How to Retain Good Farm Workers

6 tips to retain good farmworkers and why it is important. Those who work for you and with you on your farm are your assets. Getting and keeping good workers is a challenge every farm owner or manager has to deal with on a day-to-day basis.

6 tips to retain good farmworkers

Good workers are hard to find, so when you get one, you have to do everything possible to retain them.

Below are some 6 tips to retain good farmworkers and remain good workers on your farm.

1.Comfortable Accommodation

Some farm owners provide better accommodation for their livestock than for the workers who look after them.

True it is the livestock generating money, but without the workers to look after them properly, their productivity will soon drop.

So why does a goat or cow even a pig sleep comfortably than the caretaker?

Buy them good mattresses, blankets and make them eat their money well (farm workers).

2. Good Food

You would expect farm workers to have the best meals since food is produced cheaply on the farm; however, this is not always the case.

Unless they steal some it is common for a worker on a poultry farm to take a year without tasting an egg, as everything is taken to the market.

As a way of motivating them, farmworkers should be allowed to enjoy some of the food items produced on the farm or at least be allowed to buy them at a discount. Imagine selling all the litters of milk, bunches of matooke.

Give them some as a token of appreciation.

They won’t even be tempted to steal from you as some farmers cry about farm produce theft.

3. Entertainment

With the recent developments in technology, it is possible to provide some form of entertainment to your farmworkers without spending too much.

A solar-powered television set might seem to be too expensive, but it will help stop workers from sneaking off to the nearest trading center to watch Premier League.

Get a few smartphones to keep track of you on WhatsApp and also daily updates on how your farm is doing.

Keep them updated with things happening. Imagine a farmworker not even having a small torch phone??? Bosses, don’t be that mean.

4. Training

Organize regular training for your workers as a way of increasing their skill levels while at the same time motivating them.

The cheapest way is to hire an expert in a particular field like me in agro economics to carry out on-site training for all workers. The other is to sponsor a dedicated worker to go for a study tour, agricultural shows, agric lessons, etc., or go for driving lessons because at one time, maybe they can help u transport agric produce to the market.

5. Leave

Some farm owners make their farmworkers be on farms year after year, now this goes to u, don’t u receive a leave where u work from?

If u get then treat these workers like u are treated where u work. Give them some leave for 1-2 days off the farm and hire contract workers to cover that day.

Then give them a break off like on Sunday and encourage them to go to church, if they are Moslems, allow them to go pray on Friday. This will help them change their attitudes towards work.

6. Voice of Command

The farmworkers are also human beings. Don’t treat or talk to them like they are slaves at your ranch. Talk to them politely, call them by their names.

Do likewise, you, at least give them respect as they respect you. When they annoy you, seat them down and tell them what’s wrong politely.

Don’t boom words as if you have a CD inserted in you. Be calm and handle them patiently…

Hope this shall help you, succeed at your farms as u contact us for proper farmworker orientations.

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