Who suffers more: man or machine?

The 2023 harvest will be the most difficult in perhaps fifty years for many agricultural entrepreneurs. The ever-improving mechanization ensures that work can be done under almost all conditions, but the driver remains crucial. It is precisely there that heavy wear and tear is now occurring Boerenbusinessmarket analyst Niels van der Boom.

When my wife and I drive home late on Saturday evening from dinner with friends, we come across a harvester who has just picked out a corner of celeriac. While we enjoyed a game stew with seasonal vegetables, I thought about how much effort it takes to get those same vegetables out of the ground.

Machines suffer greatly under these harvesting conditions. Machines that get stuck and have to be pulled free again and again. Caterpillars cannot be towed and tricks are used to harvest the crops. Sometimes something breaks. But the wear and tear on the people who have to operate the machines is just as great, or perhaps even greater.

Don't talk, just polish
Suitable for this story is a situation I heard about at a contracting company in the southwest. The company founder himself drove a harvesting machine from seven in the morning to eight in the evening. This means arriving at the company at the latest at six o'clock and not at home before ten o'clock. Detail: this great man is now 77. It characterizes the agricultural sector. Don't talk, just clean up, they say where I come from.

Such scenarios happen everywhere. Especially in contract work, you always have to slow down during peak periods. Working long days for a few weeks and then time to relax. But those long days have now lasted three months at many companies. Even the biggest machine freak thinks it's nice. Especially when you have to leave every aisle to clean the machine, carry out repairs or pull things apart.

Chronic staff shortage
While the industry works with well-organized shifts, timetables, time-for-time arrangements and bonuses, this is a tricky issue in the agricultural sector. As a business owner, you may have the prospect of (hopefully) a large invoice and satisfied customers, although the former is not always the case. But what motivates you as an employee to demand so much of yourself? It is not without reason that the agricultural sector has been struggling with a chronic personnel shortage for years. A shortage that has become increasingly acute over the last five years and will pose many challenges. You can buy as many tractors and harvesters, rent land and build sheds, but without the right people in the right place it won't work.

Even among people who still enjoy working in agriculture, you notice a difference in mentality compared to five or ten years ago, and that is not surprising. The home front likes it when mom or dad can be seen at home, even if it is the middle of the season, and more and more people think that way. Completely logical, but it makes the puzzle even more difficult for the employer.

Robots
In ten years' time, the aforementioned contractor will no longer be able to rely on his 77-year-old father, or an extremely experienced employee who has now retired. The drivers who then have to do the work are in a different way and have been raised differently. Will there come a time when the crops are not cleared because there are simply no people? Who knows. With robotization, the sector is presented with a big fat sausage - from which many start-ups rake in millions - but in practice I see little change on most fronts. That can be fast, but slogging in the mud to get potatoes, carrots or beets out of the ground will still be a human job for a while, in my opinion. People you have to be careful with and who shouldn't wear out too much.

Niels van der Boom

Niels van der Boom is a senior market specialist for arable crops at DCA Market Intelligence. He mainly makes analyses and market updates about the potato market. In columns he shares his sharp view on the arable sector and technology.

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