Bridging the gender gap in agriculture by enhancing rural women’s economic empowerment
Bridging the gender gap in agriculture by enhancing rural women’s economic empowerment
The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) organized a Capitalization meeting in Naivasha, Kenya, leveraging the successful experience of the Women's Empowerment Business School (WE-FBS) approach. This initiative, implemented under the FAO program on "Gender Equality and Women's Empowerment in Food and Agriculture," has made significant strides in Kenya, Cambodia, and Uganda, benefiting over 10,000 individuals, with 60% of them being women.
The WE-FBS places both women and men farmers at the core of the transformative process, encouraging them to reflect on their roles, available resources, and farming activities. Through this program, participants develop strategies to maximize their commercial potential. Recognizing that women and men face distinct challenges in subsistence and commercial farming, the WE-FBS approach ensures inclusivity and equal opportunities.
With the pilot phase closing out, this Capitalization meeting provided a platform for national implementing partners and collaborators from Kenya, Uganda, and Cambodia, to review the achievements attained, reflect on the lessons learned and to discuss potential opportunities for replication and scale-up of this gender transformative approach in agribusiness.
About the WE-FBS Approach
Since 2017, FAO collaborated with KIT and CARE USA for the development of a gender transformative approach in agribusiness, namely the WE FBS. The approach focuses on women's economic empowerment in commercial farming by integrating a gender perspective into business skills development and promoting family farming as a business. It also concurrently aims to tackle the causes of gender inequalities deeply rooted in social and gender norms biased against women in the households and communities.
The objective of the WE-FBS is to contribute to: develop capacity of rural women farmers to improve productivity, profitability and sustainability of their activities/enterprises; strengthen their entrepreneurial skills and capacity to engage in lucrative value chains and access market opportunities; strengthen rural women’s and men organizations and governance structure, and networking capacity; and sensitize community members on gender issues and women empowerment.
Field Visit
On the sidelines of the workshop, the technical implementing teams from the three countries visited some of the producers’ groups involved in the program to hear from them about their experience with the programme, discuss about the changes and present the successes achieved with the WE-FBS approach.
The beneficiaries were excited about the achievements they have experienced from the trainings. “The training has enabled me to practice effective dairy farming and from my four cows, I sell 81 litres of milk per day. I also sensitized my wife who joined the group and she is now practicing poultry farming. From her 100 layers, she sells eggs as her source of income. Our diet has also really improved due to the plenty availability of eggs and milk in our home,” said Peter Kuria, a member of the Nyakinyua Self Group and beneficiary of the WE-FBS training.
The project is not only targeting women, but both women and men at the group and household level. One of its objectives is to challenge deeply rooted socio-cultural norms that create rural gender inequalities, and thereby transform gender relations at the household and community levels. “Initially, I used my husband's Identity Card without his knowledge to access loans. However, after receiving training and empowerment, we now openly discuss family investment opportunities and make joint decisions as a couple. We work together to manage our family's income and expenses.” said 47 years Gladys Mugure.
At the conclusion of the workshop, participants expressed their enthusiasm for the initiative and the creation of a community of practice. This platform will foster cross-country learning, enabling the development of more gender-responsive and transformative policies and programs.
For Further Information, please contact:
Pauline Akolo
Communications Specialist
Email: [email protected]