Impact of the sectoral determination for farm workers on the South African sugar industry: case study of the Kwazulu-Natal North and South Coasts

dc.contributor.authorMurray, Justin
dc.contributor.authorVan Walbeek, Corné
dc.date.accessioned2016-05-10T08:43:48Z
dc.date.available2016-05-10T08:43:48Z
dc.date.issued2007
dc.date.updated2016-05-10T08:42:33Z
dc.description.abstractA survey of 103 sugarcane farmers on the KwaZulu-Natal coast was conducted in order to analyse the impact of the Sectoral Determination for Farm Workers (2002) on South African agriculture. The sample was separated into a high wage paying North Coast and lower wage paying South Coast. Typically farmers were unable to distinguish between the impact of the Sectoral Determination and other labour laws. Results indicate that the impact of the legislation is similar in each region. No respondents reported mass retrenchment, but job shedding is disguised by not replacing workers (especially unskilled workers) that leave the farm. A sizeable number of growers (17 per cent on the South Coast and 44 per cent on the North Coast) have reduced the working week to 27 hours (or 36 hours in the Felixton Mill Group Area) enabling them to pay wages on an hourly, rather than a weekly basis. This strategy reduces the effective wage. About 40 per cent of growers have reduced the in-kind benefits to their workers. About half of respondents indicated that they are likely to increase their use of seasonal and contract labour in future. Although a majority of respondents indicated that they considered mechanisation of the harvesting process, cost and topographical factors currently does not make this a serious alternative to manual harvesting. However, because of increased wage costs and the relatively strong currency in recent years, chemical weed control has become an attractive alternative to manual weed control.en_ZA
dc.identifier.apacitationMurray, J., & Van Walbeek, C. (2007). <i>Impact of the sectoral determination for farm workers on the South African sugar industry: case study of the Kwazulu-Natal North and South Coasts</i> University of Cape Town ,Faculty of Humanities ,Centre for Social Science Research(CSSR). Retrieved from http://hdl.handle.net/11427/19541en_ZA
dc.identifier.chicagocitationMurray, Justin, and Corné Van Walbeek <i>Impact of the sectoral determination for farm workers on the South African sugar industry: case study of the Kwazulu-Natal North and South Coasts.</i> University of Cape Town ,Faculty of Humanities ,Centre for Social Science Research(CSSR), 2007. http://hdl.handle.net/11427/19541en_ZA
dc.identifier.citationMurray, J. J. (2006). Impact of the Sectoral Determination for farm workers on the South African sugar industry: Case study of the KwaZulu-Natal North and South Coasts. Centre for Social Science Research, University of Cape Townen_ZA
dc.identifier.ris TY - Working Paper AU - Murray, Justin AU - Van Walbeek, Corné AB - A survey of 103 sugarcane farmers on the KwaZulu-Natal coast was conducted in order to analyse the impact of the Sectoral Determination for Farm Workers (2002) on South African agriculture. The sample was separated into a high wage paying North Coast and lower wage paying South Coast. Typically farmers were unable to distinguish between the impact of the Sectoral Determination and other labour laws. Results indicate that the impact of the legislation is similar in each region. No respondents reported mass retrenchment, but job shedding is disguised by not replacing workers (especially unskilled workers) that leave the farm. A sizeable number of growers (17 per cent on the South Coast and 44 per cent on the North Coast) have reduced the working week to 27 hours (or 36 hours in the Felixton Mill Group Area) enabling them to pay wages on an hourly, rather than a weekly basis. This strategy reduces the effective wage. About 40 per cent of growers have reduced the in-kind benefits to their workers. About half of respondents indicated that they are likely to increase their use of seasonal and contract labour in future. Although a majority of respondents indicated that they considered mechanisation of the harvesting process, cost and topographical factors currently does not make this a serious alternative to manual harvesting. However, because of increased wage costs and the relatively strong currency in recent years, chemical weed control has become an attractive alternative to manual weed control. DA - 2007 DB - OpenUCT DP - University of Cape Town J1 - Centre for Social Science Research LK - https://open.uct.ac.za PB - University of Cape Town PY - 2007 T1 - Impact of the sectoral determination for farm workers on the South African sugar industry: case study of the Kwazulu-Natal North and South Coasts TI - Impact of the sectoral determination for farm workers on the South African sugar industry: case study of the Kwazulu-Natal North and South Coasts UR - http://hdl.handle.net/11427/19541 ER - en_ZA
dc.identifier.urihttp://hdl.handle.net/11427/19541
dc.identifier.urihttp://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/03031853.2007.9523763
dc.identifier.vancouvercitationMurray J, Van Walbeek C. Impact of the sectoral determination for farm workers on the South African sugar industry: case study of the Kwazulu-Natal North and South Coasts. 2007 [cited yyyy month dd]. Available from: http://hdl.handle.net/11427/19541en_ZA
dc.languageengen_ZA
dc.publisher.departmentCentre for Social Science Research(CSSR)en_ZA
dc.publisher.facultyFaculty of Humanitiesen_ZA
dc.publisher.institutionUniversity of Cape Town
dc.rightsCreative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0)*
dc.rights.urihttp://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/en_ZA
dc.sourceCentre for Social Science Research
dc.source.urihttp://www.cssr.uct.ac.za
dc.subject.otherFarm Workers
dc.subject.otherSugar industry
dc.subject.otherSouth Africa
dc.titleImpact of the sectoral determination for farm workers on the South African sugar industry: case study of the Kwazulu-Natal North and South Coastsen_ZA
dc.typeWorking Paperen_ZA
uct.type.filetypeText
uct.type.filetypeImage
uct.type.publicationResearchen_ZA
uct.type.resourceResearch paperen_ZA
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