Agropastoral Production Systems, Intra-household Resource Allocation and Household Member's Domains

IV. FIVE FAMILIES IN SAN JOSÉ LLANGA

Case Study One

1. Demographics

This relatively young family lives in the Incamaya zone which is located about a half hour walk from the central plaza of Barrio in San José Llanga. The husband and wife have been married for eleven years and have five girls all under the age of ten. All but the youngest assist the family with the household and agricultural chores. As table 1-1 indicates, all family members, except the two youngest, have been, or are currently attending school and the family lives together in San José Llanga.

The husband, an originario, was born and raised in the community and inherited his land through his parents. The farm that this family now resides on is part of a previous larger land holding that was divided among the husband and his four sisters, none of which now live in the community. The wife, an agregada, moved here from a neighboring community when she was sixteen years old to marry her husband. She is from the town of Umalla (about 3 hours walking distance).

The family relies primarily on sheep and cattle sales to secure a cash income. On a few occasions however, the wife has helped a neighbor harvest potatoes, and in return, the family received a portion of the potatoes. Also, during the last few months of the past year, they were selling milk to PIL as an extra income source. It seemed that the family was in need of an alternative income source because they were running low on cash for their planned move into Patacamaya in the coming year. There were no other forms of supplemental income earned throughout the year.

The family was making plans to build a home on land they have secured in Patacamaya from the sale of four dairy cows. They decided to move to facilitate and improve the education of their five children. The primary school that the three oldest children have been attending in Zona Barrio has been having problems maintaining teachers and enrollment. Although they plan to sell all but one cow and a few sheep to finance the move, they will continue to cultivate and harvest their land. Plans are being made for the husband's sister to live on their farm and take care of the livestock and land holdings.

2. Crops

The family has approximately eighteen hectares of land divided among crops, fallow, and native rangelands (table 1.2). This family does not rent nor rent out to other community members. The husband does however, use part of his sister's land, free of charge, to graze their animals.

The husband and wife share management-decision responsibility in crop production. When asked on separate occasions about the family's land resources, planting/harvest projections, and marketing decisions, the husband and wife responded with uniform answers. Therefore, it could be concluded that joint decisions are made in crop production.

The crops shown in table 1.3 can be used in four different ways: human consumption, animal consumption, sale, and seed. The crops consumed by the family include potato, quinoa, barley, and wheat, while those consumed by the animals include alfalfa and forage barley. The family saved seed from all crops (except the forage crops) to be used for next year's planting season and will not sell any of their crops this year.

3. Sheep Production

The family's's sheep enterprise is characterized by approximately forty-five crossbred (native/merino) sheep. Of these, about ten purebred merinos belong to the husband's sister.

Throughout the study period, the sheep products consumed or used by the family included:

milk, wool, mutton, and manure. They used thirty-two liters of milk to make cheese and for tea and soup. Of the one hundred pounds of wool that were sheared, fifty pounds were used for bed covers and clothing. Three sheep were slaughtered during festivals and sheep manure was collected to fertilize their crops.

The decision to sell a sheep product is jointly made by the husband and wife depending on the need for money at that particular time. Live sheep, manure, and wool were the products sold throughout the year to obtain cash to purchase other goods. Since last year, they sold a total of twenty sheep. They were all sold to a middleman to be butchered. About sixty quintals of sheep manure were sold to an independent buyer that frequently travels to San José to collect fertilizer from several families. They also sold about twelve pounds of wool at the Sunday Patacamaya fair. The money earned from the sale of these products was used to buy household products and food.

4. Dairy Production

This family has five adult reproductive dairy cows, four of which have male calves less than one year old and the fifth has a steer one and a half years old. Two Swiss cows and a native criollo cow belong to the family while they take care of two Holstein cows for the husband's sister.

Although this family maintains a herd of dairy cattle, most of the year they did not sell milk to PIL. When asked why not, they said milking results in thinner cows and calves. Their reason for maintaining a dairy herd, is to provide an extra income source from the sale of live animals. Towards the end of this study, they began to sell milk to PIL in order to supplement their planned move to Patacamaya.

The products the family consumed or used over the course of the year were milk and manure. Although the family previously had not been selling milk to PIL, they had been milking and useful in tea and to make cheese and soup. Since last year the family consumed thirty liters of their own milk. The cow manure was used for cooking.

The family sold milk, live cattle, and manure last year to purchase other products. By the end of the year they had sold approximately 340 liters of milk to PIL, four live cows, and eighty quintals of manure.

5. Herd Dynamics

At the time of the case study, the number of cattle grazed by this family was approximately the same as it had been three to four years ago. Over that time period, the number of cattle had increased to nine adult cows, four of which were sold this past year to purchase the land in Patacamaya. The number of sheep has increased by about twenty over the four year period. Because this family is planning to move to Patacamaya, they plan to sell all but one cow and ten sheep. Future plans for expanding their herds are minimal. The remaining animals will be cared for by the husband's sister. Because Patacamaya is relatively close, the family will return to continue crop production in San José Llanga.

