Global forum on food security and nutrition

Nitya Rao, facilitator of the discussion, School of International Development and LANSA, India

Really happy to hear about the initiatives taken by the Agriculture University at Faisalabad. I think it is very important for agriculture graduates to be sensitised to gender differences in roles and needs and respond to them. Joan Mencher has raised an important issue about small implements and animal power. We need to understand why a strong cultural taboo remains and how this can be changed? With women having the major responsibility for farming, we need to make sure that their work and contribution are recognised by policy-makers and extension workers. At the same time, we need to try and develop technologies and tools that can reduce the drudgery of their activities in farming. We also need to develop technologies to reduce the drudgery of domestic work and free up some time for child care and nutrition. 

Nitya Rao, facilitator of the discussion, School of International Development and LANSA, India

It seems important to advocate for a recognition of women's contributions to agriculture, in fact, for women as farmers, in all of South Asia, including Bangladesh. This really seems like a first step to ensure that women then have equal access to benefits and services in their own right. Such policy change will not happen without our collective advocacy. In India, a few years ago, the Women Farmers' Entitlement Bill was introduced by Professor M.S Swaminathan as a private member's bill in Parliament. This was however not taken up. There is now a network of over 70 women farmers' organisations across the country, called Makaam, which is in the process of drafting a revised bill, with support from UN Women and the National Commission for Women. Legal recognition will at least provide a basis for claiming these rights. Given women's central role in agriculture, this needs to be prioritised.

Mebit Kebede, Jhpiego Ethiopia, Ethiopia

Dear Facilitators,

I would like to share my experience and though focusing on question # 4, what is the link between dietary diversity, women’s engagement with agriculture, and access to ecosystem services?

As we all know, agricultural livelihoods affect nutrition of individual household members through multiple pathways and interactions. Among the multiple pathways, the following three pathways in particular are viewed as potentially promising entry points for improving nutritional status of smallholder household members through enhancing diet quality:

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  Food production (Diversifying production to include nutritious fruits, vegetables and animal products)
  
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  Agricultural income (Improving smallholder commercialization to generate income to purchase a healthier diet)
  
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  Women’s empowerment including the decision-making power related to income, time, labor, assets, and knowledge or preferences of female which enable them to improve their purchasing decisions, healthcare decisions, family planning decisions, and spousal communication. Since this discussion is focused on transforming gender relations in agriculture through women’s empowerment, let me focus only on the role of the third pathways to improve household dietary diversity score (HDDS) based on evidence.
  

A study conducted by Jenifer Coates and Tina Galante  in Ethiopia  to assess production diversity and women empowerment revealed that for male headed households, the result shows that each 1, 000 birr of additional agricultural income was associated with 0.04 food group increase in HDDS (p<0.01). The coefficient on the interaction of female households headship with total agricultural income was significantly positive, at 0.07, meaning agricultural commercialization had a larger effect on household dietary diversity for female headed household (P<0.010) .

The same study also disclosed that female asset ownership and literacy were much stronger and significantly associated with dietary diversity than were agricultural income or production diversity. Female assets ownership was associated with a significantly higher probability of the consumption of roots, vegetables, oils/fat, sugar/honey, and meat (all significant at P<0.05, or less) whereas female literacy was only found to be significantly associated with a 48% increase in pulse consumption (P<0.05)

Impact Assessment of Yekokeb Berhan Program (USAID Funded Program implemented in Ethiopia) also revealed that the proportion of target beneficiaries (mostly female household head) that eat three plus meals per day has increased from 49% at baseline to over 78%, while non-target beneficiaries were more likely to have only two meals per day.

These findings tell us agriculture programs that empower women and enable them to have greater control over asset and other decision-making will likely see improved dietary diversity. Therefore to enable women in South Asia to manage the competing pressures of agriculture, childcare and household responsibilities to improve household wellbeing and nutrition, programs and policies better to be designed to improve Economic opportunities of women focusing on:

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  Improving women’s access to financial services
  
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  Promoting a savings culture
  
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  Building women’s  capacity to better select and manage their economic enterprises and resources
  
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  Increasing women’s incomes and ability to create assets
  

Nitya Rao, facilitator of the discussion, School of International Development and LANSA, India

Thank you very much for the insights from Ethiopia, Dr Kebede. Please could you also share the paper you mention, or provide references? It would be interesting to understand in more detail why female headed households are doing better in terms of dietary diversity score. Is it because of a smaller household size? Are they male absent households? What are the processes and mechanisms through which better outcomes are being achieved? This can be very useful for our own practice.