Funding
The Farm Labor Dashboard has been supported by three USDA grant projects (USDA Award Number 2021-49400-35641, 2014-69006-21873 and 2018-69006-28096).
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Building Labor Management Know-How Among Beginning Farmers (USDA Award 2021-49400-35641) is providing programs and resources to help beginning farmers build labor management skills and confidence, and adopt employee recruitment, supervision and retention practices that improve farm business performance and/or farmer satisfaction with quality of life. Informed by recent research and direct farmer input, project activities target producers from regions in the Midwest and Northeast where labor challenges constrain post start-up farmers’ ability to scale up their farm businesses. The project is working to build labor management competencies among all beginning farmer participants and is specifically designed to meet the needs of women. Female operators, an historically under-served farm audience that now represent 41% of all US beginning farmers, typically have both overlapping and different content needs and delivery preferences than their male counterparts.
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Improving the Quality of Labor Management Decisions for Small and Medium-sized Farm Operators (USDA Award Number: 2014-68006-21873) examined relationships between household needs, farm structure, and market forces to understand how farmers can better anticipate the amount and type of labor needed to attain their goals. Using qualitative and quantitative methods, the team examined how farmer decisions around labor relate to existing farm structure, management style and market channels, development stage of the farm, and life stage of the family. The team used that information to develop an innovative decision-support dashboard to assist farmers in addressing their labor needs.
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Improving Labor Management Decisions on Small And Medium Sized Farms (USDA Award number 2018-69006-28096) focuses on the relationships between the existing labor pool(s), opportunities for mechanization, adoption of emerging technologies, and the level of employee skills and qualifications that best enable farmers to identify an optimal mix of labor needed to attain their business goals. The research components of this project are examining how farm labor approaches align with the farm operator's goals, attitudes toward mechanization and technology adoption, management style and market channels. The research is also examining how different strategies align with farmers' age, sex, and education level. Research findings will support development of additional decision-support tools and educational resources for farmers, all of which will be located on the existing farm labor dashboard.