Decision-making process of commercial farmers in Zimbabwe

Agricultural Administration 17 (1984) 149-162

Decision-Making Process of Commercial Farmers in Zimbabwe

Douglas McClymont

Agricura (Pvt.) Ltd, 62 Birmingham Road, PO Box 2742, Harare, Zimbabwe

(Received: 20 December, 1983)

SUMMARY

The bulk of Zimbabwe’s agricultural exports is produced by its commercial farmers. The manner in which they plan and make decisions is critical to the economy and essential knowledge for every extension worker. Commercialfarmers in Zimbabwe plan in four distinctphases- long-term plans, medium-term plans, seasonal plans and day-to-day plans. Each of these plans has a spec$cpersonal orfarm orientation. The farmers are motivated to change and their decision-making process involves ajve-phase cycle with continuous reassessment at each phase. Adoption of an innovation spurs reassessment which then leads to further modification and further assessment. The farmer, under economic and farm relatedpressures, has to continually improve to remain$nancially viable, so that the adoption of specific innovations is not perceived as being a final decision, but rather another step in a continual process of improvement.

INTRODUCTION

Agriculture in Zimbabwe is one of the major contributors to the economy of an essentially developing African country. The production of sufficient food for a country is of paramount importance where the level of industrialisation or the possession of vast natural resources, especially in the form of oil, are not sufficiently high or abundant. Sustained food production, and the export earnings from excess production, are vital and

149 Agricultural Administration 0309-586X/84/$03.00 0 Elsevier Applied Science Publishers Ltd, England, 1984. Printed in Great Britain

150 Douglas McClymont

not easily attained in a country with a manageable, but not predictable, climate. Zimbabwe has built up an enviable record in agricultural production in Africa. The impetus for this growing industry has been the farmer himself. Zimbabwe has two distinct kinds of farmer. There is the commercial farmer who produces the bulk of saleable agricultural produce and the communal farmer, the tribesman, who basically farms to grow food for his own and his family’s subsistence.

This paper is concerned with the commercial farmer who is relatively easy to point out but very difficult to define. For the purposes of this investigation a commercial farmer was taken as a farmer who derived the major part of his income from his land, who could not farm his enterprise without employed labour, who could not crop without some form of mechanization, who had to remain financially viable to stay on his land, who did not farm in the previous Tribal Trust Lands or African Purchase Areas, and who was registered with the Zimbabwe Commercial Farmers’ Union as a member. The majority of these farmers occupy their holdings under freehold tenure. In Zimbabwe3 this sector operates on approxi- mately 182 093 km2 and there are close to 6000 of them.2 Although the definition given above outlines the parameters of what a commercial farmer is, it does not give a real picture of the farmer himself.

The Zimbabwe commercial farmer tends to be a Caucasian of around 45 years old, married, with three to four children. He has worked on a farm for most of his life and is either the son or grandson of a pioneer farmer or has entered farming because it is a profitable and challenging way of life. Typically, he served a farming apprenticeship with some well known senior farmer before borrowing the money from the ‘Land Bank’ to start on his own. Most of the farmers in the country have either had to open up their farms from virgin bush or develop established farms for intense commercial production. Thus, there is an element of pioneering spirit and basic personal motivation among all of them. The farmer remains on his land through his own efforts in the give and take interaction between economic forces operating in the country and the elements. He makes his own decisions, doing things on the farm in his own manner. The severe economic constraints during the pre-independence (1980) years have ensured that what he does is commercially viable. Those who have not done this have been forced out of farming. The commercial farmer, if he is not a financial success, cannot continue to operate his farm hoping for a good season. Essentially, it is a hard school-only the best survive.

Because the commercial farmer produces to sell, he has formed the

Decision-making process of commercial farmers in Zimbabwe 151

backbone of the agricultural industry for many years. The first crop of major importance was tobacco (of which 95 per cent is exported); this was followed by cotton and coffee. The sales of these crops have brought in- and continue to bring in-valuable foreign exchange and this is supplemented by meat sales when the seasons permit. Agriculture as a whole is one of the major earners of foreign currency, and thus its success or failure determines the balance of payments record of the country. Thus, the effect of farming decisions has a major effect on the country as a whole.

