"empowering women as key drivers of food system change lindiwe majele sibanda, chief executive...
TRANSCRIPT
EMPOWERING WOMEN AS KEY DRIVERS OF FOOD SYSTEM CHANGE
Lindiwe Majele Sibanda
• Women comprise 43% of the agricultural labour force in developing countries
• Women account for two-thirds of the world's 600 million poor livestock keepers
• In developing countries, most women’s work is devoted to agriculture. Women are involved in every stage of food production.
• Female farmers receive only 5% of all agricultural extension services worldwide.
The Challenge We Face
Household Assets Vulnerability Assessment (HAVA)Livelihood Capital Assets
Low Moderate High Vulnerability Vulnerability Vulnerability
a comprehensive tool measuring the vulnerability of households and communities in relation to the impact of shocks such as HIV/AIDS, erratic weather patterns, and poverty
From Agriculture to Food SystemATONU Interventions
Crop / animal
husbandry
Aflatoxin control
Storage and
handlingFood
processing
Nutrition knowledge
Fortification
Biofortification
Women Empowerme
nt
Soil fertility
Market Enhancement
Policy environme
nt
Cooking
Labor saving technologies Gender Environmen
t
Germplasm
Why Women Empowerment • Is a means by which other important development
outcomes including improvements in child nutritional status
• Women are primary caretakers in a household, intra-household dynamics that determine allocation of resources (including food)
• Gender division of labour also influences the amount of time women have to care for themselves and children, and women’s power in decision making in farming and expenditure influences the ability to translate economic gains to nutritional improvements
• Lack of women’s empowerment increases maternal under-nutrition, and limits women’s ability to practice positive care behaviours, such as attending ante-natal visits or providing sufficient and nutritious complementary foods
Demystify the ConceptsGender Equality: absence of discrimination based on gender in the allocation of resources, benefits and access to services
Gender Equity: means the just and fair distribution of benefits, rewards and opportunities between women, men, girls and boys
Empowerment: the range of options that create opportunities and reinforce individual and collective capacities to exercise control over the life of individuals and offers them more choices
Empowerment of women is linked to having awareness of themselves, of knowledge, of their skills, their attitude
and aptitude to have a voice
Women’s Empowerment in Agriculture - Index (WEAI)
• Five domains of empowerment
Domain Indicators
decisions about AGRICULTURAL production
Input in productive decisions
Autonomy in production
access to and decision making power over productive
RESOURCES
Ownership of assetsPurchase, sale, or transfer of assetsAccess to and decisions on credit
control over use of INCOME Control over use of income
LEADERSHIP in the communityGroup memberSpeaking in public
TIME useWorkloadLeisure
Ag-Nutrition Pathways
Food production for
household consumption
Income-oriented
production for food, health
and other non-food items
Empowerment of women as agents
Nutrition-Sensitive
Agricultural Growth
Reduction in real food prices associated with
increased agricultural production
We are What We Eat From the Day One of Conception!
Invest in nutrition-sensitive agriculture so that pregnant mothers are well nourished at the onset of pregnancy - even better if we focus on nourishing every girl child for the benefit of humankind.
This can only happen if :1. decision makers and agriculture investors say no to investments that do not deliver nutrition
outcomes;
2. project designers know how to design nutrition sensitive agriculture interventions;
3. intensified communication on healthy diets and behaviour change;
4. policies to boost in availability, affordability and accessibility of nutrient dense foods, including animal source foods, fruits and vegetables; and
5. women are empowered.”
• Focus on how agriculture can deliver positive nutrition outcomes to smallholder farm families through the generation of robust evidence
• Target groups: women of child-bearing age and children in first 1,000 days of life, high burden of malnutrition
• Six-year project being implemented in Ethiopia, Nigeria and Tanzania for now
1,000 Days
Life cycle
Pre-conception
Conception to birth
0-6 months
6-24 months
Agriculture to Nutrition: ATONU
Agriculture to Nutrition (ATONU) – Key Research Questions for mapping nutrition sensitive interventions (NSI) along the agricultural value chains
Utilisation and consumptionPrimary Production Post harvest and
marketing Inputs: soil, germplasm (seed varieties, breeds), fertilizer, environmental implications
What can soil fertility management, fertilizer use, germplasm (seed variety/ animal breeds), and agrochemical use, do for nutrition? Crop Agronomy and Animal
husbandry What can agronomic and husbandry practices do for nutrition?
What can harvest practices do for nutrition?
Women empowerment - Which entry points along the agricultural value chain have the greatest potential impact for empowering women of child bearing age and improving children’s nutrition in the first 1,000 days of life (from conception to two years)? What aspects of women’s empowerment have the greatest impact on nutritional outcomes (e.g. control over crop/animal choice, decision-making regarding use of income, etc.)
