Poultry Growers' Control Strategies and their Evolution

Abstract

This paper presents a model for understanding the evolution of worker strategies in rural northern Mozambique, an industrially developing agricultural region. We reviewed administrative data on grower productivity from an integrated poultry operation, visited three grower chicken houses, and followed-up with informal discussions with the integrator, examining tasks and strategies related to productivity. Defining strategy as a mode of behavior that demands a resource profile and generates a performance profile that depends on the environment, we discuss examples of strategies and their adaptation over three time horizons. These time horizons are exemplified in the poultry growing domain as the critical brooding period following birth, the weekly routine within a growing cycle, and the span of months comprised of several growing cycles. Responding to observed flock characteristics, growers used behavioral indicators of health to adjust temperature; used heuristics to adjust feed based on measured weight; and constructed items to reduce exposure of the flock to disease. Growers adapted strategies according to the work context. Heat control strategies, for example, varied seasonally. Viewing strategy change in the context of a self-regulation model in which growers actively control their work environment reveals interactions over time horizons, which range from minutes to months, and link micro and macro-cognition. The self-regulation model also suggests that strategy change creates experiences that enrich the grower's conceptual models and improve skills, which in turn enable new strategies. Investigating growers' control strategies can reveal interactions between micro and macro-cognition that influence strategy development and change.