Foro Global sobre Seguridad Alimentaria y Nutrición (Foro FSN)

Shirin Afroz

Director-Nutrition, Helen Keller International, Bangladesh.

HKI’s experience over more than 35 years of implementing nutrition and food security programs in Bangladesh has been that traditional gender norms can limit women’s ability to leave the household and access to production system. These social norms constrain improved nutrition, and women’s access to secure food sources. The norms reduce interactions between women and men outside the family circle and often restrain women from being active part of the production system within the community. These experience led HKI to challenge these norms by integrating interventions specially aimed at empowering women.

Nurturing Connections is the signature curriculum by HKI for gender and nutrition in Bangladesh. The aim of the curriculum is to create a safe space and structure activities for communities, where they can directly discuss and challenge existing intra-household inequalities that underlie food insecurity and malnutrition. While the curriculum is oriented around nutrition and food security problems, it also builds skills in communication, assertiveness, and problem-solving. Drawing from HKI’s fieldwork and actual problems faced by local women, it provides family stakeholders (mothers, fathers, and family elders) with the opportunity to discuss nutrition and gender related problems among their peer groups, and then share their perspectives in a mediated, community-group setting.

Nurturing Connections draws on approaches developed through HKI’s integrated gender and nutrition interventions, which have been used over decades of programming in Bangladesh to empower women in improving the nutrition of themselves, their children and family members. The curriculum also has been successful in helping communities talk about the gender-power relations and about highly sensitive topics that are underline caused of gender discriminations. The approaches have also been shown to reduce domestic violence. The approach of the curriculum in not to targeting only women but include their husbands and family elders. At HKI we recognized the importance and fundamental necessity to include all family members to address gender-based discriminations within the household, and bring about change.  

HKI first tested Nurturing Connections in Nilphamari, North-West Bangladesh, in Oxfam-Novib supported Building Equity in Agriculture and Markets project. From project baseline to end line, responses among women indicated increasing from 0 to 65%, reporting they were very confident their husband’s families would support them with a personal problem; from 33 to 97% reporting having a say in child health care; from 8 to 30% receiving husbands’ support in cooking and from 40 to 56% receiving support with child care. 

Internationally, the Nurturing Connections approach has received wide interest and HKI is working to adapt it for use in local context in West Africa and in Cambodia, including a language adaptation.

Our experience has proven that homestead food production and nutrition education program, when combined with a tailored behavior change and gender intervention, can bring better impact for nutrition and wellbeing outcomes.

“During the Nurturing Connections session, I have had an opportunity to learn more about the work of my wife.  Previously I was getting indirect information about the project from my wife, because there was no direct engagement of men, that made me think that the project was doing something against our cultural norms/unacceptable with regard to women. But after attending Nurturing Connections I learned about her work and that there is nothing wrong with it”

 Bekas Kabiraj, Granganampur Union, Lohagara Upazila, Norail District, Bangladesh.

I am happy to see the discussion on interaction of gender with other important aspect of agriculture and nutrition.



We are aware that the sectors (people) with greater improvement in technology (innovation) are better off and others have deterioration in terms of trade. Unfortunately the deteriorating terms of trade for agriculture could have made women worse off within agriculture (in terms of decision making power, purchasing power, comparative higher burden of work)

Given the above situation and large number of population dependent on agriculture makes child born in these household to be more vulnerable. As indicated earlier by Sirajul, mere participation of women in agricultural interventions might not change the above mentioned dynamics. To have a positive impact on nutrition, interventions should bring men as an important stakeholder to be sensitised.

I am citing an unfortunate instance of recent drought of Marathwada (in Maharashtra, India) where a girl child died because of the burden of carrying 70-80 lts. of water a day from a distance of a Km. Startling fact was that the male adult in the region did not considered carrying water as their task even in the stress situation. Perhaps because of the perception that carrying water is a non-income generating activity and ‘unproductive’ human resource- children and women, are supposed to do it.

Can we think of ways or cite any existing policies /initiative or interventions that are sensitive to these intricacies of gender for better nutritional outcome?

