rt vol. 12, no. 2 giving women a voice

7/28/2019 RT Vol. 12, No. 2 Giving Women a Voice

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27Rice TodayApril-June 2013

amala Gurung was drawn torural development work at

an early age. Her exposuredates back to her high-schoolyears in Nepal when she served as anenumerator for a community survey.After high school, she asked herparents if she could study forestry atthe University of the Philippines inLos Baos (UPLB), nearly 4,000 kmaway!

Kamalas mother was againstthe idea at rst. Her mothersapprehension was not about herbeing so far away from home because

she had stayed in a dormitory mostof her school years. It was more aboutthe nature of the work of a forester.Its too dangerous for a woman, hermother said.

But, for Kamala, it was notdicult to imagine herself as aforester because she used to trek themountains of Gorkha and Pokharain Nepal with her father, who wasthen a British-Gorkha army ocer.I think my fathers love of nature

rubbed o on me, Kamala said.Eventually, with her parents

support, Kamala earned her degreefrom forestry at UPLB and thenworked back home in Nepal as anatural resource management ocer.Through her constant interaction

with farmer communities, she becamemore interested in the social aspectsof her work. This is where she becamedeeply involved in social issues, andproblems of the marginalized sectorsof the communityincluding womenin the agricultural sector.

by Lanie C. Reyes

Kamala Gurung makes it her mission to promote gender equality and empower women

farmers in South Asiavoice

Giving women a

Kamala GurunG (righticit w viw pc with pctt ic gi qity.

Kamala (center) tk with w iBgh t t th citic thy py i ic ig.

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Advocating for gender equityThis is what I chose to be, assertedKamala, who takes pride in beinga self-proclaimed gender equityadvocate. Both my MS and PhDdegrees are in gender developmentand social change in the agriculturalsector. Kamala obtained her MS

degree from Clark University inthe United States and her PhD fromJames Cook University in Australia.

Kamala now enjoys her workat the International Rice ResearchInstitute (IRRI) as a social scientistspecializing on gender issues inagriculture. This job gives me asense of mission to help improve thelives of rural people, especially poorwomen, she said.

Working under the USAID-funded Cereal Systems Initiative

for South Asia (CSISA) projectin Bangladesh, Kamala has beeninuential in mainstreaming genderin planning, monitoring, andevaluating the project, said ThelmaParis, IRRI senior scientist. CSISAaims to increase food, nutrition,and income security in South Asiathrough sustainable intensicationof cereal-based systems. It is acollaborative project among keyorganizations such as IRRI, the

World Fish Center (WorldFish), andthe International Maize and WheatImprovement Center (CIMMYT).

Gender inequalities in access toproductive resources and technologiesin rice farming are more pervasivein South Asia, Kamala explained.To reduce these inequalities, it isimportant to understand the crucialroles of women as farmers, consumers,and income earners in relation to men

as well as womens socioeconomicand cultural barriers in ensuring foodsecurity and livelihoods.

In specic regions of Bangladesh,the poorest women do transplantingand weeding in the rice elds asunpaid family workers or as hiredagricultural workers. However, inall regions, as soon as harvestingis done, poor women are mainlyresponsible for manual threshing,winnowing, cleaning, drying,selecting, and storing grains and seed

as well as parboiling rice for homeconsumption or for sale.

Since women in Bangladeshplay a critical role in rice postharvestand processing activities, postharvestlosses can be reduced in the countryby providing women with technicalknow-how among other support, shesaid.

Aside from conducting a seriesof training activities on postharvesttechnologies, the CSISA project

provided a group of women ricefarmers in Bangladesh with a pedalthresher for their use and for renting

out to other farmers. CSISA alsoprovided some training to improvetheir entrepreneurial skills.

Truly, many other opportunitiesare now available to improvewomens social and economicstatus by improving their accessto technologies and training

opportunities through IRRI-CIMMYT-WorldFish collaborativeprojects under CSISA, Kamala said.

Kamala explained that the projectfocuses on women because they areusually the disadvantaged group insociety. But, gender equity is not justabout women, she said. It is aboutgender roles and relations based oncultural norms.

