Strengthening the abilities of smallholder farmers in developing countries, particularly women farmers, to produce for both home and the market is currently a development priority. In many contexts, ownership of assets is strongly gendered, reflecting existing gender norms and limiting women's ability to invest in more profitable livelihood strategies such as market-oriented agriculture. Yet the intersection between women's asset endowments and their ability to participate in and benefit from agricultural interventions receives minimal attention. This paper explores changes in gender relations and women's assets in four agricultural interventions that promoted high value agriculture with different degrees of market-orientation. Findings suggest that these dairy and horticulture projects can successfully involve women and increase production, income and the stock of household assets. In some cases, women were able to increase their control over production, income and assets; however in most cases men's incomes increased more than women's and the gender-asset gap did not decrease. Gender-and asset-based barriers to participation in projects as well as gender norms that limit women's ability to accumulate and retain control over assets both contributed to the results. Comparing experiences across the four projects, especially where projects implemented adaptive measures to encourage gender-equitable outcomes, provides lessons for gender-responsive projects targeting existing and emerging value chains for high value products. Other targeted support to women farmers may also be needed to promote their acquisition of the physical assets required to expand production or enter other nodes of the value chain.
Rural household economies dependent on rain-fed agriculture are increasingly turning to irrigation technology solutions to counter weather variability, and guard against low crop yields. Organizations too are using market-based approaches to disseminate technologies to smallholder farmers, and although women are among their target group, little is known of the extent to which these approaches are reaching and benefiting them.
In the tropics, staples such as maize are often contaminated with mycotoxins, harmful by-products of fungal metabolism. In particular, high exposure to aflatoxins may cause fatal illness in people and animals, while chronic exposure can cause liver cancer in humans and, in domestic animals, growth depression and immune suppression. However, little is known about the potential health risks of milk contaminated with aflatoxins. Moreover, because of different consumption patterns and biology, men, women, boys and girls may experience different levels of risk, while because of gender roles, men and women may have different capacity to mitigate risk; yet, there are few gendered analyses of aflatoxins. This study conducts a qualitative, gendered study on awareness and perceptions of mycotoxins and how these influence risk of dietary exposure to mycotoxins among dairy farmers in Kenya. First, a risk map was developed based on previous occurrence of aflatoxicosis and relevant factors such as farming systems and dairy cattle density. This resulted in three risk categories: high risk with historical outbreaks of human aflatoxicosis, high risk without historical outbreaks and low risk with historical outbreaks. From each category, three districts were randomly selected and from each district, three villages. A focus group discussion (FGD) tool was developed and used for interviews to assess factors related to the potential risk of exposure to mycotoxins in identified risk regions and how perception of risk and risk management differed by gender. In each village, two sex-disaggregated FGDs were conducted, yielding a total of 54 FGDs. This study found that overall risk categories, awareness of mycotoxicosis and carcinogenic effects was generally low, but awareness that eating mouldy food is harmful was high. Women were more cautious than men about feeding spoilt maize to cattle. Preventive measures against fungal contamination were more common post-harvest than pre-harvest. With respect to dairy cow diets and disposal of mouldy foods, women were key decision-makers. Although commercial feeds are expensive and may be contaminated with mycotoxins, farmers regularly fed them to their cattle in low quantities to potentiate milk production. Milk was mainly sold for income generation. The farmer families consumed milk mainly in tea, which was not given to children below school-going age, thus reducing exposure to mycotoxins but also the nutritional benefits of milk. Meat was considered safe even if the cattle had been fed mouldy feeds. This study shows that there is a low understanding of the dangers of mycotoxins in food, and that certain practices among farmers may increase the risk for exposure. Gender analysis reveals that groups having knowledge are not always responsible for risk mitigation.
The International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI), established in 1975, provides evidence-based policy solutions to sustainably end hunger and malnutrition and reduce poverty. The Institute conducts research, communicates results, optimizes partnerships, and builds capacity to ensure sustainable food production, promote healthy food systems, improve markets and trade, transform agriculture, build resilience, and strengthen institutions and governance. Gender is considered in all of the Institute's work. IFPRI collaborates with partners around the world, including development implementers, public institutions, the private sector, and farmers' organizations, to ensure that local, national, regional, and global food policies are based on evidence. IFPRI is a member of the CGIAR Consortium.
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