Métayage of the older sort, re-christened as colonat partiaire, was practiced in Africa and in the overseas departments of France until modern times; its last vestiges vanished from Réunion in 2006.
On the other hand, métayage as it is defined today remains one of the options for running a farm and is given a legal backbone in the Code rural, livre IV, as well as in several laws of the European Union.
Métayage, under its modern-day meaning, remains common in Canada, and in fact compares very favourably to other farming arrangements on the basis of taxation.
Sharefarming in the broad sense finds good use where individual farmers prefer not to have complete responsibility for agricultural assets such as the land or livestock, and in such applications it is not considered exploitative.
Sharecropping began after the Civil War and ended between the 1930s and the 1940s because when machines came that could to farming more easily, landowners didn't need actual people working the fields.
In-house milking facilities tend to lie empty and unused for a good chunk of the day that could otherwise be spent doing productive (and thus profitable) work.
Likewise, land that lies empty and ungrazed serves no purpose, but can be turned to profit landowners who own neither cattle nor milking shed.
[6] The model is not exploitative, and over time, sharemilkers often slowly buy out the landholder, or alternatively use the system as a method to save for their own property.