by Vitumbiko Chinoko Care Southern Africa ReSAKSS 2019 Annual Conference

1. Centrality of Gender in Africa
Agriculture Transformation
Vitumbiko Chinoko
Advocacy and Policy Lead – CARE, Southern Africa
Vitumbiko.Chinoko@care.org
@ChinokoV
+265888857049

2. Presentation Outline
• Centrality of Agriculture to Africa’s growth
• Gender stats in Agriculture in Africa
• Manifestations of the Gender gaps in Africa’s Agriculture
• Policy recommendations to close the gap.
• Closing Remarks

3. Centrality of Agriculture to Africa’s Growth
• Agriculture is the backbone of almost all Africa’s economies,
accounting for 30-40% of the continent’s GDP,
• Agriculture provides two-thirds of all Africa’s jobs.
• Over 90% Africa’s extreme poor are engaged in Agriculture and
WB estimates that growth emanating from the sector is 2-4
more effective in reducing poverty than other sectors.
• IFAD: Agriculture development is 11 times more effective in
ending poverty than other approaches.

4. Gender in Agriculture.
• Women comprise nearly half of the Agriculture labour force. But
their productivity is lower, compared to men.
• Women produce less per hectare than male farmers.
• Challenges: Access to credit, training, markets and other
productive opportunities as men
• With same access to productive assets as men, their yields
could increase by 20-30%, raising total agriculture output by2.5-
4% (D. Doss, C.Kovarik…)
• UNFAO estimates that gains from investing in women farmers
would lift100-150 million people out of hunger.

5. CARE’s VSLA Experience
• In study in Malawi, Tanzania, Zambia, Mozambique, Zimbabwe
and Madagascar CARE found that income gains through VSLA
influenced important decision.
• HH Nutrition (30%), Climate smart Agriculture (50%) and 20%
(Education+others) was the average investment by women from
proceeds of VSLA
• Improving gender equality through agriculture has potential to
improve economies beyond the sector itself

6. CARE Policy Report in Southern Africa
Aim:
• To demonstrate the gap between policy commitment and
implementation in agriculture, climate change and nutrition.
• To show gender and women rights are incorporated into
Agriculture policy formulation and implementation.
• To suggest policy strategies to close the gender gap in the 6
countries ( Madagascar, Malawi, Mozambique, Zambia,
Zimbabwe and Tanzania

7. Agriculture, Livestock and Forestry Policy - Madagascar
• Policy recognizes gender by analyzing farming systems and land
tenures with respect to the relations between gender issues,
demographics, and agricultural/rural development
• No consideration of the specific roles or responsibilities of women in
the sector that would allow for tangibly establishing their value in
agriculture.
• No staff deployment mechanism planned for "peer" approaches
between female farmers and technicians of the Administration
• no specific program/initiatives to reinforce women's empowerment in
Agriculture
• National Climate Change Policy , does not mention about the
vulnerability of women farmers to impacts of climate change.

8. Recommendations to Government of
Madagascar
• Establish a policy or strategy on family farming, endowing it with a
real definition and taking into account all factors relating to it:
community, social and men/women-specific, cultural, economic,
geographical, and climate change
• Review and/or enrich the climate change strategy of the ALF if
needed, taking into account the evolution of knowledge and
information
• Update the National Nutrition Policy (2004) including
• Recommendation of key actions for adaptation that consider climate
parameters: current trends and future projections;
• Consideration of nutrition education that targets both men and women.

9. Malawi
• Access to land is a major challenge. Even in matrimonial systems,
men take major decisions on how to use the land.
• Women farm’s are smaller in size compared to men
• Women use less input especially hired labor, fertilizer and use of
early maturing varieties which accounts for about 80% gender gap in
productivity.
• 4% of male headed HHs received credit, while 2% of female headed
HHs.
• In general, agency related factors, such as illiteracy, make women
have limited access to extension, credit and other financial facilities.
• Women in Malawi produce 25% less per hectare compared to men

10. • Develop and implement strategies that improve and tailor
extension services to women farmers including training more
women extension officers.
• Policy implement should consider the child-care and other
household responsibilities e.g. promotion of the light weight
irrigation equipment
• FISD should aggressively be deployed to improve specific input
needs of women farmers e.g. technical expertise on to apply
fertilizer.

11. Tanzania
• Adequate gender policy provisions which unfortunately have not
influenced agriculture practice
• Farms managed by women produce 14% less on gross output
compared to men or jointly owned by other family members.
• The environmental management act has weak gender
provisions.
• Gender focal points exist at various levels but lack capacity to
address thematic issues such as agriculture.
• Gender budgeting is recognized in Agriculture Tanzania but not
implemented

12. Recommendations
• Gender Budgeting is a big opportunity to address agriculture
productivity gap
• Implement gender budgeting priorities, one of which was to
provide fertilizer and input subsidies to poor women farmers.
• Engage Private Sector to develop products which women
farmer can leverage on for credit through VSLA

13. Mozambique
“Behind a Mozambican woman, there’s an entire household
taking decisions for her’. Navarro, C. and Pellizzoli, R., 2012
• The adult literacy rate for women is only 36%, compare to 67%
for men (UNESCO,2014).
• Less than 10% of women in Mozambique have a bank account
(ICC, 2014).
• Mozambique ranks 125 out of 146 countries in the UN gender
development index.
• Only 25% of the land owners holding official user rights are
women),

14. Recommendations
• Improve extension services that are tailored to women farmers.
• Resource and implement the Gender strategy in Agriculture to
enable integration of gender in the sector
• Improve school enrollment and retention of the girl child across
the education system
• Use the opportunity to review Strategic Plan for the
Development of Agriculture Sector (PEDSA) to integrate gender
in Agriculture.

15. Closing Remarks
• Gender inequality in agriculture is a problem not just for women
but for the agricultural sector, food security and society as a
whole.
• Government, donors and civil society should resource and
implement gender integration in ALL agricultural programmes
and projects.
• Increasing input investment alone will not increase productivity
in women farmers.
• In the long term, raising education attainment for women would
increase output from agriculture investment

16. THANK YOU