How well is farmers’ social situation captured by sustainability assessment tools? A Swedish case study

ABSTRACT

Recent research indicates that sustainability assessment tools (SAT) for farms need to be contextually adapted to be acceptable and useful. Focusing specifically on social sustainability, this study sought to identify important aspects of relevance for Swedish (livestock) farmers’ social situation and compare these aspects with social indicators used in three existing SATs (RISE, SAFA, IDEA). A survey revealed that social issues of key importance for the self-reported overall life satisfaction of Swedish livestock farmers are: having a good financial situation, having a similar standard of living as others, not experiencing too much stress, having meaningful work, having decent working hours, and having a desirable family situation. Of the three SATs evaluated, RISE appears best equipped to capture the social situation of Swedish farmers but does not fully address the aspect of finding work meaningful. SAFA and IDEA both fail to capture many aspects of importance for describing the social situation of Swedish farmers. We present a novel method for testing the relevance of social indicators for farmers in a specific context. Applying this method before choosing, applying, and adapting SATs for farm-level sustainability assessments would increase the relevance of the social sustainability dimension, but deeper stakeholder engagement than offered by our survey is needed.

KEYWORDS:

• Social sustainability
• quality of life
• social indicators
• agriculture
• indicators

1. Introduction

Sustainable farming sits at the heart of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, as almost all the Sustainable Development Goals are directly or indirectly connected to food provisioning (FAO 2017). One common way to operationalize farm-level sustainability is by using multidimensional indicator-based sustainability assessment tools (SAT) that employ indicators in quantitative and/or qualitative measurements of social, environmental, and economic outcomes in a systematic and integrated way. Apart from a defined set of indicators, typically grouped under themes and sub-themes, SATs commonly include rating approaches and specific ways to display results. For agriculture, a number of SATs have been developed, primarily in research projects (Marchand et al. 2014; Schader et al. 2014; Rasmussen et al. 2017). The purpose of sustainability assessments using SATs is to assess the farm from a broad sustainability perspective, in order to identify and highlight areas in need of improvement, study trade-offs, and follow developments over time.

An emerging criticism of existing SATs for agriculture is that they are perceived by targeted farmers as not sufficiently closely adapted to their particular situation (de Olde et al. 2016, 2018). Coteur et al. (2018) concluded that SATs need to be better tuned to farmers’ needs, motivation, and visions, especially in terms of strategic decision-making. Another acknowledged weakness is that the social dimension of sustainability is less developed than the economic and environmental dimensions (de Olde et al. 2018). Although many SATs aim to embrace all three dimensions of sustainability, environmental aspects dominate in existing assessment tools. A recent review of 80 studies using sustainability indicators related to commodity agriculture revealed that almost all assessed environmental aspects (93%), while social aspects were covered by only 25% of the studies (Rasmussen et al. 2017). One plausible reason for this is that, due to its inherently more subjective nature, the social dimension is often perceived as more difficult to target in quantifiable indicators than the environmental and economic dimensions (Bond et al. 2012).

To date, multidimensional indicator-based farm-level SATs have been used to a very limited extent in Sweden (Röös 2017). Economic and environmental aspects are often evaluated at farm level and monitored at a national scale in Sweden, while social aspects are given much less attention. Swedish agriculture remains family-based. Around 92% of Swedish farms were defined as family farms in 2010, meaning that labor comes to a significant extent from the farmer’s own family and that the family bears the business risk to a large extent (Davidova and Thomson 2014). Typically, the Swedish farmer is an older male who lives alone or with his spouse and family on the farm. Of all farm work, 45% is performed by the farmer, 24% by family members, and 11% by permanent or temporary farm employees (on non-family farms, 21% of the work is performed by employees) (SS 2018). Following the wider trend in industrialized countries, since the 1950s Swedish farms have grown in size, become more specialized, and decreased significantly in number (Davidova and Thomson 2014), from approximately 96,000 in 1990 to 63,000 in 2016 (SS 2018). Agriculture has also become increasingly mechanized and dependent on external inputs (Terres et al. 2015). This up-scaling has had large impacts on the nature and organization of farm work and the social situation of the farmer. For example, farmers have become more geographically isolated, since farms are becoming larger and fewer.

The aim of this study was to identify important aspects of relevance for Swedish (livestock) farmers’ social situation and compare these aspects with social indicators used in three existing SATs. We present and discuss an approach for contextualizing indicators of social sustainability to a given application, in this case Swedish livestock farmers, which might facilitate uptake and use of social sustainability indicators to increase overall farm-level sustainability.

Social sustainability can be broadly defined as including ‘the processes that generate social health and well-being now and in the future, and those social institutions that facilitate environmental and economic sustainability now and in the future’ (Dillard et al. 2008). Schader et al. (2014) suggest that social sustainability in farming can be approached from two angles: 1) social impacts on those located on the farm (i.e. the farmer(s), family, or farm workers) and 2) the wider societal impact of the farm (e.g. the extent to which the farm contributes to employment, delivery of safe foods, and a countryside suitable for recreation). The first dimension was addressed within the scope of this study, i.e. the social situation of those located on the farm, focusing here on the social situation of the farmer.

2. Material and methods

To evaluate how well Swedish farmers’ social situation is captured by current SATs, we used the following approach. First, we conducted a survey to identify the factors of social sustainability relevant to Swedish farmers and distributed it to Swedish livestock farmers (as described in Sections 2.1 and 2.2). Next, we selected a set of SATs to evaluate and reviewed the indicators on social sustainability in these (Section 2.3). Finally, we analyzed the extent to which the factors relevant for Swedish farmers, as indicated by the questionnaire answers, are addressed by the social indicators in the selected SATs (Section 2.4).

