2023-10-05 00:23:26
Par: Douglas Okwatch
Lauren Phillips, Deputy Director for Inclusive Rural Transformation and Gender Equality at FAO, says that women’s empowerment has a positive impact on agricultural production, food security, diets and child nutrition.
Lauren Phillips, Deputy Director, Inclusive Rural Transformation and Gender Equality at FAO
Women who work in agriculture still have much less access than men to mechanized equipment, according to the report “The Status of Women in Agrifood Systems”, published in 2023 by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations. agriculture (FAO).
The report is based on a study of agri-food systems, the role of gender and work in the sector, existing inequalities in the distribution of resources, women’s agency, norms and policies, and resilience to shocks and stress.
The study shows that men and women are equally likely to adopt new technologies when enabling factors are in place, highlighting the importance of ensuring equal access to productive resources for both sexes.
The quantity and quality of digital technologies available to farmers and other actors in the agri-food system have increased significantly since the 1990s, when modern technologies for personal use, such as mobile phones, personal computers, services and Internet-based applications began to take off.
The study shows that internet access has increased overall for both men and women, while the gender gap has narrowed slightly. In 2022, 63% of women worldwide used the internet, compared to 69% of men, according to Statistica, a leading provider of market and consumer data.
Furthermore, internet access is positively correlated with income, with men and women with higher incomes being more likely to have internet access. Furthermore, internet penetration rates are considerably higher in urban areas than in rural areas.
Unfortunately, the report highlights that the gender gap in internet use in Africa remains the widest. In 2022, women were 25% less likely than men to use the internet, a gap that has remained constant since 2019, according to the study.
This disparity extends to the agricultural sector, where the study found that as more women take up jobs in non-agricultural segments of agri-food systems, gaps in access to relevant technologies become more evident.
“We really need to work hard to tackle the underlying causes of inequality, which are social norms or policies,” says Lauren Phillips, FAO Deputy Director for Inclusive Rural Transformation and Equality between the sexes.
Additionally, Ms. Phillips notes that “gender-specific approaches to changing restrictive social norms are cost-effective and have high returns, but more work is needed to develop pathways to implement gender-specific approaches to large scale “.
She adds: “Empowering women is essential to their well-being and has a positive impact on agricultural production, food security, diets and child nutrition.
Yet access to agricultural and agri-food systems technologies is essential to increase agricultural productivity.
Unfortunately, in Zambia, tangible post-harvest losses for women fish processors are estimated to be three times those of men, partly because women do not have access to processing technologies, the study notes.
In Uganda, the narrowing gap in access to improved seeds is mainly due to fewer male-led farms using improved seeds in 2014 compared to 2010.
However, women generally have fewer opportunities to receive information on improved agricultural technologies, despite their ability to adopt and use these technologies effectively.
Men were generally trained in new agricultural technologies directly by extension staff and became early adopters of the technology. Women, on the other hand, received second-hand information about these technologies through their male relatives, which delayed their adoption of these technologies, the study found.
A significant barrier for women is that machines and tools continue to be designed primarily for male farmers and workers.
“We need to empower women to play smarter roles in decision-making and products, on their farms, in their families and in life in general,” says Phillips.
The study recommends that technology design take into account women’s preferences and constraints, noting that in Ethiopia, Ghana and Tanzania, women generally did not use motorized pumps due to perceived technological complexity pumps, the physical strength required to operate them, and the difficulties associated with hiring and supervising workers.
We really need to work hard to address the underlying causes of inequality, which are social norms or policies.
However, decisions about how to use technology and who will benefit from it within the household reflect the different interests of men and women in the household, the study notes.
In Ethiopia, the study reveals that women prefer solar pumps to internal combustion engine pumps.
The study notes that ICT can bring a wide range of economic, environmental and social benefits by improving access to services in rural areas, reducing transaction costs, optimizing the use of inputs and natural resources and building resilience to shocks and crises.
However, the study warns that the exponential diffusion and expansion of ICT for agriculture in recent years may also exacerbate existing inequalities. The digital divide between developed and developing countries, as well as between rural and urban areas, persists.
Rural women are particularly less likely to have access to or use digital technologies, which is closely linked to gender differences in access to other infrastructure, including electricity. This means that access to electricity is gendered, with men and women having different opportunities to determine how electricity is provided and who benefits from its use.
Africa – 25% fewer women use the internet than men In sub-Saharan Africa, 13% of women are less likely than men to own a mobile phone.
Household energy poverty has significant negative impacts on women’s well-being in terms of health, time use and employment, and access to information, services and technologies.
The gender gap in cell phone ownership varies by region, the study notes. In 2020, low- and middle-income countries in South Asia had the widest gender gap, with women 19% less likely than men to own a mobile phone, followed by sub-Saharan Africa (13%) and the Middle East and North Africa (9%).
Rural women are less likely to own a cell phone than rural men, according to data from the 2021 GSMA Consumer Survey.
Access to mobile internet has increased significantly for both women and men in recent years, but the gender gap has started to widen again, the study notes. Furthermore, in rural areas, even when people are aware of the existence of mobile internet, a range of barriers prevent its use, including low literacy levels and a lack of digital skills.
These obstacles tend to disproportionately affect women and rural populations due to structural inequalities and social norms, which mean that rural women often have lower levels of education and therefore lower incomes, underlines the study.
Moving forward, the report suggests that digital technologies can be leveraged to close resource gaps between men and women.
Digitalization, the report highlights, offers great potential to close gender gaps in access to resources, including extension and advisory services, business training, markets and information on markets, financing and savings options.
Empowering women and reducing gender gaps in agri-food systems can have significant benefits for the well-being of women and their households.
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