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Delays in overcoming discrimination against women are generating losses of almost US$ 1 trillion in global productivity.
The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, FAO, released this Thursday (13) a report that emphasizes the importance of women in agri-food systems.
The study explains that ending gender inequality in the sector would increase global Gross Domestic Product by almost US$ 1 trillion and reduce the number of food insecure people by 45 million.
Worst conditions
According to the agency, 36% of the female workforce in the world works in agri-food systems. In Sub-Saharan Africa, 66% of female workers work in the sector. However, working conditions tend to be worse than those for men.
Cases of irregularity, informality, work intensity and lower wages reveal that the role of women is “marginalized”. Female workers also have less land ownership, less access to credit and training, and need to use technologies designed for men.
The report indicates that when economies go through periods of austerity, women are the first to be laid off. Globally, 22% of women in the non-agricultural segments of agri-food systems lost their jobs in the first year of the Covid-19 pandemic, compared to 2% of men.
The study confirms that women are more vulnerable to climate shocks and natural disasters, as resource constraints and discriminatory gender norms can make it difficult for them to adapt.
For example, women's workload, including hours worked in agriculture, tends to decrease less than men's during climate shocks such as heat stress.
Female protagonism
Another point of concern is insecurity. Of the countries analyzed in the Asia-Pacific region, Timor-Leste is second in the ranking of physical violence against peasant women. Among the African countries included in the sample, Angola is among the 15 with the highest rate of aggression.
According to FAO Director-General QU Dongyu, gender inequalities are “endemic” in agri-food systems. He claims that through female empowerment “the world will take a leap” towards the goals of eradicating poverty and creating a planet free from hunger.
In this sense, positive correlations were found between the level of women's empowerment and dietary diversity in Bangladesh, Ghana, Kenya, Mozambique, Rwanda and Timor-Leste.
The study authors explain that interventions focused on female protagonism could increase the income of 58 million people, improving the resilience of another 235 million.
Domestic work and access to daycares
The FAO report shows that interventions to improve women's productivity are successful when they address unpaid domestic work.
The agency also highlights that access to daycare has a large positive effect on mothers' employment. According to the research, increasing women's employment and resilience requires social protection programs, education, training and greater land tenure security.
Although 75% of policies related to agriculture and rural development in 68 countries analyzed recognize the role of women, only 19% include gender-related targets.
Insufficient progress
The FAO says progress in reducing gender disparities has stalled or reversed. Improvements in nutrition, income and access to quality jobs are stalled. To overcome these challenges, the agency proposes recommendations for building fairer and more sustainable agri-food systems.
These include improving women's access to mobile internet, which decreased from 25% to 16% between 2017 and 2021 in low- and middle-income countries. Another measure considered important is to ensure better ownership rights over agricultural land for women.
Agri-food systems encompass the primary agricultural production of food and non-food products, the production of food of non-agricultural origin and the food supply chain, from producer to consumer.
Source: datagro
