Suggestions on the draft of
“CFS VOLUNTARY GUIDELINES ON GENDER EQUALITY AND WOMEN’S AND GIRLS’ EMPOWERMENT
in the context of food security and nutrition”
Self Employed Women’s Association (SEWA) is a member based organisation of women workers from informal sector in India. 2/3 of the membership is from rural areas and majority of whom are small and marginal women farmers. Moreover, 75% of SEWA’s membership is associated to the food systems. Although, world over the discussions on food systems heavily focus on producers, at SEWA we strongly believe that the Food systems in itself forms a circular economy with informal sector women workers involved at each and every stage. This includes the producers (Small and marginal farmers, share croppers, plantation workers, fishers, agricultural laborers etc.), the food processors (cleaning, sorting, grading, processing, etc.), distributors, sellers (vendors and hawkers, street vendors, natural markets, staff in super markets etc.), chefs (professional, home-based workers preparing snacks and condiments, catering staff etc.), consumers as well as waste / garbage recyclers who then make fertiliser from waste which goes back to soil to produce food.
Women shoulder around 60-65% of responsibilities in the Food systems. Despite this huge number, women are not only facing the challenge of their voices not being heard, but also they are hardly having any visibility in entire Food Value Chain System. Therefore, institutionalizing gender equality and gender transformative approaches in our homes, our farms, our communities, and in entire Food Value Chain System has become utmost important. Also, for the workers involved in such integrated food system, access to food is a basic right and hence food security is also a human right.
Therefore, with the objective to offer a platform to the informal sector women workers to bring forth their issues and challenges but also best practices and innovative solutions, SEWA organized national, regional and Global dialogues with women participants from the countries of Global South and a diverse audience constituting appropriate policy makers, private sector organizations, grassroot workers’ organizations, philanthropic foundations, scientists, academicians, Govt. representatives, CSOs, economists and individual consumers.
We organised, a consultation meeting on 23rd and 25th of October regarding the CFS draft on CFS VOLUNTARY GUIDELINES ON GENDER EQUALITY AND WOMEN’S AND GIRLS’ EMPOWERMENT in the context of food security and nutrition. The draft in its present form and gave a brief background and then discussed each point and the actions in detail. After presenting and explaining each point feedback was sought from each of the members present. Following suggestions were received from SEWA and the women led organisations of Farmer’s Forum Network run by SEWA in India.
POINTS OF SUGGESTIONS
Small and marginal women farmers constitute larger pie of women farmers who are not visible and voices are not heard. So organising is a key for collective strength which leads to understanding self worth, developing courage and building agency among women. So members based women’s organisations should be promoted to ensure participation and building agency.
Inclusive informal sector women owned and managed Capacity Building agencies shall be promoted which help them grasp easily through participatory learning and teaching modules and methodologies.
Sister to sister approach in Cross Learning helps in easy grasping and adoption among cross country and regional learning.
Participation of women should be ensured in local governance besides being involved in policy and decision making. Men should be sensitized to ensure the participation of women.
Sensitization of men should be included in women empowerment approach.
Motivation and awareness and empowerment of women in rural areas and in tribal areas regarding equality and leadership is important. The existing network of organizations can be used for changing the gender norms that prevent women from assuming leadership roles and in raising their voices.
Training of women with regards to technology is necessary so that they can access schemes and benefits that are available for them, through technological platforms.
Women’s participation should be ensured not only in policy making but in implementation as well.
In public distribution of goods through shops/centers, etc. many times women hesitate because of the crowd and wait and by the time there turn comes the goods finish, and many times because of social norms are also not allowed to go to these places. There should be committee at Gram Sabha to monitor the safety of women and for addressal of harassment cases. Women members from organizations working at grassroots who are actively working women should be part of these committees.
In instances of domestic violence, counselling is needed for both genders. With regards to this formation of collective groups and taking this forward will really be helpful.
Many times, the girls miss out on formal education and access to higher education is not available for them at village level. Groups of youth should be formed at village level at village level to provide coaching to girls and women.
Women’s markets should be created and there should be better facilities for women in the market. (Example: Seed Bank)
There is need to create awareness, have education and training so that women can use their traditional seed varieties and make seed banks for them and sell.
Women should be part of the decision-making bodies at all levels for the agriculture and allied policy making bodies not separate for women cell but mainstream decision making bodies. Activities like the purchase of fertilizers and seeds and marketing should be done by women as well.
There should be a policy to ensure that if the husband of a women dies, she has access to legal rights as a legal heir and she has excess to government schemes.
Schemes are needed to provide access to land to women who are landless workers.
When women wish to take loan, banks insist that land should be in their name so there should be policies and schemes by which banks can give loans to landless and women.
Many women are landless workers. There should be for women who are landless workers so that they can get access to land, finance and government schemes.
The names of women should be there in land records.
Society should accept name of women in land records and other productive assets as they are making great contribution in areas like fishing processing and farming.
Women have lot of responsibilities, and it is to be seen how these responsibilities can be shared at home and for doing outside work. It needs to be seen how to increase the decision-making capacity of women. Structural changes are needed to increase their decision-making capacity.
Training needs to be given to women regarding nutrition (Poshak Ahar). There here should be decision making committees to distribute food kits. There is a need to conduct trainings in diet and nutrition and can explain its importance.
Awareness should be created among women regarding various types of vitamins such as A, B, C, D.
Social protection is very important for development of women leaders individually and collectively.
Many schemes of government for farming/ agriculture do not reach women farmers who the marginal and poor. Therefore, participation of women farmers should be ensured for designing social protection schemes to give access to social protection to agriculture workers.
Mme Megha Desai