NEW DELHI (19 MARCH 2012)—Over 700 participants including ministers, World
Food Prize laureates, gender experts, international and non-governmental
organizations, and farmer’s groups from 50 countries rallied for increased
investments and improved policies targeting women farmers at the first-ever
international conference on women in agriculture.
The majority of formal processes and policies now in place to lift up women
farmers have failed, according to participants, who called for dramatic new
approaches that build change from the ground up and make women an equal
partner in agricultural development.
Women provide some 43 percent of the agricultural labor force in developing
countries, but face widespread restrictions on their ability to buy, sell or
inherit land, open a savings account, borrow money or sell their crops at
market. Farming is a major source of employment and the economic backbone in
many developing countries. Their ability to produce food is further hampered
by a lack of access to fertilizers, water, tillers, transport, extension
services, knowledge, and physically exhausting labor and drudgery associated
with traditional farming practices that have remained unchanged for
generations.
“There is a deep inter-linkage between women and agriculture, the
development of both being essential for the progress of every nation,” said
H.E. Pratibha Devi Singh Patil, president of India who addressed the
meeting. “The first Prime Minister of India, Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru, once
said that ‘in order to awaken the people, it is the women who have to be
awakened. Once she is on the move, the family moves, the village moves, the
nation moves.’”
“We find ourselves in a world where urgent actions are needed to unleash the
potential of half of the world’s population,” said Michelle Bachelet, Head
of UN-Women in a video address. “Women play a large role in agriculture,
providing food for their families and communities but we need urgent policy
attention.”
The Global Conference on Women in Agriculture, was organized by the Indian
Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR) and the Asia-Pacific Association of
Agricultural Research Institutions (APAARI). It was sponsored by the Global
Forum on Agricultural Research (GFAR), a group that seeks to ensure
agricultural research leads to concrete development outcomes.
“We all know of the large role that our mothers, our sisters, our wives, and
our daughters play in agriculture. This conference has developed a way
forward for more creative and effective joint actions to empower these women
farmers,” said S. Ayyappan, director general, Indian Council of Agricultural
Research.
The benefits of investing in women famers include the potential to increase
food production by up to 30 percent, thus reducing the number of hungry
people by up to some 150 million, according to the United Nations Food and
Agriculture Organization. In 2010, there were some 925 million
undernourished people, mostly in the developing world.
“Women take on the most tedious and backbreaking tasks,” said the Hon.
Minister of Agriculture and Food Processing, Sh. Sharad Pawar during an
address at the conference.
These include most of the non-mechanized labor in farming—transplanting
crops, weeding, harvesting, and post-harvest processing. Researchers
reported on new technologies that could cut down the billions of hours women
spend on drudgery, including more than 20 new tools ergonomically designed
for women by the Central Institute of Agricultural Engineering in Bhopal.
“Better food security and lowered malnutrition will only come if women are
empowered,” said Raj Paroda, executive secretary of APAARI. “We need to help
women play a more effective role and be recognized by policymakers and
development agencies. We need to link women to markets and provide them with
access to knowledge and assets.”
Experts released other new research findings on a wide range of topics from
linking women to markets, to household food security, to malnutrition, and
to roles of men and women farmers. Some findings include:
Research from a nationwide survey of households in India finds that women
farmers are as productive as men, despite having less access to irrigation,
education, and other services such as extension. They use more labor,
perhaps making up for other disadvantages. Yet women continue to earn a
lower wage in agriculture than males, and the gap is rising despite
comparable productivity, indicating discrimination in the casual labor
market.
Better yields do not necessarily lead to increased food security and lowered
malnutrition for households. Research suggests the need for broader
agricultural thinking to include household food security.
More education for girls and women may not always lead to an increased voice
in decision-making due to long-standing gender biases and roles that start
at birth.
“We need more evidence to explain the context and the constraints, as many
of our assumptions may not be correct,” said Ume Lele, former senior advisor
at the World Bank.
Paroda noted five actions points that emerged from the conference. They
include recognizing women’s central roles in agriculture and nutrition;
generating more knowledge and evidence; spurring more collective action and
leadership among women in order to take advantage of opportunities;
addressing discrimination and securing women’s rights; promoting ownership
and control of land and other resources in order for them to be able to
negotiate and bargain; tailoring the global agenda to suit local needs; and
following up on youth engagement.
Conference organizers formally launched and expanded a program, the Gender
in Agriculture Partnership as a “global initiative embracing all actors
involved in gender in agriculture,” to systematically engage a wider
network, through the GFAR partnership, to drive forward change. They stated
that a global conference on women in agriculture would be held every three
years to move forward the action points from the conference and
transparently track change in the agricultural system. The Forum for
Agricultural Research in Africa (FARA) offered to host the next conference
in Africa.
“You can only fend for yourself if you have the knowledge,” said Monty
Jones, a World Food Prize laureate, chairman of GFAR, and executive director
of FARA. “Finance schemes should leave money in your palm; they should build
income, not just help farmers to break even. There should be a bank account
for every woman who is working in the field.”
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Addressing gender in agriculture on a global scale through the Global
Conference on Women in Agriculture is a follow-up action from the 2010
Global Conference for Agricultural Research for Development (GCARD) road
map. The outcomes and recommendations from the gender conference in New
Delhi will be presented at the next GCARD to be held in Uruguay 29 October
through 1 November 2012.