2.1. Farmer survey

To identify the factors that are most important in terms of describing the social situation of Swedish livestock farmers, we designed a questionnaire that was sent out to all members of the Association of Swedish Animal Farmers. A total of 4337 farmers were approached by email (2649 farmers) or regular mail (1688) and invited to participate in the survey. Of these, we failed to contact 421 (mainly due to a non-functional email address). The response rate was 17%.

The survey contained a list of 46 questions (see Section 2.2 on how these were designed) asking farmers on a scale from one to five (or to tick ‘don’t know/not relevant’) about how they perceived their situation; for example, ‘Do you have a good financial situation?’ (see Table 5 for all questions). To determine the factors that best explain farmer satisfaction (and that should be captured in a SAT used in a Swedish context), we ran correlation analysis between each individual question and a ‘Life Situation Index’. This index was derived from calculating the mean of farmers’ answers to the following three questions:

• To what extent are you satisfied with your life as a farmer?

• To what extent does your life as a farmer meet your expectations?

• To what extent is your ideal life similar to your current situation?

Table 1. Brief description of the sustainability assessment tools (SATs) included in this study.

	RISE (HAFL 2017)	SAFA (FAO 2014)	IDEA (Zahm et al. 2008)
Aim of the tool	The purpose of the RISE (Response-Inducing Sustainability Evaluation) tool is to contribute to enhancing the sustainability of agricultural production, by supporting knowledge-based processes that are founded on voluntary participation, confidentiality, and capacity building. The RISE method translates the sustainability concept to the farm level and makes sustainability more measurable, communicable, and tangible. RISE has been used on more than 3300 farms in around 57 countries.	SAFA (Sustainability Assessment of Food and Agriculture) is a common framework for measuring performance according to core sustainability themes. SAFA provides an international reference tool for assessing the sustainability performance of food and agriculture enterprises. The purpose of a SAFA is to support the implementation of effective sustainability management and communication in the food and agriculture sector worldwide. Through voluntary assessments, the goal is to holistically assess enterprise performance along the four dimensions of sustainability.	IDEA (Indicateurs de Durabilité des Exploitations Agricoles or Farm Sustainability Indicators) is a self-assessment tool for farmers and policymakers to support sustainable agriculture based on three essential functions: producing goods and services, managing the landscape and playing a role in the rural world. The IDEA method is based on research work and gives practical expression to the concept of sustainable farms. IDEA has been tested on more than 1500 farms between 2000 and 2007.
Overarching sustainability dimensions	Economic, environmental, and social dimensions, but without classifying the themes and indicators evaluated under explicit dimensions.	Good governance, environmental integrity (includes animal welfare), economic resilience, and social well-being	Three scales of sustainability: agroecological, socio-territorial, and economic
Structure	10 themes, 46 indicators	21 themes, 58 sub-themes, and 116 indicators	16 target objectives with 41 indicators used for characterization
Definition of the social dimension	RISE manual has an overall definition of sustainability including all sustainability dimensions, but also emphasizes that sustainable agriculture ‘provides durable employment, sufficient income, and decent living and working conditions for all those engaged in agricultural production.’	Social sustainability is about the satisfaction of basic human needs and the provision of the right and the freedom to satisfy one’s aspirations for a better life (WCED 1987). This applies as long as the fulfilment of one’s needs does not compromise the ability of others, or of future generations, to do the same.	The definition of sustainable agriculture involves viability, livability, and environmental reproducibility. Livability focuses on analysis of farming activities and their provision to a decent professional and personal life for the farmers and their families.
Presentation of results	Aggregated results for the 10 themes in a spider diagram	Aggregated results for the 21 themes in a spider diagram	Aggregated results for 10 components in a spider diagram

Table 2. Summary of social sustainability themes and indicators in the RISE sustainability assessment tools. From Grenz et al. (2016).

Theme	Indicators	Description of the indicator
Working conditions ‘… assesses the objective working conditions for farm employees and self-employed farm labor.’	Personnel management	Including ‘whether the farm has a professional, forward-looking personnel management system in place and whether working conditions comply with the decent work standards established in the relevant human rights conventions and agreements.’ Scored based on, for example, written employment contracts/pay stubs or payslips/work permits for all personnel/protection against unfair dismissal/adequate income protection in the event of accidents, sickness, maternity, etc./no discrimination/no forced labor of any kind/freedom to form labor unions.
	Working hours	Working hours and annual vacation are recorded and evaluated against the regional standard. Highest score for 5 days per week, 40 hours per week and 6 weeks paid vacation, can be adjusted to regional level.
	Safety at work	Including the frequency of work-related accidents and cases of illness on the farm, prevention measures taken to prevent them and risk of illegal child labor.
	Wage and income level	Comparing the income of people working on the farm against their financial needs. Self-employed workers are also asked about the farm’s financial results (e.g. changes in business value, private account deposits/withdrawals, building up of reserves, equity capital formation).
Quality of life ‘A high level of satisfaction with their work and their life in general is important for the physical, mental and social well-being of the people living on the farm. Quality of life, satisfaction and happiness are important indicators of successful sustainable development. Quality of life is achieved when individual goals are currently being met.’	Occupation and training	Including how important their occupation and initial and ongoing training are to them and satisfaction with current situation.
	Financial situation	Question about how important the financial situation is to the interviewees and how satisfied they are with it.
	Social relations	Including how important social relations are and the satisfaction with current situation.
	Personal freedom and values	Importance of personal freedoms and the ability to live by their personal values and their satisfaction in this regard.
	Health	Covering the importance of health (including stress) and the satisfaction with current situation.
	Other areas of life	Covering the importance of other areas of their lives and their satisfaction with current situation.

Table 3. Summary of ‘social well-being’ themes, sub-themes, and indicators in the SAFA sustainability assessment framework. From FAO (2013). QL = Qualitative indicator to be assessed through interviews by the person performing the assessment, QN = Quantitative indicator.