6. Labor Allocation

Intra-household labor allocation can be divided among the different agricultural enterprises this family maintains. The husband is in charge of the dairy enterprise, the wife is in charge of the sheep enterprise, and both are actively involved in the crop enterprise. The family allocates their child labor force to the activities needing assistance at a particular time. Person-specific tasks within each agricultural enterprise will be broken down and addressed in the following sections.

a. Crop Production

Crop production is one enterprise in which the husband and wife share complete responsibility of the management and decision making process. All phases of production require the labor of both husband and wife, as well as the children during harvest season. In general, as shown in table 1-4, each phase of production can be broken down according to specific family members. Task-specific activities follow.

The first phase of production, tilling, is the only phase in which the family hires outside labor. The second phase, cleaning the land of debris, was only done for potatoes and was completed by the husband and wife. The third phase, planting, has three stages, all of which were completed for potato production only. The husband controls plowing, leaving the wife responsible for both seeding and fertilizing. The exception to this is found for quinoa, in which the husband completed both the plowing and seeding. None of these phases were carried out for alfalfa production because it had been planted previous to the survey.

The couple worked together to complete the weeding and fertilization (with urea) for potato production, but received additional assistance from their oldest daughter to complete fumigation. The family also remarked that their daughter will be able to supply an increasing amount of labor in the future. These three phases were not completed for any other crop, except quinoa which was fumigated by the husband because it is vulnerable to insect attack.

The last phase, harvesting, was completed by the husband and wife with additional labor from the oldest daughter during the potato and wheat harvest, and from hired workers for quinua (one worker) and forage barley harvest (three additional workers).

The three family members work together during the weekends only from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. leaving the husband to harvest the potatoes during the weekdays. This is due to the school commitments of the three oldest children during the weekdays which leaves the wife in charge of herding the livestock and caring for the two youngest children. When the older children return from school at noon, they assist their mother with herding and household chores.

b. Sheep Production

The wife allocates most of her labor during the year to sheep production. She takes primary responsibility for herding, milking, and selling. The shared tasks are shearing, bathing, cutting the newborn female tails, and collecting sheep manure.

The principal task identified by the wife is herding. Both the wife and the four oldest girls provide the labor for this task. Also, two dogs have been trained to herd using voice command. Herding usually requires the labor of one person, however, when herding the sheep near cropland, assistance from two children is needed to prevent the animals from straying into the fields.

The second task, milking, is done by the wife before the animals are taken out to graze during January and Februrary. It takes her about half an hour to milk ten sheep twice a week to obtain about thirty-two liters of milk per week.

When the family sells sheep, it is the wife's responsibility to transport and sell the animals at the Patacamaya Sunday fair. She usually leaves early Sunday morning (about 1 a.m.) and walks seven hours to market with the sheep. Because they sell the sheep to a middleman, she does not need to spend more than a few hours in the morning at the market. With the money from the sale, the wife buys household goods for the family.

Shearing, bathing, cutting the newborn tails, and collection of sheep manure are tasks shared by the wife and husband. In general, sheep are shorn in the corral before going to graze. Both the husband and wife spend approximately four hours in the early morning to shear about six animals. After all the sheep have been shorn, they are bathed in a medicated dip to control external parasites. It takes the husband and wife three hours to sponge bathe the entire herd at home.

The other two tasks associated with sheep production, cutting the newborn female tails and collection of manure were not identified as directly related tasks. The first task is shared by both the husband and wife who spent one afternoon cutting the tails of the newborn female sheep. The other task, collecting sheep manure from the corral, is carried out by the husband and wife and done each day.

c. Dairy Production

The husband allocates his labor mainly production of dairy cattle. His responsibilities include: herding, breeding, buying, and selling. The husband and wife collect the cattle manure and feed forage at home. The wife is primarily responsible for milking.

Usually, the family herds together during the day, but the husband is the primary caretaker of the cows while grazing. When the husband is away or attending to other activities the wife or children take responsibility for watching and re-tethering the cows.

Breeding, is one task that the husband will solicit outside help with. In the past, they brought a bull from one of the other zones. This year, because they have a one year old bull, they plan to sell it after using it for breeding.

The husband takes care of transport and sale of the cows. It takes him between five and six hours walking with the cows to reach Patacamaya for the Sunday market. Because he sold the animals to a middleman, he did not need to spend the whole day negotiating prices with other farmers. If he buys any cattle he is responsible for negotiating the price.

The husband also is in charge of the annual cleaning of water holes. This is accomplished by digging out the soil from around the sides and depositing it on the bank. It usually takes him no longer than one morning, in late October, to complete the task.

The wife is responsible for milking the cows in the mornings before they are taken to native rangeland. It usually takes her about a half hour to milk two cows twice a week (June to January). Although he had not previously been doing so, when the family decided to sell milk to PIL, the husband also took charge of milking one cow each morning and delivering that milk to PIL.

Feeding dried forage at home and collection of cattle manure for cooking are tasks shared by the husband and wife. The family feeds cut forages to the cows each evening between June and October. Collection of cow manure is generally done once a month or when it is needed for cooking.

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