From the extension point of view, it was essential that the decision- making processes and the factors affecting them were exposed in order to ensure that farmers were getting the best advice, making use of this advice, and consequently positively improving agricultural performance. It was decided that the effect of the important factors could be determined through in-depth interviews of the chosen commercial farming leaders. This approach was chosen specifically in preference to the more classical experimental or survey approach as it was felt that a’ ‘qualitative’ investigation at these levels would be more valuable than the more ‘quantitative’ surveys carried out by other workers. It was also felt that Lowe’s’ argument that, ‘research should resist the tendency to assume that only knowledge derived from the classical methods of inquiry is of value’ (p. 185) was particularly pertinent here.

Ten major commercial and extension agencies were approached and asked to list those whom they considered to be the fifty most successful and knowledgeable farmers with whom they dealt. It was decided that a farmer must have at least eight mentions in order to qualify as a respondent. Thirty-one farmers qualified but, of these, six refused to participate in the research study. An interview schedule was drawn up for these farmers which was tested and validated. The interviews were carried out during the period April, 1981 to April, 1982.

Each farmer was visited and interviewed by the author. Responses were recorded on a tape recorder and then transcribed later. These interviews took from 23 to 4 h and, although the open-ended questions of the schedule were used as a basis for the interviews, the interviewer used his discretion in probing areas of obvious interest to the farmer. All the interviews were conducted in a friendly atmosphere and no respondent appeared reluctant to give information on any subject. Each transcription was subjected to a content analysis, and the responses were tabulated and coded. Three independent judges were used to check the reliability of the

1.52 Douglas McClymont

coding; a summary was made and reanalysed. Validity and reliability were established using a series of independent judges for the validity testing exercise and a test/r-e-test method for the reliability determination. Coder reliability was also established with the use of independent judges, and satisfactory results were obtained.

ASSUMPTIONS MADE IN THE STUDY

The major assumption of the whole investigation was that the leaders in the commercial farming areas are examples of the ideal farmer and representative of what every farmer should be striving to achieve. They are seen as the ultimate target that the extension worker is attempting to influence his clientele to achieve. It was assumed that, although the farmers chosen may not statistically accurately represent the majority of commercial farmers, nevertheless, owing to their position, their accumulated experience and expertise, they did provide a sufficiently substantial foundation upon which to draw conclusions and make recommendations.

A further assumption was that the instruments developed would indicate only those factors which had a significant effect. Conversely, any factor exerting a minimal or suppressed effect would not be brought to light by the investigation. All the judges considered this to be a reasonable assumption, although many did express the reservation that they had no real hard evidence to support this. This aspect was very important as it was agreed with the judges that cognizance should be taken also of ‘non- mentions’. In other words, if a respondent did not mention a particular fact in response to a question where it was thought this factor or fact should be important, then it was assumed that the farmer did not consider this factor or fact to be of major importance.

DESCRIPTION OF SAMPLE

Although the interviews carried out on the sample of twenty-five farmers cannot be considered a random survey in the ‘classical’ sense, and therefore the results cannot be said to be truly ‘representative’, in a statistical sense, of the whole population of commercial farmers, nevertheless it is necessary to describe the sample. It was a selective


sample, and comprised those who were perceived as being the best farmers in the country. The twenty-five farmers interviewed all had at least ten years’-and, in one case, thirty-seven years’-farming experience. The mean period spent as a farmer for the group was 27.6 years. This indicated that the business success in farming and the length of time in this occupation made the respondents particularly valuable as reservoirs of farming experience and expertise. The fact that a number of them (22) served in the upper echelons of farming politics also adds to their worth for this study.

Their formal education tended to be relatively low, with the majority (15) obtaining only a school leaver’s certificate. Their subsequent success in farming has shown that, although their educational achievement was relatively low, their intelligence certainly was not. Only four went to an agricultural college, while two served an apprenticeship-one on National Service in Britain.

The majority (19) owned their farms, while the remainder either had a long-term loan or were senior executive or board members in the farming corporations which owned the farms. Each respondent gave a specific reason for wanting to farm; nearly half (13) replied that they farmed because they enjoyed the outdoor life and had always wanted to farm, while the rest (12) farmed either because of family commitments or ambition in this direction. Only one considered himself to be a ‘business’ man, all the others seeing themselves as purely ‘farmers’, with the means to diversify into other businesses. This was reflected in the high proportion of farmers (11) who said they farmed for enjoyment. Most of the others (8) saw farming as a challenge or as a means to strive for perfection.

