Paper short abstract:

The aim of this paper is to examine manifestations of wellbeing in the lives of Latvian farmers under the conditions of growing economic recession and disquiet in Latvia’s rural areas. It also aims to challenge the understanding of economic activity as based on economic efficiency.

Paper long abstract:

The aim of this paper is to examine manifestations of wellbeing in the lives of Latvian farmers under the conditions when there are no jobs in rural areas and no markets for local produce, farms go bankrupt and many rural residents migrate away from their communities. The manifestations of wellbeing are approached through the concept of embeddedness. The paper pertain to challenge the understanding of economic activity as based on economic efficiency by indicating that economic development guidelines set out to modernise rural areas and enhance agricultural productivity have to deal with complex relationships embedded in local socio-cultural contexts. The paper argues that relations in which rural life strategies are embedded have culturally constructed meanings that help to explain why people remain in rural areas and carry on economically inefficient production. Such viable agro-activities as for instance bath-house services, home beer-brewing, organic farming and small-holder farming are not primarily guided by economic efficiency, but rather by culturally construed awareness of one's own identity and that of others, of certain values, of social and natural environment (including one's home place), of continuity, all amounting to a certain vision of a good life. The study of rural lifeworlds, economic practices and agro-activities is based on the analysis of culturally constructed values, social ties, as well as human relations with nature and meanings attached to them in 40 Latvian farms, where long term fieldwork was carried out in 2010 and 2011.