As women take a greater role in producing the world’s food, Dr Elizabeth Warham explains how new research is bringing benefits to them and their communities.

Close your eyes and imagine a typical farmer. Perhaps you pictured a hefty man in overalls, sitting on a tractor. You probably did not think of a young woman with a baby on her back, hoeing the field; a woman throwing a fish net into a small pond, or a young girl cutting grass for dairy cows. But scenes like these are the norm in most of the world.

Women farmers are responsible for more than 50% of food production worldwide. In developing countries, women produce 60-80% of the food. In sub-Saharan Africa and the Caribbean, they provide up to 80% of staple foods. As much as 90% of the work in the rice fields of Asia is carried out by women. In many countries in the developing world, women do most of the inland fishing and handle most of the work associated with fish farming. They also raise livestock and manage dairy production.

In the fields, women farmers sow, weed, apply fertiliser and pesticides, harvest and thresh the crops. After the harvest, rural women are responsible for storing, handling, stocking, processing and marketing the crops. And when the women go home from the fields, they prepare the food for their families.

Women farmers often possess unique knowledge about plants, fish and livestock, such as how the different parts of a plant can be used for food, medicine and animal feed. In addition, women help to protect and save the seeds and breeding stock that provide the ‘genetic resources’ for producing food. In the Andean region of South America, for example, food production is dependent on the seeds collected and stored by local women in their ‘seed banks’.

The importance of women as food providers is increasing as fewer and fewer men are farmers. Men are leaving rural areas in many developing countries to live in towns and cities, where they can increase their incomes. Rural male populations are also declining because of sickness and conflict.

So women are the key to better nutrition, more efficient production and distribution of food, and improved lives and economies in rural communities. And yet their contributions are often severely limited by lack of access to resources. Both men and women farmers in most developing countries are not able to buy land or obtain credit, but women’s access is even more limited as a result of social, political and cultural factors. Many experts agree that if women farmers did not face these constraints, agricultural productivity in developing countries would grow significantly.

“Without women we all go hungry”

Recognising the wisdom behind this old African proverb, international researchers are analysing changing gender relations to help make modern agricultural research more relevant to resource-poor women farmers – some examples are outlined opposite. Working with national partners in more than 100 countries, their efforts include developing crops that grow rapidly, cook easily, and are higher in protein and other basic nutrients. The women them-selves are also encouraged to become agricultural scientists, and are offered numerous training courses and a variety of information and products that, increasingly, can be accessed from remote locations.

Some material included in this article is adapted from Women’s Work – Feeding the World by Future Harvest.
Future Harvest is an initiative of 16 food and environmental research centres located around the world.

African rice breakthrough

Scientists at the West African Rice Development Association have successfully crossed two distantly related kinds of rice – a robust African type and a more productive Asian species. The new rice, which could produce up to twice as much grain as current popular varieties, is more resistant to local stresses in farmers’ fields.The rice has the wide drooping leaves of traditional African rice, a characteristic that helps to smother weeds. Weeding – work mainly done by women and children – accounts for up to 40% of the labour invested in the region’s rice crop. The new taller rice is also easier to harvest, an important factor for women who often carry babies on their backs while harvesting.

Peddling out of poverty?

The treadle pump is a small scale, low-cost irrigation device used for small fields or vegetable gardens which could not be irrigated previously. Where the pump is close to homes it may also be used to access available water for domestic use and livestock, reducing the need for women and children to carry buckets of water long distances. In Asia and increasingly in Africa, small-scale irrigation is providing poor farmers, particularly women, with new sources of food – such as vegetables – and income.Experts predict that the use of small-scale irrigation devices will grow substantially in the future, but little is currently known about how millions of treadle pumps will affect water resources. Water researchers at the International Water Management Institute in Sri Lanka are studying the implications of the growing use of these devices, to give governments, NGOs and other institutions vital data and information to shape policies for future use.

Nut processing in rural Ghana

The shea butter tree is a small deciduous tree abundant in the savanna areas of West Africa. The production of shea butter for cooking or cosmetics is an important – in fact, often the only – income-generating activity for women in rural areas. Traditional processing of shea nuts carried out by women and children is time-consuming, and uses large quantities of firewood and water, both of which may have to be carried long distances to the village. The women complain that roasting the pounded kernels and boiling the extracted cream are hot, heavy tasks and the kneading causes back and shoulder pains. To counter these problems, researchers have developed a simple press which reduces average processing time from 9.5 to 3.25 hours, cuts water use from 90 litres to just 1.7 litres, and requires no firewood at all. Economic analysis shows good returns can be achieved at higher processing rates. Further research is now exploring the potential for women shea nut gatherers to sell directly to a commercial operation and the opportunities for wider markets – in soap or as a substitute for cocoa butter in chocolate.

Harnessing horse power

For many poorer people, draught animals are far more appropriate than tractors and combine harvesters which can damage fragile tropical soils and are unsuitable for the tiny plots of land tilled. Research funded by the DFID Livestock Production Programme has looked at using single donkeys or horses, rather than traditional pairs of oxen. By studying the performance of donkeys as draught animals, their feeding and drinking behaviour and developing a lightweight plough and other implements, the range of operations that can be performed by donkeys has been increased. As a result animal traction has been extended to a poorer group of users, and in particular to women who find these animals easier to handle, cheaper to maintain and less likely to fall sick during droughts.

Bees raise income in Tanzania

Traditional beekeeping practices in the tropics are not well suited to women as they typically involve siting heavy log hives high up in trees far from home, and harvesting at night. New research has created a cheaper, lighter hive and developed simpler management techniques. Estimates suggest that income raised from harvesting a new hive could be as much as £50, compared to £8 from a traditional log hive and £16 from a commercial frame hive. One group of Tanzanian women who produce medicines, toiletries and candles using honey and beeswax make an average annual income of over £4,000, of which 30% is profit. Beekeeping has given them the opportunity to control their own earnings and, through the formation of beekeeping groups, to socialise with other women, often for the first time.

For more information on DFID’s Renewable Natural Resources Research Strategy, visit www.dfid.gov.uk or call the Public Enquiry Point on 0845 300 4100 (+44(0) 1355 843132 outside the UK).