Thirteen listed their main aim in life as ‘developing the farm to such a state that it can be handed over to my son(s) (son-in-law) as a successful and on-going business’. The remainder considered that their main aim was to strive for perfection in farming as far as was possible. In these cases their families were not interested in farming, or else the farmer had no children. The statements and comments from all the respondents indicated that they were conscious of being highly motivated to achieve their individual objectives. Only three had not been on official agricultural committees at some time, but these were very active in several church, charitable and community service organisations. Those who had been-and were-participating in agricultural politics had a wide spectrum of involvement, from serving as local Intensive Conservation


Area Committee Chairmen to being Commercial Farmers’ Union Presidents. All exhibited a very high involvement in their community’s affairs. All had been on the executive committee of their local sports club at some time.

For the sample, the mean size of farm was 1489 ha, but the range varied from 202 ha to 2834 ha, and the mean cropping area was 257 ha, with a range of 35 ha to 810 ha. The very wide range of types of crop grown invalidated the size of farm as a reliable variable to consider. For instance, a farm of 202 ha producing only 35 ha of coffee had a similar cash turnover and profit margin to another farm of 1200 ha producing a total of 280 ha of maize, wheat and cotton. A more meaningful indication of the size of the operation was given by the respondents when they expressed it in dollars turnover or dollars Gross Margin. The diverse nature of the crops grown also invalidated size of labour force as a comparable variable (irrigated winter wheat is highly mechanised, while cotton requires large picking gangs). The annual turnover of the sample varied from $120 000 to $1.2 million.

PLANNING PROCEDURE

In the farming operation, each respondent had a planning procedure, which had been developed with experience, some plans being more sophisticated, but apparently not more effective, than others. Each plan seemed to be separated into four distinct phases.

Phase I was the long-term plan-the farmer’s life’s goals. This was directed either to handing over to the family or as being a striving for farming perfection. The agricultural details in this planning phase appeared to be subtended to the personal goal level that ensured financial independence, security in old age, etc., of each farmer.

Phase II became less personal and more agricultural, and included definite plans to expand cropping area, to buy adjacent farms, to build dams for irrigation and other major projects that required in the region of a 5-, to lo-year timeframe.

Phase III was the seasonal plan, entirely related to the business of the farm. Here such things as rotations, financial details and cash flow, cropping and management practice sequences, and so on, were considered. This phase of planning was undertaken on an annual basis, but with an increased timeframe, depending on the crop or animal

Decision-making process of’ commercial farmers in Zimbabwe 155

management system. For instance, rotations on a tobacco farm require a 5-year timeframe, to be reviewed annually, with coffee and other plantation crops having an 8- to 20-year timeframe. The planning in this phase concentrates on the seasonal aspects, with consideration also being given to the implications of any decision made in the long-term.

Phase IV was the day-to-day planning, which the respondents all considered on a weekly basis. At the beginning or end of each week, the day-to-day details of the following week were decided. This was the most flexible stage of planning and was the one that related directly to weather and crop growing conditions.

This raised an interesting point on the timing of agricultural messages by extension personnel. In aiming for maximum effect it would appear that the extension worker should try and get the message that he wishes implemented in a hurry to the farmer at the time phase IV decisions are made, i.e. at the weekly planning session, which the respondents indicated they carried out either on a Friday afternoon/Saturday morning for the following week or Monday morning for that particular week.

It appeared that phase I plans were very formalised and relatively rigid and that changes in these were only effective after much thought and discussion, and active information seeking. The week-by-week plan was very flexible and there was evidence that the decision-making at this level was, to a large degree, left to the farm manager or made in full consultation with junior staff. It appeared that the farther the farmer moved from the phase IV type of plan to the phase I type of plan, the less junior staff were involved and the more personal and family con- siderations were important. Thus, the influence of the wife and family was reduced in moving from a phase I to a phase IV plan while that of the paid employees increased.

