The Specialties of the Agricultural Workforce

Fróna, Dániel – Kőmíves, Péter Miklós

Keywords: agriculture, labour force, employment, Hungary, European Union, J21, J43, Q16

The contraries of the urban and rural environment have been grown during the last decades. The villages using the natural resources available in the rural areas for example during the agricultural production are less able to give competitive options for the rural people interested in urban lifestyle. Because of this tendency the rural population is decreasing in Hungary and in the European union as well.
As a consequence of the process described the structure of the agricultural labour force is continuously deteriorating. The number of people working in the agricultural sector is decreasing and this tendency is especially true for the young employees. The labour force employed in agriculture is increasingly aging in case of the private holders and in case of the hired agricultural labour force as well because the agricultural work needs continuous activity from the employees, but the wages are not reflecting the amount of energy used. The tendency of the last years in Hungary shows that the amount of the used unpaid labour force (mainly the family members helping the private holder) decreased.
in case of the Eu Member States joined the European union in 2004 or later – and in case of Hungary too – it is really conspicuous that the gross value added and the labour input in case of the agricultural work is not as efficient as it is in the case of the EU-15. In Hungary the share of the agriculture in the total GDP is low and could not show a growing tendency in the last years.

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