Thanks a lot for sharing your input about the women empowerment in agriculture for better nutrition and I would like to mention that when we talk about agriculture and nutrition, it is very important to know and consider not only agriculture but know livestock too. Women are traditionally and locally involved in the agriculture and livestock sector in the CDCs level. They produce products regularly in the local area and they know how to feed, how to treat and how to extend their livestock and agriculture. Also livestock is good source for nutrition, each woman  knows how to keep, feed, treat and bring extension in their livestock like cows, chicken, goats, fish and bees. Also, dailywage-based poor and agriculture farmers' wives are involved in the cultivation of agriculture seeds, vegetable seeds, and establishment of new orchards. They learn new technology like establishment of greenhouses, fish ponds, and bee keeping.

In our country, Afghan women traditional involved in the agriculture and livestock know the traditional importance of agriculture and livestock issues. Strengthening and empowerment of women is required, and there is a need to conduct different kinds of training for capacity building of them. Only then it will provide sources to earn income, find marketing for their product and in linkages - getting their product to local and supermarkets resulting in regular transfer of their produce to the Baazzar market. It is good way to provide facilities for females to involve themselves in the process of business.

When they have the required trainings and have better capacity, then women will be able to have better knowledge of cultivation, irrigation, water management system, treatment, keeping, feeding, trade and extension of agriculture and livestock. This will help solve their economic problems in the future, and will empower them to be involved in the economic process of the country.

Eng Shah Wali “Allokozai”

East Zone manager

Norwegian Project Office,

Rural Rehabilitation Association for Afghanistan (NPO/RRAA)

Analogous to the water-diamond paradox, women spend more time doing unpaid household work including child-care and cooking. Social and cultural norms prevent them from asking the males in the household to help out in the domestic work, specially in the rural areas. The household dynamics might not even allow them to cook according to their own preference. Typically, in India, they are also the last to eat in the household. 

Given this context, it becomes vital to increase their awareness and education levels. The importance of the first thousand days in a child's life and diet diversity needs to be stressed. Empowering the women is the only way forward to tackling the inter-generational aspect of malnutrition. 

Helping homestead gardeners mitigate the impact of soil salinity

Homestead food production (HFP) is an effective way to help poor families increase access to nutritious food and new sources of income. HFP enables women to access fresh vegetables for themselves and their children directly, instead of relying on a male family member to purchase them, and proceeds from household gardens are usually controlled by women and thus more likely to be used for education, healthcare and other activities which directly benefit women and children. Helen Keller International (HKI) has implemented HFP programs throughout Bangladesh since the early 1990s. As part of the global Project Laser Beam initiative, the Mondelez Foundation supported HKI to increase women’s asset base and food security through HFP, improve nutrition, address gender barriers and intra-household communication and strengthen farming groups.

However, a changing climate requires that new practices be integrated into strategies to promote HFP, particularly in the vulnerable areas of southern Bangladesh which face frequent floods and cyclones where southwestern Bangladesh bordering the Bay of Bengal, is particularly vulnerable to floods and storms. The soil salinity is worst during dry periods. The spring of 2012 was particularly dry, with no rainfall during the month of May according to the local farmers and the Department of Agricultural Extension. With support from the Mondelez Foundation, HKI surveyed the impact of soil salinity on household gardeners in Shymnagar, Satkhira district during this period and rolled out strategies to help families continue vegetable production.

About half of households were already implementing practices to cope with soil salinity. Among these, 38% were using organic compost and 34% were planting crops in pits which were first leached with water. However, households with the knowledge and means to adopt these practices tended to be among the better off; poor households who are more reliant on their gardens for food and income had fewer coping mechanisms and were thus most affected by the salinity.  

Challenges: However, introducing this practice requires a relatively high level of expertise by program staff in order to demonstrate the correct method of soil management and planting for various types of crops. Composting & mulching is a practice that poor household have found more difficult to adopt. It is therefore worth developing tools and techniques to promote composting in areas where vegetable cultivation is a priority strategy to increase nutrition and income for poor households.