Theme	Sub-theme	Default indicator	Description of indicator
Decent livelihood	Quality of life	Right to quality of life	Individuals at the enterprise should 1) have an average workweek, voluntary overtime, regular breaks, etc., 2) be able to participate in culture of one’s choice, 3) have the ability to enjoy a culturally appropriate diet, and 4) have time to spend with family and friends. QL
		Wage level	The percentage of employees that are paid at least at or above the living wage for the region. QN. Highest score if 100%.
	Capacity development	Capacity development	Employees should have opportunities for capacity development, e.g. through attending training or conferences, or by discussing opportunities for advancement openly and fairly with management. Primary producers should have the possibility to adopt improved techniques, etc. QL
	Fair access to means of production	Fair access to means of production	Access to sufficient knowledge about practices through, for example, extension services and access to necessary equipment and facilities. QL
Fair trading practises	Responsible buyers	Fair pricing and transparent contracts	Primary producers’ rights to fair pricing, contracts or agreements. QL
	Right of suppliers	Right of suppliers	Buyer recognition and support of primary producers’ and suppliers’ rights to freedom of association and to collective bargaining.
Labor rights	Employment relations	Employment relations	That there are written agreements with employees that meet at least national and international labor treaties including social security and that employees understand these. QL
	Forced labor	Forced labor	Employees’ freedom to quit work or raise grievances without fear. QL
	Child labor	Child labor	Employment of children that negatively affects their right to be children and attend school. QL
	Freedom of association and right to bargaining	Freedom of association and right to bargaining	Employees’ freedom to negotiate as individuals or groups, or be part of a union which represents them. QL
Equity	Non discrimination	Non discrimination	Occurrence of discrimination of groups or by sexual identity in hiring, job allocation, promotions and firing, or in awarding contracts to suppliers. QL
	Gender equality	Gender equality	Occurrence of discrimination against women in hiring, remuneration, training, advancement, and access to resources. QL
	Support to vulnerable people	Support to vulnerable people	Support to disabled, young, and aged workers within the farm operation and also prevention of degradation of resources or opportunities for members of vulnerable groups in the community. QL
Human safety and health	Workplace safety and health provisions	Safety and health training	Provision of training in health and safety for employees, and ensuring that this training is effective. QL
		Safety of workplace, operations, and facilities	Provision of a workplace that is safe, clean, and healthy. QL
		Health coverage and access to medical care	Provisioning of health coverage and access to emergency medical care for employees. QL
	Public health	Public health	Avoiding pollution of the local community. QL
Cultural diversity	Indigenous knowledge	Indigenous knowledge	Recognition and respect the rights of indigenous communities upheld though fair contracts. QL
	Food sovereignty	Food sovereignty	Availability of inputs such as seeds and breeds of the farm’s choice with a focus on local and traditional variants. QL

Table 4. Summary of ‘socio-territorial’ components and indicators in the IDEA sustainability assessment framework. From Zahm, pers. com. FSA = farmer self-assessment, SC = set through predefined scoring system defined in the tool.

Component	Indicators	Description of the indicator
Quality of the products and land	Quality of foodstuff produced	Whether products are certified e.g. organic and linked to the territory. SC
	Enhancement of buildings and landscape heritage	Quality of landscape elements, e.g. hedges and trees, including the maintenance of old buildings and the architectural quality of new buildings to maintain rural heritage. FSA
	Processing of non-organic waste	Avoidance of burning organic waste and sorting and reuse of organic waste on-site. SC
	Accessibility of space	Access to the public, e.g. hikers and horses, and path maintenance. SC
	Social involvement	Involvement in associations, opening the farm to direct tastings and sales, housing near the farm. SC
Organization of space	Short trade	Local and direct sales. SC
	Autonomy and enhancement of local resources	Autonomy of feed supplies, use of local fertilizers, seeds, breeds, and energy, rainwater recovery. SC
	Services, multi-activities	Local commercial services, agro-tourism, educational farm, different types of social experiment projects. SC
	Contribution to employment	Creation of on-farm jobs in recent years, job creation through local employment networks, percentage of seasonal workers who live in the neighborhood. SC
	Collective work	Pooling of equipment and services, networking. SC
	Probable farm sustainability	Whether the farm is likely to exist in the future according to the farmer. FSA
Ethics and human development	Contribution to world food balance	Dependence on imported area for feed production, expressed in percentage of the total area. SC
	Animal welfare	Livestock access to clean water, comfort in the fields (e.g. shady areas, shelters) and inside farm buildings, health condition, grazing and confinement. SC
	Training	Training per working hours, reception of groups of professional visitors, e.g. students. SC
	Labor intensity	Number of weeks per year when the farmer considers he/she is overworking. FSA
	Quality of life	Self-perceived quality of life of the farmer. FSA
	Isolation	Self-perceived feeling of geographical, social, or cultural isolation. FSA
	Board facilities, hygiene, and safety standards.	Quality of reception and accommodation for temporary workers and trainees, safety of facilities and equipment. SC

Table 6. Mapping of the social indicators in each SAT that match the most important factors to describe social sustainability of Swedish farmers.

Factors most relevant for Swedish farmers (from survey in this study)	Indicators in RISE (HAFL, 2017)	Indicators in SAFA (FAO, 2014)	Indicators in IDEA (Zahm et al., 2008)
Having a good financial situation Experiencing a similar standard of living as other Not experiencing too much stress Finding work meaningful Having decent working hours Having a desirable family situation	Relevant: Working hours Wage and income level Financial situation Social relations Personal freedom and values Health (including stress) Missing aspects: Finding work meaningful	Social sustainability indicators targeted at farm workers and not the farmer himself/herself. For Sweden where most farms are family farms this is major limitation.	Relevant: Labor intensity Quality of lifeMissing aspects: Not experiencing too much stress Finding work meaningful Farmers perceived financial situation Having a desirable family situation

Table 5. Strength of correlation (Pearson’s rho) between life situation index and individual questions in the survey.

