Australia's agriculture workforce has increased slightly and got younger

And women are leading the charge, representing two-thirds of the workforce growth in a five-year period.

Government forecaster ABARES has just released its snapshot of Australia's farm workforce, which showed there were 239,093 people employed in agriculture on-farm in 2021.

This was an increase of 4.7 per cent from the 2016 census.

A quarter of the total on-farm workforce in 2021 was aged 15-34 years, which was a slight increase from the 24 per cent in this age group five years previously.

However, the proportion of young people working on-farm remained much lower than the general Australian workforce, where 37 per cent of workers were aged 15-34 years in 2021.

Of the young people working in agriculture, 33 per cent were women, up from 30 per cent in 2016.

Overall, there were 79,827 women working in agriculture in 2021 (33 per cent of the total workforce). This was up 7105 workers from 2016, which represented two-thirds of the overall expansion in the on-farm workers over the five years.

The percentage of women working in agriculture with a "non-school qualification" was 51 per cent, up from 45 per cent in 2016. This was above the figure for all on-farm workers, at 48 per cent.

The median age of all farmers was 50 years, unchanged since 2016. It remained older than the median age of all Australian workers, which was 40 years.

Nearly half - 46 per cent - of all farm workers were employed in sheep, beef and grain farming. This was a slight drop from 2016.

The most common roles were farm manager (55 per cent of the total farm workforce) and labourers (26 per cent).

Farm worker pay continued to lag the general workforce, with 22 per cent of agricultural workers earning more than $1449 a week in 2021, compared with 37 per cent earning that amount or more in the general workforce.

More farm workers worked full time (68 per cent), than the general Australian workforce (59 per cent). Full-time work was defined as 35 hours or more hours a week.

The group classified as "Other Crop Growing" worked the longest, with more than 60 per cent of that group working more than 40 hours a week.

This was closely followed by sheep, beef cattle and grain farming.

Less than 35 per cent of those in nursery and floriculture production worked more than 40 hours a week.

People from culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds made up 13 per cent of the agricultural workforce, up from 11 per cent in 2016.

The heaviest concentration of agriculture workers were found in Queensland - Bundaberg, Cassowary Coast, Toowoomba and Lockyer Valley local government areas - and in Victoria at Mildura, Campaspe and Shepparton.

These regions are noted for their high concentration of fruit and/or vegetables, which require a large workforce for harvesting.

The 2021 census was conducted while much of south-eastern Australia was in covid lockdowns. However, the number of farm workers who worked no hours in the week leading up to the census was relatively unchanged from the 2016 census, at 3.3 per cent compared with 3 per cent.

Interestingly in Victoria, the state hardest hit by lockdowns, 3.4 per cent of workers reported having not worked in the week prior to the 2021 census. This was almost unchanged from 2016, when 3.3 per cent reported not having worked.

The 2021 national results showed the farm workforce was relatively untouched by covid shutdowns, compared with people employed in the arts and recreation services (15.3 percent who reported not having worked) and accommodation and food services (12.8 per cent).

ABARES economist Ben Slatter said the timing of the census would have had some impact on figures, with the number of on-farm workers likely to have been higher without border closures.

Mr Slatter said the most significant trends from the data was the rise in young people, women and workers from culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds.

"Behind those proportion numbers, the actual total number of young people and women were up 10 per cent from the previous census."

"You are looking at some positive trends there.

"If the workforce is looking to grow the available labour then it is perhaps in some of these underrepresented groups that you will see an increase."

One industry recruiter, who did not wish to be named, said he had a "huge gripe" about the figures, as they did not represent the entire agriculture sector.

"If these are just farmers working on farms, they grossly under-represent the length and breadth of the whole industry," he said.

"On-farm is obviously a very critical part, but it is not the whole picture of agriculture or agribusiness. The farmer is in the middle, but what about everyone else?"

However, Ben Slatter said ABARES acknowledged the census data made it difficult to identify all workers in agriculture.

He indicated a forthcoming report, The difficulty in identifying the agricultural workforce, would address this issue.