Results: PLB provided training to households, both men and women, to increase garden production and produce more varieties in small water-prone areas, introduced poultry-rearing practices to increase production, formed marketing committees with links to market actors, built business skills to market agricultural products, and educated mothers through nutrition education.  Data were collected from project participants as a panel survey at baseline (n=207) and end line (n=197). Participants were pregnant women with more than 2 decimals of land.

A significant reduction in inadequate diets was observed among target women at baseline, 76% (n=158) of women had an inadequate diet (all participants were pregnant at the time of the baseline). By the end of the project, this number had dropped to only 23% (n=45) among the same survey sample. There was also a significant increase among women who consumed >5 food groups per day.

Amin Uddin, Director- Food Security & Livelihood, Helen Keller International, Bangladesh.

The Double Burden of Poor Nutrition in China:

Roles of Fathers and Grandparents for Children’s Diet Quality

Over the past two decades, China has met its first Millennium Development Goal (MDG) of halving the proportion of people who suffer from hunger. Particularly impressive progress has been made to improve the nutritional status of Chinese children. From 1990 to 2010, the prevalence of stunting and underweight caused by malnutrition in children below 5 years old were decreased by about 70%. Meanwhile, the improvement in nutritional status resulted in a general acceleration of growth and development of children. China has employed a number of strategies to help achieve this progress, mainly including scaling up political commitment, increasing resources and taking urgent actions on nutrition.

Since 1990, the Chinese government has promulgated the Outline Program for the Development of Children in 1990-2000, 2001-2010 and 2011-2020, respectively, to implement the principle of giving priority to children. Under the guidance of this policy, various programs and activities for improving children’s nutritional status and health have been implemented, especially in rural areas. For example, with the launch of Nutrition Improvement for Children in Impoverished Areas Program, the National Health and Family Planning Commission started promoting a nutritional parcel (a soybean-based micronutrient-fortified food supplement with a demonstrated effect on the reduction of anaemia and other micronutrient deficiencies) among children aged 6-24 months. To date, with the allocated government funds, around 4 million children in 341 poverty counties have enjoyed the benefits of this nutritional parcel. Another fruitful activity is the China Nutrition Improvement Plan (2011), which covered children in 699 impoverished counties, provided free daily school meals for 26 million children. Except for nutrition interventions, the National Health and Family Planning Commission has issued a new version of the "Chinese dietary guidelines (2016)" recently, which includes specialized guides to infants, children and adolescents, respectively, to meet their needs of physiological characteristics and nutrition.

In spite of the remarkable achievements in improving children’s nutrition, new threats to children’s health continuously arise in China. For example, with the rapid develoment of economy, nutritional shifts in recent decades are driving the obesity epidemic in Chinese children. China, now, has been one of the developing countries struggle with the so-called ‘double burden’ of the undernutrition and overnutrition. A recent work carried out by our group suggests that the diet quality of Chinese children, in general, was not very cheerful. Underconsumption of soybeans, fish and shrimp, eggs, vegetables and fruits, and overconsumption of fried foods and meats were becoming growing threats to Chinese children. Notably, this study has proposed an impact of paternal, rather than maternal, education level on the children’s diet quality, suggesting the important role of fathers which had been ignored before, in children’s nutrition. It is conceivable that fathers can exert great influences on children’s eating since fathers play a major role in the traditional Chinese family. Another novel finding of this research was the relevance of family size for children’s diet quality, which indicated the grandparents’ impacts in the three-generation family.

Taken together, the persistent undernutrition and the increasing overnutrition among Chinese children demand sustained targeted efforts to promote optimal nutrition. Future priorities should be given to the special roles of fathers and grandparents in improving children’s nutrition.

Respected All FAO/UNEP friends and all members of globe

Hi I am Bibhu Santosh a Young Scientist of Gender mediated Agriculture and Climate Smart Extension.I am pleased to share my Research to Society for upliftment and Devt. of Rural artisans.

I think this may helpful for every one.

