System of Rice Intensification (SRI) and Labouring Bodies: Exploring Socio-technical

Interactions

Sabarmatee Knowledge, Technology and Innovation Group,

Wageningen University

My puzzle began here During my exploratory visits from January to June of 2011

in around 30 villages, I got to interact with people who were doing rice cultivation before selecting my study villages and formulating my questions and questionnaire.

Village typology and discussion on drudgery issue

No. of villages Where discussed on drudgery issue 2 villages Non-SRI, so no discussion on drudgery issue 7 villages Could not discuss drudgery issues for

different reasons 1 village Women of same community do not do any

on-field task in rice-fields at all 20 villages Discussed drudgery issue

Learning at Preliminary Stage • Prior to the current research work, I heard

women saying SRI is less strenuous. • During my preliminary visits, mostly women,

who worked in SRI fields, reported some - direct effect and - indirect effects

of SRI on their bodies

Direct Effects

Reported Reasons given - Reduction in infections in hands and legs withn SRI (more specifically if chemical fertilizers and pesticides are not applied in the SRI fields)

- Do not have to put hands and legs continuously inside muddy water for long.

- Reduction in work hours.

- SRI is less strenuous.

- Reduction in total amount of work

- Men shared  women’s  work

- Change in postures

- Change in type of work

Indirect Effects Impact Reasons given

- Get more time to cook and eat comfortably, - Get more time to rest and hence feel better

- Change in nature of the work - Change in total hours of work - More participation of men which relieved women of their workload

Puzzle  continued…………….

Same technology, same tasks, same gender: but experiences of young and old are not same !!

Chandrabati, below 40, Gunjigaon Tulasi, above 50, Rajnapalli

Even experiences of husband and wife were different

Leshu and Chandrabati Sabita and Jambeswar

Realized that: - Impact of SRI on labouring bodies is different, not

only for men and women, but also between young and old, which has differential ramifications.

However, - Although very important, assessing all the impacts

within the present study was not manageable. - This required different research methods (mainly

experimental combined with clinical), additional budget and support of expertise from the fields of medicine like dermatology, epidemiology, physiology, etc.

This can be considered as future researchable issue.

What I explored within the framework of this study was:

“SRI  is  less  strenuous” plus the dynamics of change

Main research question: How do SRI and labour mutually shape each other?

Sub-research question: What happens to labouring bodies because of introduction of SRI, and in  turn,  how  do  people’s  

bodily experiences shape SRI?

Historically, drudgery and pain assessment are, often, not integrated in mainstream studies on technology impact assessment. Exclusion of this has resulted in not developing appropriate mechanisms to address the health issues of a large vulnerable labouring group.

Mutual Shaping of Labour and Technology ‘Agriculture  as  a  performance is part of the

wider  performance  of  social  life’                                    Paul Richards

‘Social  and  technical  cannot  be  seen  apart’                      

Bijker and Law

‘Technology  may  have  been  seen  as  socially  

shaped, but shaped by men to  the  exclusion  of  women’                                                                                                  

Wajcman

International  Food  Policy  Research  Institute’s  conceptual framework of the

linkages between agriculture and health: Agricultural producers [farmers and workers]

through intermediary processes of labour [energy, time, amount, location] while interacting with environment [water, air, soil] become exposed to occupational health risks like water associated vector borne diseases.

[Hawkes, Corrinna and Ruel, Marie T, Understanding the Links Between Agriculture and Health, Brief-1, Focus 13, IFPRI, USA, 2006 ]

Materials and Methods Materials: - Purposively selected 3 villages located in 3

districts of Odisha, India, having diverse: agro-ecology, ethnic groups, rice cultivation practices, labour characteristics, and institutional interventions. - General observation of agricultural operations

in 2011-12, but focused on randomly-selected 20 sample SRI farming families in each village having 545 rice plots during 2012 .

Materials and Methods Methods: Multiple Parallel Case Study Design, exploratory in

nature Tools: Technographic Approach Primary sources: • Focus Group discussions • Participant-observation of tasks and measuring

technology-specific materials and distances • Individual informal interviews • Story-telling • RaCoPA – Pain Mapping Tool & Ergonomics Tool • Filming and Ppotography

Social scientists, by and large, face the challenge of selecting recommended scientific methods or using tools for assessment of drudgery and pain that involve use of sophisticated and expensive instruments by skilled persons during the actual work in the rice field.

In this context, it was essential to design

and use a participatory and innovative tool to understand the bodily experiences like pain and drudgery

A tool was designed called RaCoPA

(Rapid Comparative Pain Assessment) taking inspiration from concept of PRA and using body maps and FGD tools

Process of RaCoPA: Some Glimpses

What are the specific activities that men and women (also children) do to produce rice, and which ways of growing rice cause how much pain in which parts of

their bodies?