Question:	Rho
Do you have a good financial situation?	0.472**
Do you have a work situation with a reasonable level of stress?	0.470**
Do you have the same standard of living as others around you?	0.461**
Do you have the opportunity to create a desirable family situation?	0.451**
Do you feel that your work is meaningful?	0.443**
Do you have reasonable working hours?	0.426**
Do you have the opportunity to take time off work?	0.376**
Do you feel hope for the future of your own farm?	0.370**
Can you afford to hire the labor you need?	0.355**
Are you proud of the farming activities you are performing?	0.325**
Do you feel appreciation from society for the farming you are performing?	0.312**
Do you get a fair price on your products?	0.309**
Do you feel hope for the future of Swedish agriculture?	0.300**
Are you listened to and respected by friends and neighbors in your area?	0.271**
Do you think you compete on equal terms with other farmers within your product range in Sweden?	0.267**
Do you have good relationships with your neighbors?	0.264**
Is your farm a safe workplace?	0.263**
Are you able to live off what you earn from farming?	0.254**
Are you and your family healthy?	0.247**
Do you feel appreciation for your farming from friends, neighbors, and acquaintances in your area?	0.245**
Do you have close friends in your area?	0.245**
Do you have sufficient control over the land you use (you own it or have long-term lease agreements)?	0.244**
Do you have the opportunity to participate in local associations and networks?	0.242**
Do you have the opportunity to exchange services with other farmers and get help when you need?	0.236**
Can you run your production as you wish without being hindered by regulations?	0.228**
Are you listened to and respected by society at large?	0.222**
Do you have the opportunity to choose supplier of feed, manure, fuel, and other inputs?	0.219**
Are there organizations that successfully represent your interests (e.g. The Federation of Swedish Farmers)	0.212**
Do you have the opportunity to hire labor with the right skills (provided you can afford to do that)?	0.209**
Do you have the opportunity to influence the price of what you sell?	0.202**
Do you think you compete on equal terms with other farmers within your product range within the EU?	0.188**
Do you have access to relevant advisory services?	0.184**
Do you have access to relevant training in agriculture and business?	0.157**
Do you have access to veterinarians and other services related to animal production?	0.149**
Are the authorities you want to have contact with available?	0.141**
Do you have access to public and commercial services, such as schools, healthcare, shops, public transport, and pharmacies?	0.125**
Do you have the opportunity to influence decisions at local level (municipal and county level) that are important to you?	0.118**
Do you have the opportunity to influence decisions at national level that are important to you?	0.104**
Do you have access to alternative sources of income, e.g. snow plowing and tourism?	0.101*
Do your animals live a good life?	0.097*
Do you have access to broadband, roads, stable electricity, and other infrastructure?	0.063
Do you feel that administration and paperwork are unnecessarily extensive?	−0.118**
Do you feel affected by discrimination based on, for example, gender, background, sexuality, and age?	−0.158**
Do you feel affected by discrimination due to your farming practices (e.g. practicing organic or conventional agriculture and crop or livestock farming)	−0.227**
Do you feel alone?	−0.298**
Do you feel worried about your financial situation?	−0.299**

**Correlation significant at p < 0.01.

*Correlation significant at p < 0.05.

A Cronback’s alpha value of 0.889 was found, which indicates high internal consistency for these three questions. The non-parametric Spearman correlation coefficient (rho) can be used to measure the strength and direction of association between two ranked variables (Weaver et al. 2018). It takes a value between -1 and 1, indicating the correlation strength and direction. Here, we used it to check the correlation between the questions in the survey and the Life Situation Index, in order to identify which questions were of key importance for explaining overall life satisfaction and therefore important to capture the social situation of the farmer. As an alternative, we could have asked farmers explicitly to state or rank the factors they find most relevant. The reason that we did not do so is that we suspected that this would give us answers that were biased towards social issues that farmers currently found challenging or problematic. We expected the correlation of questions with overall life satisfaction to be a more robust strategy for identifying factors that farmers find important, regardless of how they are currently doing in these areas.

We also included an open-ended question where farmers were asked if they felt that question(s) important for mapping their overall social situation were lacking in the questionnaire (‘Do you think any other questions are needed to capture your life situation? If yes, which?’).

2.2. Identifying factors to include in the questionnaire

To develop questions to include in the quenstionnaire, we turned to the limited amount of research on the social situation of Swedish farmers. Due to the very limited number of peer-reviewed studies on the topic, we also added relevant grey literature in the form of Master’s theses and government reports. In addition to searching the Internet and using a snowballing technique based on the studies found, we also consulted prominent social science researchers studying agriculture in Sweden and contacted the Swedish Board of Agriculture, in order to identify relevant literature. We continued this process of talking with researchers in the field and searching reference lists and the Internet until we achieved saturation, i.e. where no new literature was found.

We found no published peer-reviewed quantitative study aiming to embrace a comprehensive set of relevant aspects of Swedish farmers’ social situation. Therefore, we used as our starting point the work by Nordström Källström and Caselunghe (2010). This study surveyed factors of relevance for social sustainability in rural Sweden and identified eight relevant themes 1) Participation, democracy, and social status, 2) Networks and social relations, 3) Health, security, and work environment, 4) Equality, 5) Education and learning, 6) Service and communication, 7) Livelihood and occupation, and 8) Financial distribution. These are further divided into a number of sub-themes. The themes and sub-themes were discussed and further refined by the author group, based on the available literature, as described below.