Yours Loving

Bibhu

I want to bring one particular issue. In the name of women empowerment in agriculture and making gender as cross-cut in every development programme or project are not we actually over burden them through increasing engagement in agricultural activities. In Bangladesh, especially the rural women are solely responsible for household activities, childcare and even many of the post-harvest agricultural activities. We very seldom recognized these and try to increase their participation in agriculture to achieve project or programme goal. Increasing participation does not necessarily mean empowerment. Research or even policies should indicate how we can bring women in the decision making process. Awareness and education might have the answer for sensitizing both men and women on this issue. 

ENGLISH TRANSLATION BELOW

Hasta qué punto puede influir el reconocimiento normativo del papel de las mujeres y su contribución a la agricultura en fortalecer su empoderamiento y, a su vez, en los resultados nutricionales?  

Considero que el reconocimiento normativo contribuye a la visibilidad y le da el carácter de obligatorio al asunto que quiere regular, lo pone en la agenda de los gobernantes, en los planes de los técnicos y en la mente de las comunidades. Por ello el reconocimiento del papel de la mujer y su contribución a la agricultura contribuye de manera importante al empoderamiento. A continuación me permito presentar el resumen de un proyecto en mi país denominado Bases para una estrategia de intervención con enfoque de género y familias: El caso de comunidades campesinas e indígenas en Nariño- Colombia.

Perilla L1Universidad Nacional de Colombia

Resumen

En esta investigación nos propusimos identificar los roles que mujeres y otros miembros de la familia cumplen en la nutrición, para definir estrategias sostenibles , que busquen el reconocimiento del valor que tiene el papel que ellas cumplen en los procesos productivo, de cuidado y de nutrición de las familias y las comunidades. Esta investigación se aborda desde una perspectiva de Mujeres y Familias.

En los sectores rurales de Colombia, es evidente una histórica invisibilización del aporte que han hecho las mujeres en la producción de bienes y servicios, del trabajo agrícola y de comercio. Estos trabajos, son considerados, culturalmente, como una prolongación de las tareas domésticas, que las mujeres “deben hacer”, por lo que no son valorados como actividad laboral o económica, pues el rol de la mujer es restringido al espacio del hogar.

En esta investigación, esta reflexión forma parte de la corriente principal del problema de seguridad alimentaria y nutricional.

Esta investigación desarrolla un enfoque cualitativo, a partir de técnicas como Espacios de Encuentro, grupos focales, entrevistas a profundidad y elaboración de Historias de Vida, lo que permite identificar las dinámicas sociales y familiares de las mujeres.

Hemos estudiado los roles reproductivos, productivos y omunitarios de los miembros de la familia y su relación con: el significado del ser mujeres y hombres; lo que significa ser familia; la participación de las mujeres en las organizaciones sociales y comunitarias; su capacidad organizativa y creadora de redes y nuevas redes sociales para el bienestar de sus  familias y comunidades.

En unos primeros análisis, encontramos que muchas mujeres siguen teniendo un lugar de subordinación y de silencio, muchas veces generado por la violencia intrafamiliar, reconociendo que existen aspectos de orden cultural y simbólico en estas regiones, en donde la religión cumple un papel determinante que, en última, afecta la calidad nutricional en la familia. Esto no significa que las mujeres no participen de propuestas y acciones colectivas, sino que, a pesar de las resistencias asumen también responsabilidades colectivas y se aventuran a la participación comunitaria.

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How far can policy recognition of women’s roles and contributions to agriculture lead to strengthening women’s agency, empowerment and in turn nutritional outcomes?

I believe policy recognition contributes to the visibility of this matter and establishes its binding nature, putting it on the agenda of government leaders and technicians, and raising public awareness. Therefore, the recognition of the role of women and their contribution to agriculture strengthens their empowerment. Please find below a summary of the project “Foundations of a gender and family sensitive intervention strategy: Peasant and indigenous communities in Nariño, Colombia”. 

Leonor Perilla, National University of Colombia

Summary

This research aimed to identify the role of women and other family members in nutrition, in order to define sustainable strategies acknowledging their contribution to productive processes and to family and community care and nutrition. This research follows a gender and family sensitive approach.

In rural areas of Colombia, the contribution of women to the production of goods and services, agricultural labour and trade has been traditionally neglected. Culturally regarded as an extension of their home duties, women “must do” all this work. Therefore, it is not considered an occupational or economic activity, as the role of women is homebound.

