Australian women make up half of the rural work force, but are under-represented in agricultural politics, agribusiness boards and the decision making process of farming organisations. If Australian Agriculture is to be taken seriously as a progressive, relevant and modern brand, then closing the gender gap and providing suitable career pathways for women is a vital first step.
Prior to the establishment of the “Women in Agriculture” movement in the 1990’s, farming women, in law, were recognised only as unproductive ‘sleeping partners’, not farmers or agribusiness people in their own right.
The movement produced the Australian Women in Agriculture (AWiA) organisation, who lobbied to change this and it wasn’t until 1994 that the Australian Law Reform Commission changed the legal status of women in agriculture to that of ‘farmers’. From the farm gate, right through to the Boardrooms of Australia’s most powerful and influential Agribusinesses, there is a growing gender issue that is not only reducing our talent pool, but impacting on our brand.
Our industry currently has a number of challenges, none greater than our ability to attract the best business thinkers, innovators, and communicators. Each year, there are over 5,000 jobs advertised in agribusiness, yet there’s less than 700 graduates of Ag Science, Ag economics and Agribusiness to fill many of these roles.
There is no doubt we need more, talented people in Ag, but according to Nigel Crawley, a Director of Australia’s leading Agribusiness recruitment company Rimfire Resources, we’re precluding a large percentage of the population, due to the types of roles and structure of roles offered to women.
“In over 16 years of recruitment, I have never seen a company recruit by gender, but if you look at many of the roles, particularly in regional areas, they are quite often full time and require travel. By that design alone they preclude many women, particularly those that are working mothers.”
Mr Crawley believes designing structured career pathways is a critical first step in not just attracting the best candidates to entry level roles but importantly, in retaining quality candidates after they have children.
“Job sharing, part time roles and working remotely are all concepts that many businesses use effectively particularly in the financial sector, however it’s a relatively foreign concept in Agribusiness,” he said.
“If companies can build sustainable career pathways around this issue, they will become an employer of choice, enjoy better staff retention, and importantly secure the best talent.” Mr Crawley added that women often had to leave the workforce whilst they had children, only to return some years later on lower salaries with less responsibility and opportunity for career advancement.
“This has a major impact on women gaining the necessary experience and skills to move in to senior management roles and potentially on to Boards,” he adds. “Boards are often selected based on two key criteria, skills and experience. Skills based Boards are well represented by women in Agriculture including those of MLA and Dairy Australia, however many experience focused Boards do not have women on them.”
“My argument here is that if women, like men are chosen at board level as a result of their management or industry experience, then organisations need to be more flexible and enterprising and create opportunities for women to gain that experience,” concluded Mr Crawley.
Women make up 40 per cent of Australia’s farmers (and they have twice the tertiary qualifications of the men) and 31 per cent of the agribusiness workforce, however it is men aged 35 and over who are likely to be elected to boards. Presently, there is only one woman on the Board of the NFF, Fiona Simson, who was elected as Vice President in November 2014.
Ms Simson is the first woman to fill this role.
To be fair, Agriculture is not alone in its disproportionate representation of women in its Board ranks. The latest percentage of women on ASX 200 boards is now at just 20.1%.
If Australian agriculture is to thrive, it needs talented men and women. Businesses, governments and representative bodies that accommodate flexible career pathways and an open mind, may just attract some of the best business, science, engineering and marketing brains in the world, and therefore provide Australian produced food and fibre with a distinct and sustainable brand and business advantage.
Now I must declare my interest here, I employ women in agribusiness at Redhanded. They are often the most talented creative and strategic minds in the business. They are hard to find. I also have a farm that is successfully run by my wife, who in her spare time is President of our local Landcare Group and a member of a women’s only Best Wool, Best Lamb program.
So why do I care? Well I also have two daughters and if one day they choose to pursue a career in agriculture, I would like to think they would be afforded the same opportunities I have.
Check out Jim Gall’s final word in the ‘Decision Ag’ Magazine, published bi-monthly in The Weekly Times.