With regard to decision-making, a definite hierarchical process was apparent. Generally, the pressure of decision-making was reduced from phase IV to phase I. The underlying motive in a phase IV plan appeared to be profit or the elimination of loss. Decisions at this level were concerned solely with units of production, such as bags of maize lost through lack of applied fertilizers, kilograms of tobacco saved through timeliness of suckeride application, etc. This all tended to be viewed ultimately as the maintenance of financial stability.

As the respondents moved from the short-term seasonal level, the basis of stability and security changed. Priorities no longer included giving the crop what it needed, when it needed it, to stabilize or increase


production-and therefore financial return-but were concerned with personal stability and security.

Planning phases I and II were concerned with future stability, either for family reasons or for conditions of old age or security in retirement. The decision-making in personal terms at this level was seen as being relevant and of major importance. The respondents saw farming in terms of fulfilling not an agricultural or production goal, but a personal one. Figure 1 shows various conditions diagramatically as a series of continua across the phases of planning.

I Long-term

plan

II Intermediate

term plan

III Seasonal

plan

IV Day-to-day

plan

(a) Planning orientation

More personally oriented Less farm oriented

Less personally oriented More farm oriented ’

(b) Planning involvement

More family involved Less/nil farm staff involved

Less family involved More farm staff involved l

(c) Decision- making style

(d) Security

RIGID FLEXIBLE 4 (Family oriented) (Crop, business, t

enterprise oriented) More personally oriented Less personally oriented

Less crop oriented More crop oriented (e) Goals More personal-goal oriented Less personal-goal oriented

Less farm oriented More farm oriented -;t

Fig. 1. Diagram of continua of planning phases of commercial farmers.

There was considerable evidence from all the respondents of a very strong practical, and yet rational, conservatism in their planning and operation. Change or innovations among the respondents wereperceived by the respondents themselves as being slow, and yet, to the remainder of the agricultural community and the extension experts, the respondents were the innovators or leaders. All respondents stated that change was effected only after a definite series of decisions had been made and the subsequent phases carried out. Figure 2 gives an outline of the decision- making process that emerged. This is essentially a cyclic decision process, and, as such, is at variance with the ‘classical’ model suggested by Lionberger,4 Campbell1 and Rogers and Shoemaker6 (pp. 137-60).

From the analysis of the content of the interview transcripts, as checked by the judges, it appears that there is an initiation phase, which is motivated either by a problem in the farming system, a conscious or

Decision-making process of‘commercial jhrmers in Zimbabwe

INITIATION PHASE REVIEW PHASE

I57

Reassessment

IMPLEMENTATION PHASE

Implementation with adjustment

Confirmation---tACTIVE INFORMATION- SEEKING PHASE

Literature Active Specialists Information Neighbours Seeking Friends Through Opinion leaders

Own trial

REASONED EXPERIMENTAL PHASE Limited trial, modified in field

/ \

Reasoned simulation process or modification

Fig. 2. Decision-making process of commercial farmers.

unconscious reassessment (a ‘getting an out of the rut’ impulse), a desire to improve, or the introduction of a new idea from an outside source. The initiation phase leads the respondent to review his own methods. This appears to be done on three levels: an internal, personal review; a discussion with neighbours/farming friends and discussion with specialists. Often, this is sufficient to solve a problem. If it does not, then there is a distinctive active information seeking phase. Here the


respondents actively approached opinion leaders or confidantes in the farming community, specialists, relevant literature, or else had their own trial operations to find out for themselves. Active information seeking usually included at least three or four sources of information and was characterised by the respondents asking increasingly more specific questions, rather than exhibiting the more discussive phase,of the more personal initial review. This active information seeking involved a continuous reassessment of the new information in the light of respondents’ present or extant mode of production when the decision was made.

This phase also included a very practical adaptive component. Here the respondents took the new information and tried to evaluate or blend it in, in terms of their farming system at the time. This stage involved all the perceived attributes of the innovation, as stated by Rogers and Shoemaker6 (pp. 137-60). However, the innovation was not the only part to receive this type of integration assessment. The respondents tried to see what modifications had to be made both to innovations and to their farming systems at that time. Considerable mental juggling and discussion, reassessment and evaluation, occurred here before the respondents were convinced enough to proceed.