A recurring aspect of the social situation of farmers is their financial situation. For example, in a survey on 300 Swedish farmers’ health, good social contacts and good financial situation were found to be essential aspects (Jönsson 2010). While the actual financial situation for farms is often handled under the pillar of economic sustainability in SATs, it has been pointed out repeatedly that farm finances are intimately linked with (or might be seen as a part of) the social dimension (Sneddon et al. 2006; Magis 2010). In addition, it is not only the level of income that is of relevance, since the more subjective experiences of having a good or bad financial situation, of getting fair prices for products and services, and of getting an income that is considered just in relation to one’s peers are also important dimensions of social sustainability (Nordström Källström 2008). By being self-employed entrepreneurs, and highly dependent on market prices, weather, and changing policies and prices, farmers may also be particularly exposed to stress resulting from vulnerability to external factors that they cannot control (Kolstrup et al. 2011; Statistics Sweden et al. 2012). In addition, recent research indicates that many farmers across the world feel increasingly exposed to global market fluctuations, and believe in many cases that the state has stepped back from supporting them (Smith et al. 2010; Thompson et al. 2013). This applies also in Europe (European Commission 2016) and in Sweden, where a recent publication shows that Swedish farmers feel financial pressure and believe that the Swedish government could do more to secure their interests (Fischer and Röös 2018). Several studies also indicate that understanding and adhering to (changing) rules and regulations, as well as vague expectations from authorities, is a major burden and a cause of stress for Swedish farmers (Nordström Källström 2008; Kolstrup and Hultgren 2011; Chaganty 2016). To reflect this, we split theme (8) Financial distribution in the report by Nordström Källström and Caselunghe (2010) into two new themes: ‘Balance of power and fair pricing’ and ‘Fair competition and freedom to act’, resulting in nine themes in total.

Several studies emphasize the importance for well-being of farmers being appreciated by the wider society and their peers (Nordström Källström 2008; Statistics Sweden, Swedish Board of Agriculture, Swedish Environmental Protection Agency, The Association of Swedish Farmers 2012; Saunders 2016; Joosse et al. 2017) (captured in the theme ‘participation, democracy and social status’). The importance for Swedish farmers of being engaged and feeling belonging in their social surroundings is exemplified by the fact that despite, or potentially because, Swedish farms are getting fewer and farther apart, farmers are still engaged in local movements and organizations to a larger extent than the average Swede (Nordström Källström 2008). The family-farm organization indicates that the possibilities for a generational shift are important for farmers’ perceived well-being (Zagata et al. 2015). However, Joosse et al. (2017) nuance the idea of this shift having to stay within the family by pointing out that farming continuing on the farm in a way that respects previous practices may be more important than the transfer of ownership within the family.

Each of the nine themes (the original first seven ones from Nordström Källström and Caselunghe (2010) and the two new ones) were then broken down into a total of 46 more specific aspects that, based on the literature, could be turned into concrete questions expected to be meaningful to Swedish farmers (see Table 5). The questions were designed to:

1. Be of key relevance in evaluating Swedish livestock farmers’ self-reported social situation.

2. Be possible to answer by individual farmers.

3. Capture as fully as possible the variety of aspects of relevance for farmers’ self-reported social situation.

We tested the questions on six farmers to confirm their relevance, check whether any issues perceived as important by the farmers were overlooked, and ensure that questions were formulated in a way that avoided misinterpretation. Following minor adjustments resulting from the test results, the questionnaire was sent out to farmers.

2.3. Selection of SATs

de Olde et al. (2016) compiled information on 48 different SATs in order to find tools suitable for assessing farm-level sustainability in a Danish context. In the set of selection criteria applied to identify relevant tools, the tool had to: 1) be aimed at assessing sustainability at farm level using indicators, 2) be published in a peer-reviewed scientific journal or report, 3) include economic, environmental and social indicators, 4) be suitable for assessment of livestock and arable farms, 5) be suitable for north-west Europe, and 6) be available in Danish or English. As these selection criteria fit the purpose of the present study well, we used them to select SATs for evaluation. Four tools (RISE, SAFA, PG, and IDEA) complied with de Olde’s selection criteria. However, the PG tool measures public goods and therefore, by definition, it does not include the social situation of the farmer, which was the focus of our analysis. Therefore, PG was excluded and RISE Version 3.0, SAFA, and IDEA were assessed. An overview of these three SATs is presented in Table 1, and the full indicator set of each tool is supplied in the Appendix.

2.4. Evaluation of SATs

To evaluate how well RISE, SAFA, and IDEA capture the social situation of Swedish farmers, the indicators on social sustainability in these three SATs were compared in terms of how well they cover the aspects identified as important in the survey. The three SATs are structured differently (see Tables 1 and A1-A3). Therefore, it was not completely straightforward to identify social sustainability indicators in each SAF, i.e. what indicators to include in the review, especially since our focus was on the social situation of the farmer and SATs commonly mix indicators of relevance to farmers and society under the same theme. RISE does not organize its 10 themes explicitly under the social, environmental, and economic dimensions of sustainability (Table A1). However, two of the themes, ‘Working conditions’ and ‘Quality of life’, can clearly be characterized as belonging to social sustainability and therefore we included these in our review of social indicators in RISE (Section 3.2.1). For SAFA, we included the indicators in the theme ‘Social well-being’ (Section 3.2.2). For IDEA, we included all indicators in the ‘Socio-territorial scale’, although some of these indicators clearly focus on agriculture’s contribution to society, rather than the farmer’s situation. However, IDEA mixes these perspectives and, in order to be transparent, we included all indicators and assessed those most relevant for our farmer perspective (Section 3.2.3)

3. Results and discussion

3.1. Results from the farmer survey

The results from the survey showed that the questions with the strongest positive correlation (Pearson’s rho > 0.4) with the Life Situation Index were related to (Table 5):

• Having a good financial situation

• Experiencing a similar standard of living as others

• Not experiencing too much stress

• Finding work meaningful

• Having decent working hours

• Having a desirable family situation.

Feeling hope for the future of the farm came in eighth place (rho = 0.370), indicating that this aspect is also highly important for social sustainability, as expected after analyzing the qualitative literature. However, being proud of one’s farming activities and feeling appreciation from society ended up with slightly lower rankings than might be expected from the literature review (Section 2.2). A weak negative correlation was also found for the questions on whether the farmer feels alone or is negatively affected by discrimination (Table 5).

