy is an agrarian one. Farmers and managers need to understand that labour bodies only stipulate minimum wages allowable to a certain group of workers but this does not necessarily mean they can not pay more than that. One therefore needs to understand the labour hierarchy of needs as outlined below from the lowest to the highest.

The labour hierarchy of needs;

Physiological needs

Farm workers are one of the marginalised groups of workers in Zimbabwe. Basic physiological needs include thirst, hunger and these directly determine the behavior of workers.

Safety needs

Farm workers work usually under deplorable health and safety conditions and hence this compromises the contribution they give to net farm productivity. Such safety needs that must be provided for include shelter, protection against danger and job security.

Social needs

Every human being at one point feels the need to be associated to something. The treatment that labour receives must be in such a way that they have a sense of belonging, association and are accepted by others in the society. This gives people a healthy mental state which becomes the starting point to the amount of concentration they can give to productive work on the farm.

Esteem needs

Most workers from other industries find this need satisfied (whether fully or partially) but it is rare with farm workers. After any form of work, workers take time to rest and reflect on the gains and losses they have attained from their services. Such things as achievement, status and recognition in the society might not sound very important, but they actually determine how much effort a worker is prepared to invest in comparison to what he/she gets in return.

Self actualisation needs

Any worker at any particular level always has the ambition to move to the next level in the labour hierarchy. Provision of such conditions as room for labour upgrading and further training gives workers an impetus to be readily willing to invest their potential at best. Any working environment where no good is anticipated results in an unproductive or rather less productive labour force.