women's empowerment

This Intervention Guide for the Women’s Empowerment in Agriculture Index (WEAI) by USAID provides guidance to donors and implementers of agricultural market development programs on how to translate into practice the evidence and insights gained from the WEAI survey results. This is the second edition of this guide. It has been updated to include more examples of how to implement the interventions, gender analysis questions, social and behavior change communication techniques, and more. »

This ICRISAT study aimed to revisit this issue of gender and commercialization of crops. They developed a ‘women’s crop tool’ that measures how much control women have over different crops. This tool was used to compare women’s perceived level of control at different stages of commercialization and to compare the perceptions of men and women regarding women’s control. »

This issue of Farming Matters presents stories about women from who forge positive change through agro-ecology on their farms and in their communities. While around the world women leverage change in their communities using agroecological approaches, only little has been written about it. This issue of Farming Matters presents stories and analyses of agro-ecology as a strategy for women to create safe, healthy and just societies. »

Recognizing the management prowess of women in agricultural family enterprises. Women’s rights, supporting women’s economic participation and female entrepreneurship are priorities on the Trade and Development agenda of the Dutch government. However, how can we effectively support this agenda in a complex sociocultural context in programmes with so many other priorities? »

This concise report by UNWomen estimates the monetary value of the gender gap, its associated costs and the effectiveness of certain policies and interventions in agricultural productivity. The report focuses on the countries Malawi, Tanzania and Uganda. However, the analysis can be replicated by policy makers from other countries since the methodology and data used to quantify the costs of the gender gap and to determine to what extend different factors contribute to the gender gap are aptly presented in two Appendices. »

This report highlights five major constraints that can limit women’s productivity and inclusion into the agricultural economy in Africa: lack of access to assets, lack of access to financing, limited training, gender-neutral government policy, and time constraints due to heavy domestic responsibilities. Women make up almost 50% of the agricultural labour force in Sub-Saharan Africa. A total of 62% of economically active women in Africa work in agriculture, making it the largest employer of women. »