In this research, this thought is part of the food and nutrition security problem.

This research develops a qualitative approach, based on techniques such as forums, focus groups, in-depth interviews and records, which enable the identification of the social and family dynamics of women.

The research has studied the reproductive, productive and community roles of family members and their relationship with the meaning of being women and men; the meaning of being a family; the participation of women in social and community organizations; their organizational skills; and their ability to create new social networks for the well-being of their families and communities.

An initial assessment showed that many women still play a subordinate and silent role, usually driven by domestic violence and linked to cultural and symbolic factors. Religion also plays a decisive role in these regions, affecting the household nutritional status. This does not mean that women do not participate in communal proposals and initiatives: despite the difficulties, they take collective responsibility and dare to participate in communal activities.

ENGLISH TRANSLATION BELOW

La promotion des bonnes pratiques alimentaires constitue un pilier important dans les programmes de jardins scolaires mis en place par la FAO en République Démocratique du Congo.

Dans la majeure partie des cas, au début de nos interventions, le travail n’étant pas rémunéré, il est compté beaucoup plus de femmes que d’hommes. Un grand travail de sensibilisation est mené auprès des autorités coutumières et politico-administratives pour arriver à une participation des hommes à cette étape. Mais, dès que les premières retombées financières se font voir, il est également observé une augmentation des hommes dans les groupes.

Les us et coutumes locales ont encore une grande influence dans le comportement des femmes et hommes dans les communautés bénéficiaires des projets. L’approche Champ Ecole Paysan, CEP, qui est la méthodologie participative utilisée dans la mise en place des activités permet d’aborder non seulement les aspects liés à l’agriculture, mais aussi à des aspects sociaux notamment le genre. Ajouter à cela, la production d’émissions à la radio qui est le média le plus répandu en milieu rural en RDC pour toucher le plus grand nombre de personnes. Les CEP ont permis à des femmes d’être capables de s’exprimer en public, de diriger des groupes, de devenir des entrepreneurs agricoles. L’implication des femmes dans la mise en place des jardins scolaires a contribué à l’amélioration des conditions de fonctionnement des écoles et des repas qui y sont servi. Il serait important d’y ajouter l’élevage des cobayes  pour avoir des protéines animales dans la ration alimentaire. La synergie avec les programmes de l’UNICEF (Villages et Ecoles Assainis) et ceux du PAM permet d’améliorer le paquet d’activités dans les écoles en vue de l’amélioration de la nutrition

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Promoting good nutritional practices constitutes an important pillar in the school gardens programmes put in place by the FAO in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.

Despite the main objective being to improve children’s nutrition, the second objective is to contribute to the financial empowerment of the parent committees in the schools. School gardens are both a pedagogical tool and a source of vitamin and mineral-rich food and also of revenue through the sale of the produce. The produce from the school gardens improves the nutritional quality of the meals served at school and at home because, in some cases, vegetables and seedlings are given to the teachers and parents to transplant which makes vegetables accessible at home as well.

In most cases, at the start of our programs, the work was not paid and relied on many more women than men. A large amount of work involves the increase of awareness with the traditional and politico-administrative authorities to encourage men to participate at this stage. But, as soon as income starts being seen, more men are also observed joining the groups.

The local habits and customs still have a strong influence in men and women’s behaviour in the communities benefitting from the projects. The Farmer Field Schools approach (FFS) which is the participative methodology used in the establishment of the activities, not only allows for the approach of agricultural aspects but also social aspects, notably gender. Add to this the production of radio programmes, which are the most well established media in the rural DRC, can reach the most amount of people. The FFS allowed women the capacity to publicly express themselves, coordinate groups, and become agricultural entrepreneurs. The inclusion of women in the development of school gardens contributed to the improvement of the operating conditions in schools and of their meals. It would be important to include guinea pig raising as a source of animal protein. The partnerships with UNICEF programmes (Health Schools and Healthy Villages) and those with the WFP improve the activity packages available at schools which, in turn, improve nutrition.