Pointing Pain

Pointing out points of pain

Explaining posture and points of pain

RaCoPA Product

Name of the village and address Date Focal Group: Specify gender and age group (may attach a name list with age, years of experience, etc.) Physical Pain Experienced by Women Labourers of  ………Village

Activities Conventional Transplanting Method

SRI Direct Sowing Method

e.g. Manual Weeding

Hand, palm, back, elbow, waist, thighs, knees, feet, nails - more

Hand, palm, back, elbow, waist, thighs, knees, feet – very much less

Hand, palm, back, elbow, waist, thighs, knees, feet, nails – more than conv. TP method

Mechanical weeding – Mandva weeder

not used , no pain Shoulders, hand including wrist and palm, chest leg

Not used, no pain

Trade-off between reduction and increase in drudgery

Reduction in drudgery Increase in drudgery

Women - Uproot fewer seedlings - Transport less seedlings, lighter in weight, due to smaller-size seedlings - Men participated in tasks like weeding

- Have to do more numbers of weeding - Use of mechanical weeder - More supervision

Men - Smaller-size nursery making - More women participated in nursery raising

- Work for longer time for land leveling, channel- making , bund dressing - Participated in marking, transplanting and weeding

Hours spent on different tasks (per acre)

Land preparation - BullockTractor Power tillerNursery UprootingTransportingTranspalntingWeeding HarvestingRajanapalliConv 80-90 4-5 6-10 7-8 70-80 20-30 130-150 100-150 90-100SRI 90-100 4-5 6-10 2-3 6-8 10-15 75-90 40-50 90-100Gunjigaonconv 150-160 4-5 8-12 25-30 8-14 150-160 100-120SRI 160-170 3-4 4-5 4-8 110-120 40-50 100-120KokarigudaConv 70-80 4-5 20-30 5-10 90-100 45-50 50-60SRI 70-80 2-3 5-10 3-5 70-80 20-25 40-50

Leveling and channel making – additional tasks for men

• Sensing the drudgery of additional tasks, many men did not support SRI and still do not support SRI.

• But women like Laxmi Mohanty or Ahalya Nahak manage to do SRI in spite of opposition from their spouses.

• After 2-3 years of efforts as plots became

more leveled, drudgery is reduced. • Women also started participating in channel

making, bund dressing, etc.

Size of nursery, quantity of seed determine the amount of work

SRI nursery Conventional nursery

Often SRI nurseries are closer to main field or inside the main field – so travelling distance is reduced

Seed and Nursery per acre

Seeds – Need to handle only 2-3 kgs in SRI instead of 20-40 kgs in conventional method Nursery - Need to managed only 1 decimal area

for raised bed in SRI; 10 decimals for a conventional nursery

What happens to labouring bodies in this case?

Weight and distance matters a lot Carrying seedlings for

conventional plots Carrying Seedlings for

SRI plots

What is transported and how much is transported

SRI

Conventional

Seedling weights vary across methods, so does drudgery

Average seedling weight for conventional method

• Actual weight of seedlings carried by labourers

• Actual weight carried by labourers – women

• Actual weight carried by Men and Women in SRI

Same posture in different methods but amount of work differs, as does time

SRI Conventional

Transplanting in SRI Although drudgery is reduced due to lesser

number of seedlings, planting single, younger seedlings at wider spacing -- elderly women do not like it.

Concentration on planting at certain points (in grid) is boring and hence more stressful to them.

But younger ones find it less painful and hence they

like it. Average time of pushing the hand into the muddy water in conventional method is 40-50 times per minute, and in SRI, just 6-10 times per minute.

Gender-wise work participation in weeding (in number of labourers)

No. of weeding

Gender Rajnapalli Gunjigaon Kokariguda

1st weeding Men 22 54 14 1st weeding Women 158 68 275 2nd weeding Men - 29 2 2nd weeding Women 26 18 1 3rd weeding Men - 3 - 3rd weeding Women - 18 -

Men’s  participation  reduced  women’s  drudgery,  and  increased  men’s  drudgery.

Design and weight of weeders has different impacts on bodies, and hence on SRI

Cono weeder- heavier - more painful - discarded

Mandva weeder – lighter, less painful - In use now

Cono weeder was replaced by Mandva

weeder model mainly because both men and women experienced more drudgery while using it, besides the fact that it did not work well in some soils.

Weeding by using weeder is fun for them

No man above 50 participates in weeding

? No elderly woman too

Due to adaptations, drudgery is reduced in conventional

method also – wider spacing, less seedlings to handle

SRI is changing conventional

practice

Conclusion - Issue of drudgery is a product and process in social

and material interactions which may not necessarily show any predictable pattern of outcomes.

- Drudgery is less in case of SRI, especially for women, more specifically when men share their tasks.

- But reduction in drudgery does not necessarily lead to appreciation of the technology by all age groups.

- Drudgery could be a potential contributing factor for acceptance or rejection of a tool like a particular design of weeder or even a technology like SRI.

Bodily experiences are potential contributing factors for skilling and deskilling.

Bodily experiences are yet to be recognized from labourers’ perspectives who are actually end-users of a technology like SRI or artifacts like weeders.

Extension strategies, tool designing can be better

done if bodily experiences are taken into account.

THANK YOU VERY MUCH