When respondents were asked whether they needed another question in the questionnaire to capture their social situation, 79% responded that they did not. Only 10% (67 respondents) suggested an additional topic. Of these, most issues had already been addressed in the survey, but some farmers wished for more questions to highlight their high priority. These included:

• Issues concerning politics and the burden of bureaucracy (20 responses)

• A wish for additional questions about the family situation (15 responses)

• A wish for more questions on various aspects of the farm’s financial situation (nine responses)

• Comments about the importance of addressing working hours/being able to take holiday/feeling tied to the farm (nine responses)

• Generational shift (four responses). (An additional two questions concerned the farmer’s age, which can be interpreted as related to this question and to those on family situation, workload, and the future of the farm.)

• A wish for additional questions on farmer’s health and stress (six responses)

• A wish for additional questions on the importance of feeling appreciation from society (two responses).

Only three open responses clearly addressed issues that were not included in the survey: one concerned a wish for questions on the effects on the farmer/farming of weather variability, and two concerned threat from predators and/or animal rights activists. Six responses were not possible to interpret.

The open answers reinforced the importance of the family situation and the financial and work situation for farmers’ well-being.

Although the literature review of Swedish farmers’ social situation (Section 2.2) indicated that factors of high importance to Swedish livestock farmers in the survey are also likely to be of relevance to other farmers, some circumstances that are particular to livestock farmers may have affected the results. As a significant share of the livestock farmers interviewed run dairy farms, which require timely and regular attention by the farmer, and as livestock rearing in general requires more constant and regular labor inputs than, for example, crop cultivation, it is likely that the possibility to take time off, have reasonable working hours, and hire the necessary labor (e.g. so that the farmer can take holidays) might be more important for the group of farmers studied than for farmers in general. Self-perceived financial situation might also have been emphasized more by this group than overall, as dairy farmers have gone through a recent period of particular financial difficulties (Kolstrup and Hultgren 2011; Fisher & Röös 2018).

3.2. Social sustainability indicators in SATs

3.2.1. RISE

Indicators for the two themes ‘Working conditions’ and ‘Quality of life’ are summarized in Table 2. The indicators in the theme ‘Working conditions’ quantitatively measure aspects such as working hours, work-related accidents, and income levels, and these quantitative measurements are evaluated against the regional standard, e.g. for working hours the standard is typically 40 hours per week. In the theme ‘Quality of life’, the interviewees are asked to directly rate their satisfaction with different areas of their lives (Table 2) using a five-point scale, and hence in this theme the perceived satisfaction of the farmer is captured.

In the theme ‘Farm management’, aspects such as risk management and sustainable business relationships are included. Such aspects touch upon social sustainability as perceived by the farmer, as they relate to how secure the farmer feels about their business.

The RISE manual states that it is necessary to distinguish between the individual and societal level of social sustainability (Grenz et al. 2016). However, it then goes on to state that: ‘On a farm, the individual level features more prominently, since the main purpose of the business is to meet the individual needs of the people who live and work there.’ This is clearly reflected in the social indicators of RISE, which center around the social situation of the farmer (Table 2).

3.2.2. SAFA

In SAFA, social indicators are grouped under the dimension ‘Social well-being’ (Table A2). Six themes are further subdivided into 13 sub-themes and 19 indicators (Table 3). The social indicators in SAFA are more extensive than those in RISE as regards the range of issues included. As in IDEA (Section 3.2.3), those in SAFA move beyond the farm into impacts of farm activities on society. There is a clear focus on the situation of farmworkers, including issues such as forced and child labor and freedom of association, reflecting the ambition of SAFA to be applicable in many settings, including those where working conditions are much less controlled than in Sweden. All indicators except one (wage level) are qualitative indicators, requiring extensive interviews to be carried out with different actors in the food chain, such as the farm owner, farm workers, community members, and suppliers. The SAFA Guidelines and Indicator documentation (FAO 2014) provides suggestions on how this can be done, but for assessments to be comparable between farms, between different people performing the assessment, and over time, the indicators have to be further concretized. Unlike RISE and IDEA, SAFA does not provide set rating systems for the indicators, so these have to be developed for each context.

3.2.3. IDEA

Social indicators in IDEA are found under the ‘Socio-territorial scale’, which is one of three sustainability scales in IDEA (Table A3). The ‘Socio-territorial scale’ in turn contains three ‘components’ and 16 indicators (Table 4). The first component, ‘Quality of the products and land’, clearly focuses on agriculture’s contribution to society by including aspects such as the quality of the foodstuff produced, providing access to the farm through the maintenance of footpaths, and cultural heritage preservation. The second component, ‘Organization of space’, contains several indicators to measure the farm’s contribution to the local food system and community, but also one indicator in which the farmer is asked to assess how probable it is that their farm will be maintained going forward. The third component, ‘Ethics and human development’, includes indicators that deal with the social situation of the farmer, e.g. ‘Labor intensity’, ‘Quality of life’, and ‘Isolation’, and also one indicator on animal welfare and one concerning the farm’s contribution to world food balance. IDEA provides a simple scoring system for each indicator. For some indicators, the farmer is asked to do the rating, e.g. for ‘Labor intensity’ the farmer is asked about the number of weeks they feel overworked.

3.3. Evaluation of the relevance of SAT social indicators for Swedish farmers

Table 6 summarizes how the social indicators in each SAT match the most important factors to describe the social situation of Swedish farmers as found in the farmer survey.