Post-harvest handling, storage, and processing, packaging and marketing
How can product handling and processing (harvesting, processing, storage, food preparation, etc.) contribute to nutrition?How do we ensure that increases in agricultural income lead to improved nutritional outcomes?
Quality of food on the plate
Behaviour Change - How can best practices in nutrition and health, including behaviour change, be integrated into agricultural programmes and projects to improve the nutrition status of women and young children?
What are the best delivery mechanisms for educating farming households about nutrition?
Cross-Cutting Issues
Programme Design - How can agricultural programmes be designed to improve nutritional outcomes within smallholder farm families? What are the appropriate indicators and “standards of credible evidence” for measuring the nutritional impact of agricultural interventions across the value chain?
Capacity development - How can multi-sectoral agriculture-nutrition decision makers, practitioners and policy advocates be most effectively equipped with knowledge/evidence and their capacity strengthened to support and advocate for the integration of agriculture and nutrition, and up-scaling of successful programs?
Delivery Mechanism - How can agriculture and health help to effectively reduce hunger and malnutrition among women of child bearing age and children?
ATONU Frameworks and Technical Assistance
ATONU has developed frameworks that may be used to do the following:• Assess country readiness for nutrition-sensitive agriculture
• Assess project/program suitability for integrating nutrition-sensitive interventions
• Selection and design of nutrition-sensitive interventions
• Impact evaluation of nutrition-sensitive interventions
ATONU is available to provide technical assistance to existing and pipeline projects that would like to deliver positive nutrition outcomes.
ILRI Chicken Genetic Gains Project
• Ethiopia and Tanzania:‾ African Chicken Genetic Gains (ACGG)
• The ACGG Project’s aim is to improve the production and productivity of chickens by smallholder households by introducing improved and tropically adapted genotypes in Ethiopia, Nigeria and Tanzania
• The ATONU project activities are being embedded within the ACGG Project.
II. Nutrition and
Hygiene Education
III. Women empowerment
for income decision making
IV.Vegetable
production
BCC• Optimal diets in
(MIYCF) Maternal Infant and Young Child Feeding
• Maternal and young child feeding (MIYCF) care group model learning sessions
• Hygiene in food processing, preparation and handling
• Community mobilization and sensitization on gender
• Men sensitization on child and maternal nutrition
• Joint financial planning and budgeting lessons
• Alternative energy and time saving technologies
• Vegetable production
• Processing
• Storage
• Utilization
Rigorous evaluation of the nutrition-sensitive interventions
ILRI – ATONU NSIs to Achieve Nutrition Outcomes
I. Improved
Consumption of Animal Source
Foods
• Intake of chicken meat
• Intake of eggs
Six Steps to Empower Women in Agriculture to Nutrition: ATONU
Measure the assets and food needs in communitiesEvaluate the food systems cycle from inputs to production, distribution, processing, consumption, and waste
management
1. Food System Assessment
Undertake health needs assessment to describe prevailing health problems to deduce malnutrition related problems . 2. Health Status Assessment
Determine who makes decisions about: (1) Agriculture production; (2) access to agriculture resources; (3) use of income-oriented production for food, health and other non-food items (4) leadership in community; (5) time use
3. Women Empowerment Status
Healthy diets & diet diversity: the household and individual-level ones (woman and child) are good indicators of diet quality associated with micronutrient adequacy of the diet4. ATONU Outcomes
Potential NSIs: (1) Labor saving technologies; (2) Biofortification; (3) Intercropping and rotation; (4) Animal husbandry; (5) Aflatoxin control; (6) Storage and handling; (7) Food processing, fortification and cooking; (8) Market
Enhancement; (9) Women Empowerment; (10) Nutrition knowledge; (11) Behavior Change Communication; (12) Policy environment
5. Nutrition-Sensitive Agriculture Identified,
Designed and Implemented
(1) Coordination mechanisms and partnerships for a food systems wide view; (2) involvement of communities to identify nutrition problems and develop interventions; (3) knowledge on nutrition quality of traditional and herbal
foods; (4) capacity to design and implement NSIs that deliver evidence for ATONU impact; (5) appropriate tools to identify opportunities for agriculture interventions for NSIs within the broader context; (6) communities of practice
6. Capacity Development of all
Actors
Healthy Food Systems & Health People
What Will Success Look Like by 2030?
EMPOWERED WOMEN
Well-nourished women and children in rural smallholder
farm families
Policy makers and investors incorporate nutrition in the
design of agricultural policies and programmes
Validated evidence of nutrition-sensitive
interventions
Ag-Nutrition community of practice
equipped to design nutrition-sensitive
agriculture projectsAgricultural experts working
with nutrition and health experts to deliver positive
nutrition outcomes
Women’s empowerment is a key driver of food systems
change, from food production to consumption.
When women are empowered to make decisions, children’s
education, health and nutrition improve
Take Home Message
When women are empowered to make decisions about the food system from the
dining table to the farm, children’s education and health improve.