Once they were convinced-and all these decisions were rational and reasoned-they proceeded to the reasoned experimental phase. None of those interviewed could be included, in any of their decision-making styles, in Campbell’s type 3 (non-rational problem-oriented) categories of decision-making. r Their method of decision-making seriously questions Campbell’s paradigm. All their decisions were rational; some are and were problem oriented, as with Campbell’s type 1, others arose from the desire to improve or from the continuous reassessment the respondents had made, and are making, and these are not related in any way to the type 2 (rational innovation-oriented) category that Campbell lists. Some decisions did stem from the introduction of a new idea, but far from, as Campbell (p. 463) suggests, the farm operators’ ‘awareness of the innovation clearly preceding the awareness of the need and in fact creating the desire for a change’, the innovations stimulated an assessment as to how best they could be used, if at all. The desire to change, if this is called a constant interest in new processes or reassessment of existing ones, was already there. Thus, the innovations themselves did not stimulate changes and cause decisions, because the desire to change among the respondents was already there. The


innovations were only solutions to problems that continually arise, i.e. how to keep on improving.

Although a strong conservatism was exhibited and expressed, nevertheless, in the remarks on travel, each respondent exhibited a critical and continuous interest in innovation. The desire to change appears always to be there, but the decision to change was made only after a rigorous and conservative assessment. The respondents could not be said to be really conservative for they were liberal in the consideration of new ideas, although subsequent action was on the conservative side. This is especially important in agricultural extension when taking into account the approach that should be taken when introducing something new to a farmer. In the reasoned experimental phase the respondents either went through the aspects of innovations in simulated exercises, on paper, in their minds, in discussions with neighbours, in watching their neighbours, etc., or else they tried them out on a small scale.

In Zimbabwe innovations often cannot be tried out by the farmer on a small field test. A $220 000 combine harvester requires at least 400 ha to harvest to make its purchase economically worth while, so the farmer can only watch a neighbor or a demonstration (in Zimbabwe, due to import restrictions, machinery companies do not advertise or provide dem- onstrations for potential buyers of this type of equipment). In any event, this is the classical ‘trial’ phase and serves as reasoned confirmation of the personal decision made by the farmer.

Once the respondents were satisfied at this level, they implemented the innovation. Often, circumstances did not allow them to do so (three had had new combine harvesters still on order for the last 5 years). The implementation of innovations was accompanied by a review of the effect of these innovations on their farms and a further reassessment where they actively sought confirmation of their decisions from neighbours, specialists, etc., as to whether they were implementing the innovations in the correct manner. The classical model suggested that, once the innovation had been accepted, reassessment would either lead to continued use or rejection. ’ This was the ‘adoption tree’. With the respondents, a reassessment phase came immediately at, and after, adoption. There was a learning or experimental phase where the respondents learnt as they implemented the innovations, trying to carry them out properly. During this time, modifications were made by the respondents both to the innovations and to their farming systems to obtain smooth-running farm procedures. The classical models suggest the

160 Douglas McClymorlt

innovation fitting in like a piece from a jigsaw puzzle, cleanly and neatly. The respondents indicated that the innovations were introduced usually with some ‘juggling’, analogous to a person wriggling into his seat in a crowded football stand. Only when the innovations had been integrated into their farming systems and been seen to work well did the respondents cease obtaining confirmation of their decisions and ‘adopt’ the innovations in the classical sense.

Once this had been done it became clear that the respondents were ready for the initiation phase again, and the whole process was in a position to be repeated. An unstated assumption of many of the research studies is that, once something is adopted, then ‘that is it’. The respondents did not show this, and it appeared that reassessment was introduced almost immediately in the struggle towards farming perfection.

Too often, a rigid time scale is attached to a model of this kind. The data suggested that this is unrealistic. Each farmer and farm is a separate entity in Zimbabwe and variations in personal, financial and situational aspects may allow the process to function at different speeds with different farmers. The process may take from as little as a few months to several years, and it is often unrealistic to predict how adoption will progress. This raises a serious question about research done on the adoption rates of specific innovations as being indicators of ‘innovativeness’ among farmers. The Rogers model of innovator categories, proposed after studies on rates of adoption of specific innovations (Rogers and Shoemaker,6 p. 27) would then be invalid as a measure of a farmer’s ‘innovativeness’.