Comparing the factors with high relevance for Swedish farmers and the social indicators in RISE gave a relatively good match. The quantitative indicators in the theme ‘Working conditions’ in RISE cover the aspects of financial situation and working hours, factors of top priority for Swedish farmers. However, it could be difficult to capture the farmers’ financial situation and working situation using standardized quantitative measures such as wage levels and standard 40-hour working weeks, as farm work is inherently different. RISE accounts for this by including a theme with qualitative indicators (‘Quality of life’) that are measured by asking the farmer how they perceive the situation. This theme contains an indicator of the farmer’s perceived financial situation, social relations, and health (including stress) that also captures the most important topics for Swedish farmers. Including both 1) quantitative measurements and 2) questions to the farmer on their self-perceived financial situation and working conditions is interesting, as it enables us to learn more about how farmers’ perceived situation corresponded to standardized quantitative measurements.

One aspect of high importance to Swedish farmers, but which is not captured by RISE, is that of finding one’s work meaningful. Instead, RISE includes indicators of personal freedom and training. We did not ask farmers about personal freedom explicitly, but our question on discrimination relates to this issue, as discrimination (or its absence) captures some dimensions of freedom. Discrimination was found to be weakly correlated with the Life Situation Index in our survey, so it might be valid to include such an indicator in a SAT targeted at Swedish farmers. Instead of including an indicator for training, for Swedish conditions including an indicator measuring whether farmers find meaning in their work might better reflect the overall life satisfaction of Swedish livestock farmers.

RISE places the indicator ‘Wage and income level’, which might be considered an economic indicator, in the theme ‘Working conditions’. It justifies this by stating that the remuneration which workers get for their work is a central aspect of the working conditions in any business (Grenz et al. 2016), referring to the European Working Conditions Survey (Parent-Thirion et al. 2007). Our results also clearly show the importance of perceived financial situation for overall life satisfaction, which makes it difficult to separate economic and social sustainability, and the overall importance of the financial situation for the social (as seen also, for example, in the frequent talk about socio-economic factors in sustainability assessment and elsewhere, e.g. Bond et al. 2012).

Turning to SAFA, this tool places a clear emphasis on being able to detect exploitation of farm workers and other injustices in the production process, giving less attention to the situation of the actual farmer. Family situation of the farmer is not explicitly addressed in SAFA, which is problematic from a Swedish perspective and probably from the perspective of many other countries where family farming remains strong. It is clear from our survey that it is not possible to separate the farming business from family life and that the family situation, including possibilities for generational shift, is highly important for evaluating the social sustainability of farming in Sweden. In addition, none of the three tools evaluated addresses whether the farmer feels appreciated for their work, which was found to be important in our survey.

The IDEA tool clearly excludes economic aspects from its ‘Socio-territorial’ component. Moreover, the ‘Economic scale’ in IDEA does not include any indicator that accounts for the farmer’s perceived financial situation (Table A3). Hence, IDEA fails to capture this issue specifically. However, it includes a ‘Quality of life’ indicator in which the farmer is asked to rank their overall life quality. If the farmer feels dissatisfied with their financial situation, this could probably be captured by a low score on this indicator, but a low score could also have several other explanations. Both SAFA and IDEA include quality of life as an indicator in itself, while in RISE quality of life constitutes an overarching theme which covers several more detailed indicators (Table 2). The inclusion of quality of life in SAFA and IDEA as an indicator in itself creates a risk of it being interpreted differently in every evaluation instance, which reduces the possibility to draw more general conclusions about the drivers behind farmers’ low or high self-reported quality of life.

IDEA includes an indicator called ‘Probable farm sustainability’, which is measured by asking the farmer whether the farm is likely to exist in the future. This indicator might thus in part capture the aspect of feeling hope for the future, which is lacking in the other tools but was found to be important to Swedish farmers. IDEA also includes the indicator ‘Isolation’, capturing the self-perceived feeling of geographical, social, or cultural isolation, hence covering this aspect more explicitly than the other frameworks.

3.4. Limitations and further research needs

Applying the survey approach described in this paper before choosing, applying, and adapting SATs for farm-level sustainability assessments can increase the relevance of the social sustainability dimension. Still, sustainability assessments have their roots in reductionist and rational approaches to assessment, based on external expert consultation and quantifiable indicators. Therefore, aspects of a more subjective nature, including many that might be of relevance for measuring social sustainability, are more difficult to capture by external expert review. In these instances, approaches where targeted stakeholders are involved in designing indicators have been more successful (Bond et al. 2011). This calls for further stakeholder engagement than offered by the survey we performed here. We acknowledge this need for context specificity and stakeholder involvement in the development of tools for farm-level assessment of (especially) the social dimensions of sustainability. At the same time, we stress the importance of having indicators for social sustainability that are to some extent quantifiable and generalizable (at least across similar contexts and time periods) if social impacts are to be acknowledged and addressed on the same level as environmental and economic impacts in sustainability assessments. However, lack of specificity and relevance is not the only obstacle to the uptake and use of farm-level SATs. Coteur et al. (2018), who developed a SAT for four different agricultural sub-sectors in participatory research design, point out that, when SATs are more closely connected to strategic decision-making, they are able to stimulate farmers’ action and also their motivation to use the tools.

de Olde et al. (2018) describe the tradeoff between comprehensiveness and ease of implementation of SATs. For example, including a wider range of aspects increases the breadth of the assessment, but drastically (exponentially) increases the complexity in contextualizing and using the tool. This applies to all dimensions of sustainability, including social sustainability. To fully capture the social situation of Swedish farmers, the full questionnaire in this study (Table 5) could of course be used. That could be a valid alternative if the assessment was limited to the social dimension. However, for it to be used alongside environmental and economic themes in a farm-level SAT, a subset is needed, preferably building on the factors that are most important to describe the social situation of Swedish farmers. This study identified these and also compared them against indicators in existing SATs that could be applied. However, the number of indicators required and their precise configuration still need to be tested on-farm.