In Bangladesh or elsewhere,if you dont inform or involve thehusbands, the wives wont aend

any project-related activities such asfocus group discussions, meetings,or training activities, Kamalacontinued. So, I always go andtalk with the male member of thehouseholdoften the husband. I tryto convince him why his wife needsto participate in these activities.Otherwise, it will not work; therellbe conict in the family.

Expanding role of women

Kamala pointed to recent data fromFAO that show that the role of womenin agriculture is changing and

InfoladIes BIKe t vig t tht hp w i Bgh gt cc t iti gict.

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Rice TodayApril-June 201328


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29Rice TodayApril-June 2013

increasing because men are goingabroad to work.

But, because women-headedhouseholds have no technical skills,they rent out their rice elds to otherfarmers. This makes it importantto involve women in training andawareness programs such as on new

varieties and associated improvedcrop management practices forsubmergence- and saline-prone riceareas.

Kamala passionately believesthat women should have a sayin research and developmentactivities. We should includetheir voice: rst, in our researchwork, and second, in the policy-making and decision-makingprocesses, and we should givethem access to resources such as

information and communicationtechnologies.

Info at the doorstepsMore often than not, womencannot go out of their village toaend training activities becausethey are busy with their work.

So, why not bring thetechnologies to them? Kamalathought.

This year, she pushed for the

exploratory testing of tapping theInfoLady model to reach womenfarmers, said Dr. Paris.

The InfoLady project wascreated in 2008 by D.Net, aBangladesh-based social enterprise(www.dnet.org.bd), and othercommunity organizations. D.Netrecruits women and trains them forthree months to use a computer, theInternet, a printer, and a camera.It also arranges bank loans for thewomen to purchase bicycles and

equipment.Equipped with a laptop, Internet

access, and a bike, an InfoLady goesfrom one remote village to anotherto help women get informationranging from health, agriculture, andeducation to government services.

To carry out the InfoLady modelin Bangladesh, Kamala and the rest of

the CSISA project team held a three-day training for 17 InfoLadies to helptransfer agricultural technologies torural farmersparticularly women.The training covered improvedcropping and intercropping systems,fertilizer management, maizevarieties, rice-based postharvest

technologies, and basic aquacultureand pond management, amongothers.

varietal selection (PVS) activities forreleased and prereleased varietiesin rice areas prone to drought,submergence, and salinity underthe Stress-Tolerant Rice for Africaand South Asia (STRASA) projectfunded by the Bill & Melinda GatesFoundation.

Thus, more women now have avoice in the quality traits they lookfor in varieties than before. Changes

are not only happening in themind-sets of researchers in theeld but also in the workplace.We have more women onresearch teams under the CSISAproject than before, Kamalaadded. Many of them havegone through IRRIs LeadershipCourse for Asian andAfrican Women in Research,

Development, and Extension.Kamala shares a view with

her supervisor and mentor Dr.Paris that removing genderinequality in the context oftraditional mind-setsespeciallyin Bangladesh and Indiaisnot easy. That is why they bothbelieve that changes can happenthrough a concerted eort andsupport from policymakers,research leaders, partnerships

with government andnongovernment organizations,and, of course, the womenfarmers themselves.

As they work with keypartner organizations, Kamalaswork, along with the CSISA teamseorts to empower women and givethem a voice, is crucial to aainingglobal food security. According tothe FAO's 2010-11 State of Food andAgricultural Report, if women inrural areas had the same access to

land, technology, nancial services,education, and markets as men,agricultural production could beincreased and the number of hungrypeople reduced by 100 to 150 million.1

Ms. Reyes is the managing editor ofRiceToday.

Weve come a long way sincethe beginning of the womens rightsmovement in the 1970s thanks togender equity advocates such as Dr.Gelia Castillo, a Filipino nationalscientist and former visiting scientistat IRRI, Kamala pointed out. Dr.Castillo started the Women in Rice

Farming Systems network at IRRI inthe mid-80s.

In addtion, Dr. Paris paved theway for much of the progress inintegrating gender concerns in IRRIsresearch and development. Sheencouraged researchers to involvewomen (at least 30% among theparticipants) in the participatory

Women In Bgh t ch icvity ig pticipty vitcti (PVs) ctivity.

isaganiserrano

1 www.fao.org/news/story/en/item/52011/icode/.

rt vol. 12, no. 2 giving women a voice

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