Two farmers may have identical ‘innovativeness’, but, due to individual circumstances, one may implement an innovation several years before another. It would then seem inappropriate to class one farmer as an ‘innovator’ and the other as a ‘laggard’. Thus, the tracking of numbers of particular innovations adopted by numbers of farmers against a time base is not a valid measure of the ‘innovativeness’ of a farmer, classified by his performance in relation to his peers, but rather is a measure of how an innovation has been taken up by farmers or has diffused through a population.

INFORMATION SEEKING OF COMMERCIAL FARMERS

The process of decision-making involves the seeking of information, and several characteristics of information seeking behaviour emerged from


the interviews. Fourteen of the respondents subscribed to the South African Farmers Weekly and World Farming publications, over and above the free magazines (The Farmer, Tobacco Today and Modern Farming) that are supplied to all levy paying commercial farmers. These external publications have little of immediate local interest, but are a source of news and innovative ideas. Three of the farmers with specialist interests ordered specialist pig and coffee journals.

The respondents gave the impression that the local magazines gave good value and that outside ones were always ‘interesting’. A number of respondents (10) voiced the opinion that, at their level of farming, the farming press gave little really specialist advice other than local interest articles. If specialist articles or literature were required, then these farmers would approach the specialist concerned on a personal basis and obtain the relevant pamphlets, plans and instructions.

All the respondents preferred to obtain advice on a personal level, the sample being split between a direct visit to a specialist (11) or a discussion group with a specialist present (14). Those preferring the latter appeared to favour both the specialist’s advice and an input from local farmers with similar conditions but more experience. The advice given by these people was seen as being a source of new information or ideas, or else a means of confirmation and reinforcement of existing practices. The level of innovativeness of the sample was high, with twenty-three having acquired at least one innovation on their farms in the last three years. The source of information of these innovations was split between research stations/specialists (15) and neighbouring farmers (8). All had modified the innovations for their own situation. Three main reasons were advanced for implementing these innovations: the improvement of efficiency and management, income stability under adverse weather conditions and the solving of specific problems, with improvement in efficiency and management drawing the largest response (16).

IMPLICATIONS FOR AGRICULTURAL EXTENSION

Success in agricultural extension depends on presenting a farmer with the correct information at the correct time and getting him to make the correct decision. Only if the extension worker is aware of the manner in which a farmer makes his plans and decisions can he be sure that he is presenting a message at a time when the farmer is at his most receptive.


The farmer, motivated to improve, is taking part in a continual process of information digestion and evaluation. His final decision depends on the information being presented so that he can make a reasoned decision. Thus, the information must be presented in a manner that takes advantage of when the farmer makes his plans and, more especially, what sort of plans he is making.

The extension worker should also tailor his message to fit in with the information process that the farmer is going through. Every message must be presented a number of times before the farmer will accept it. Thus, the information servicing of farmers takes place over a period of time. Large-scale high-powered ‘one-off innovation programmes do not work with farmers. The decision-making process requires that a message on an innovation has to be presented a number of times.

In terms of the manner in which the farmer makes his plans, this means that the extension worker has to provide messages in severalforms over a critical period if he wishes to obtain the desired result. Extension work, therefore, means a series of programmes tied in with the farmer’s situation, and this can only be done if the extension worker understands his target farming population.

REFERENCES

1. Campbell, R. R., A suggested paradigm of the individual adoption process. Rural Social., 31(4) (1966), pp. 458-66.

2. Grundy, T., Focus on farming-4. The Farmer, 52(3) (1982), p. 7. 3. Howden, R. H. G., Personal Communication, 1981. Crop Production

Division, Department of Agricultural Technical and Extension Services, Box 8 117, Causeway, Harare, Zimbabwe.

4. Lionberger, J. F., Adoption of new ideas andpractices, Ames, Iowa, Iow State University Press, 1960.

5. Lowe, J., The education of adults--A world perspective, Paris, UNESCO Press, 1975.

6. Rogers, E. M. & Shoemaker, F. F., Communication of innovations: A CYOSS- cultural approach, New York, The Free Press, 1971.

Documents

Decision-making process of commercial farmers in Zimbabwe