4. Conclusions

In this paper, we present a method to test the relevance of social indicators for farmers in a specific context. Applying this approach before choosing, applying, and adapting social indicators in SATs for farm-level sustainability assessments would increase the relevance of the social sustainability dimension, but deeper stakeholder engagement than offered by our survey is needed. Our evaluation showed that the RISE tool has the potential to capture the social situation of Swedish farmers, which is probably partly explained by it being originally developed in Switzerland and used extensively in similar contexts. Some modifications to the qualitative part of RISE (‘Quality of life’), including adding indicators that capture seeing a future for one’s farm and finding one’s work meaningful, would further increase its relevance for Swedish farmers. A striking finding in our analysis was how differently the three frameworks handle assessment of social sustainability. SAFA and IDEA fail to capture many aspects that our survey identified as important for describing the social situation of Swedish farmers, while SAFA includes many aspects (including forced labor and child labor) that would probably feel irrelevant to Swedish family farmers.

Acknowledgments

Our thanks to the Future Agriculture initiative at the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences for funding this study.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Sveriges Lantbruksuniversitet [Future Agriculture].

Appendix

Table A1. Themes and indicators of RISE 3.0.

Themes	Indicators	Themes	Indicators
Soil use	Soil management Crop productivity Soil organic matter Soil reaction Soil erosion Soil compaction	Biodiversity	Biodiversity management Ecological infrastructures Intensity of agricultural production Distribution of ecological infrastructures Diversity of agricultural production
Animal husbandry	Herd management Livestock productivity Opportunity for species-appropriate behavior Living conditions Animal health	Working conditions	Personnel management Working hours Safety at work Wage and income level
Material use & environmental protection	Material flows Fertilization Plant protection Air pollution Soil and water pollution	Quality of life	Occupation and training Financial situation Social relations Personal freedom and values Health
Water use	Water management Water supply Water use intensity Irrigation	Economic viability	Liquidity Stability Profitability Indebtedness Livelihood security
Energy & climate	Energy management Energy intensity Greenhouse gas balance	Farm management	Business goals, strategy and implementation Availability of information Risk management Sustainable relationships

Table A2. Sustainability dimensions, themes, sub-themes, and indicators of SAFA.

Dimension	Theme	Sub-theme	Indicators
Good governance	Corporate ethics	Mission statement	Mission explicitness, mission driven
		Due diligence	Due diligence
	Accountability	Holistic audits	Holistic audits
		Responsibility	Responsibility
		Transparency	Transparency
	Participation	Stakeholder dialogue	Stakeholder identification, stakeholder engagement, engagement barriers
		Grievance procedures	Grievance procedures
		Conflict resolution	Conflict resolution
	Rule of law	Legitimacy	Legitimacy
		Remedy, restoration and prevention	Remedy, restoration, and prevention
		Civic responsibility	Civic responsibility
		Resource appropriation	Free, prior and informed consent, tenure rights
	Holistic management	Sustainability management plan	Sustainability management plan
		Full-cost accounting	Full-cost accounting
Environ-mental integrity	Atmosphere	Greenhouse gases	Reduction target, GHG mitigation practices GHG balance
		Air quality	Air pollution reduction target, air pollution prevention practices, ambient concentration of air pollutants
	Water	Water withdrawal	Water conservation target, water conservation practices, ground and surface water withdrawals
		Water quality	Clean water target, water pollution prevention practices, concentration of water pollutants, wastewater quality
	Land	Soil quality	Soil improvement practices, soil physical structure, soil chemical quality, soil biological quality, soil organic matter
		Land degradation	Land conservation and rehabilitation plan, land conservation and rehabilitation practices, net loss/gain of productive land
	Biodiversity	Species diversity	Species conservation target, species conservation practices, diversity and abundance of key species, diversity of production
		Genetic diversity	Wild genetic diversity enhancing practices, agro-biodiversity in-situ conservation, locally adapted varieties and breeds, genetic diversity in wild species, saving of seeds and breeds
	Materials and energy	Material use	Material consumption practices, nutrient balance, renewable and recycled materials, intensity of material use
		Energy use	Renewable energy use target, energy saving practices, energy consumption, renewable energy
		Waste reduction and disposal	Waste reduction target, waste reduction practices, waste disposal, food loss and waste reduction
	Animal welfare	Animal health	Animal health practices, animal health
		Freedom from stress	Humane animal handling practices, appropriate animal husbandry, freedom from stress
Economic resilience	Investment	Internal investment	Internal investment
		Community investment	Community investment
		Long ranging investment	Long ranging profitability, business plan
		Profitability	Net income, cost of production, price determination
	Vulnerability	Stability of production	Guarantee of production levels, product diversification
		Stability of supply	Procurement channels, stability of supplier relationships, dependence on the leading supplier
		Stability of market	Stability of market
		Liquidity	Net cash flow, safety nets
		Risk management	Risk management
	Product quality and information	Food safety	Control measures, hazardous pesticides, food contamination
		Food quality	Food quality
		Product information	Product labelling, traceability system, certified production
	Local economy	Value creation	Regional workforce, fiscal commitment
		Local procurement	Local procurement
Social well-being	See Table 3

Table A3. Sustainability scales, components, and indicators of IDEA.

Scale	Component	Indicators
Agro-ecological scale	Diversity	Diversity of annual and temporary crops, diversity of perennial crops, animal diversity, use and conservation of the genetic heritage, crop rotation, enhancement and conservation of genetic heritage
	Organization of space	Cropping patterns, dimension of fields, organic matter management, ecological buffer zones, measures to protect the natural heritage, stocking rate, fodder area management
	Farming practices	Fertilization, effluent processing, pesticides and veterinary products, animal well-being, soil resource protection, water resource protection, energy dependence
Socio-territorial scale	See Table 4
Economic scale	Economic viability	Available income per worker compared with the national legal minimum wage, economic specialization rate
	Independence	Financial autonomy, reliance on direct subsidies from CAP and indirect economic impact of milk and sugar quotas
	Transferability	Total assets minus lands value by non-salaried worker unit
	Efficiency	Operating expenses as a proportion of total production value