  Recent measurements of charm-baryon production at midrapidity by the ALICE
collaboration show baryon-to-meson yield ratios significantly higher than those
measured in $\rm e^+e^-$ collisions, suggesting that the charm fragmentations
are not universal across different collisions systems. Thus, measurements of
charm-baryon production are crucial to study the charm quark hadronisation in
proton--proton (pp) collisions. In proton--lead (p--Pb) collisions, the
measurements of charm baryons provide important information about cold nuclear
matter effects and help to understand how the possible presence of collective
effects could modify the production of heavy-flavour hadrons. In this
contribution, the most recent results on open charm-hadron production in pp and
p--Pb collisions measured by ALICE are discussed.
