Learning Route on women’s empowerment, business development and sustainable natural resource management. Scaling-up programmes for the rural poor in Nepal. 6 to 13 December, 2014. IFAD & PROCASUR.

1. Nepali Women
Invisible Force to Reckon With

2. Context - Overall
Women in Nepal - far more advanced
than 10 years ago
– Women’s Literacy rate: 34.9% in
2001 to 57.4% in 2011
– Women’s Employment to
population ratio : 52.2% in 1990
to 62% in 2009
– Women Labor participation:
52.4% in 1990 to 80.4% in 2011

3. Context continued……..
– Women (grassroots) in
Leadership positions - more
than 26% in Community
Forestry User Groups
– More Organized – strong user
groups, networks, cooperatives
etc. (forestry, agriculture, saving
and credit; irrigation etc) .

4. Context continued……..
– Increased Representation:
political, formal and informal
institutions (favorable
policies).
– Progressive Policies – 50% in
CFUGs; reservations; subsidies

5. Context continued…….
Increased opportunities
and engagement in
income generation
Provision for loans
(saving groups – though
small)

6. Context continued…….
More opportunities – to
develop, gain new skills,
awareness;
Access to technologies – e.g.
biogas, mobile phones

7. But - what does a deeper
analysis show?
Progress has been uneven across – Gender, Socially excluded
groups, geographically remote areas;
These groups still lag behind in terms of
Access - Resources; Timely information
Opportunities
Representation; Voice and Influence Decisions;
Interpretation and implementation of policies………

8. Gaps:
In Nepal:
• More than 75% women engaged
in Agriculture
• Women’s share of earned
income is only 1/3rd of that of
men
• E.g. among Terai Janajati 43%
women work without pay
(Value & Visibility)
• Only 10 percent cultivable land
registered with women;
Women and Men Engaged in Agriculture by
Caste/Ethnicity and Regional Identity
Source: DHS 2006 Survey Data

10. Literacy rates (6 years and over)
100
90
80
70
60
50
40
30
20
10
0
Poorest Second Third Fourth Richest
economic catagory
percentage
men
women
Literacy: Nepal (male 75%; female 53%); Dalit women 35%: Dalit men
50%;
Secondary education: Only 1.1 % Dalit women compared to 13% BC
women

11. Gaps in Decision Making
• Household levels - 10% cultivatable land
registered with women
• Community levels e.g. Community
Forestry - Women in executive committee
positions -26 percent ;
Institutionally:
• Agriculture : gazetted level = 6.21% are
women (with none in the Special Class)
and in non-gazetted level = 16.95%
• Forestry: gazetted level = 3.6 % are
women (with none in the Special Class)
and in non-gazetted level = 7%
• Addressing Gender (Sector-wise) – largely
limited to gender focal points
Implications: decisions, prioritization,
developing agendas etc.

12. Recent Scoping Study Findings on
Gender and Climate Change show:
Reduced - quality and quantity of
drinking and irrigation water
• Increased women’s workload:
Most critical and overarching
issue - drudgery
• Access to drinking water:
poor and dalits (untouchability
in Terai) most hit.

13. • Hardening of agricultural soil:
additional work after ploughing;
more water & manure; long hrs.
physical labour; Frustrates – hard
labor wasted.
• Low harvest and low family
nutrition: selling cereals at higher
price & purchasing low quality
cheaper rice from terai or India;
sharp change – diet pattern and food
diversity

14. Agriculture and Food
Security
• Increase in weed and outbreak of pests: additional back-breaking
work; loss of fodder - not edible/preferred by
livestock; off the shelf chemical herbicides; hire extra labor;
• Early ripening of crops and vegetables and storage issues
• Decrease in larger and smaller livestock: From 4 -5 to 1 -3
cows/buffalos - less fertilizers and manure for the biogas.
Increased dependency on chemicals

15. • Decrease and disappearance of
women ‘pewa’ crops and vegetables:
e.g. Beans and lentils are high value
crops particularly for women –
personal income with full control.
• Backsliding - agro-based enterprise
and income: time, alienation from
information, resources, networks
• Increase in loans: repayment suffers,
more debt, Change in use of saving
and credit loans.

16. • Migration: Food security issues have further
triggered migration both seasonal and for
foreign employment – e.g. brick kilns
• Increased Drudgery: With the absence of
economically active men, critical mass of
rural work-force is borne by the rural
women
• Financial crunch – dealing with the gap
period when the male members are either
late or cannot send money - although easy
access to loans for women whose male have
migrated to foreign countries

17. • Violence against women: It has
manifested itself in several forms of
example:
 mental violence having to deal
with new responsibilities and
decision making;
 hindrance in mobility and
character assassination (esp. in
Terai)
 Broken families – infidelity ,
divorce

18. Access to timely information and new
knowledge: Women’s new
(disadvantaged) situation not
understood – further alienated

19. Reinforcing exclusion:
• Political influence on decision-making
and benefit distribution;
• Decreased quantity and quality of
participation in mixed forest user
groups;
• More active and powerful women
are being increasingly sidelined;

20. Interesting developments
• Vertical empowerment
and growth

21. Men supporting
women’s leadership –
mostly among young
generation/young
husbands

22. Slip Sliding away of Women’s Social Economic
and Political Empowerment

23. Dibyagurung@wocan.org
dibyadevigurung@gmail.com
Mob: 977-9841261339
www.wocan.org