Women's work in agriculture has been systematically ignored and subvalued both in Costa Rica and in the rest of the region, thus minimizing the urgent need to give adequate treatment to gender issues in the planning of the sector. Moreover, even though this need has been acknowledged, the motivation and training of the technical personnel of the affected institutions, the theoretical-conceptual knowledge of the gender issue and the methodological and operational tools have been insufficient or inadequate to obtain the desired results and effects. At the political level there has been precise strategic targeting to direct the gender dimension incorporation process into the sector's guidelines. On the other hand, lack of disaggregated statistics by sex in household census and surveys have been an obstacle for the planning and formulation of policies and, in turn, have aided the subvaluation of women's activity in the sector.
The institutional strategies and mechanisms adopted by the government did not produce substantial changes in the attitude of the executives and technical staff, nor have they generated greater and more equitable participation of women in the new productive scenario.
In fact, from the viewpoint of rural women, as Luz María Campos21 points out, in spite of the changes made in the active occupation structure, there has been no actual participation of women in the economic, social and political life. Moreover, small women producers have not had real access to the training, research and technological processes in the mixed farming sector.
Within this context, the government of Costa Rica decided to undertake the project "Support to Women Producers in the Rural Area within the Framework of a Gender Approach", with the technical and financial support to strengthen the productive role of rural women and to improve their living conditions.
The main objective of the MAG/FAO/GENDER project was to contribute to the introduction and development of an alternative methodological approach, the Gender Approach, in the guidelines, policies, programs and activities of the mixed farming and environmental sectors. To achieve this, the involved national agents and project personnel worked together in order to perform the actions and create adequate strategic and operational tools. Among them it is worthwhile mentioning the following:
· Cooperation among the various institutions of the official mixed farming sector and the NGOs.
· A training plan for the Huetar Atlantica region (pilot area).
· Adequate methodologies for gender training and didactic material.
· Proposals for the incorporation of the Gender Approach into the Strategic Guidelines of the Mixed Farming and Environmental Sectors.
· Action Plan to generate the necessary institutional conditions to introduce the gender approach into these sectors.
· Mobilization of grassroot women organizations for consolidation of an agricultural women producers movement in the region.
· The various project components generated their own dynamics and results, were carried out in an integrated modality and provided feedback to each other.
Components centered on |
Activities and aims |
|
Training of human resources |
Sensitizing, motivating and training both technical and administrative personnel as well as the farmers regarding gender issues. |
|
Strengthening of grassroot groups and the institutional system |
Respond to the need of adopting a gender perspective at all sector levels. |
|
Revision of policies |
- Identify problems and indicate actions, measures and institutional mechanisms in order to solve them. - Correct the differential impact of the policies on men and women, through proposals sensitive to the differences of gender. |
The execution of these three activity lines facilitated, on one hand, the joint and coordinated work of the relevant institutions, and, on the other hand, permitted the participation throughout the process of both the sector personnel and farmer groups. The former acquired new sensitivity and knowledge regarding the problems of gender, and the latter achieved more space to plan and manage development projects and to obtain more `power' as a consequence of their organizational capacity and their access to the decision making spheres.
The activities related to the revision of policies were centered on two interrelated issues: 1) to generate a reflection process on the implications of the policies in force and to provide recommendations for the incorporation of the gender approach into the guidelines of the sector, and 2) to initiate an institutional strengthening process so that the recommended measures and mechanisms could be adopted.
The targets to be achieved and a group of actions to improve both women's access to production resources and their control of the same, under conditions of equality, competitiveness, efficiency, and sustainability, were defined with the first initiative (See graph 1). The proposed measures were aimed at the acknowledgment and valorization of women farmers's work, overcoming a series of ideological and institutional obstacles that, in general, limited access and control of the indicated resources in each thematic axis.
New spaces to create or reinforce institutional structures that benefited gender equality were identified through the second initiative, taking advantage of the institutional system readjustment process. Planning sensitive to the gender dimension is based on the participation of women farmers in all decision making institutions of the sector and in their organizational capacity. The measures were aimed at overcoming the verticality of the planning system and its bias in matters of gender, favoring feedback from the farmer bases in general and rural women in particular.
GRAPH 1 - AXES OF THE PLAN FOR GENDER INCORPORATION INTO THE MIXED FARMING AND ENVIRONMENTAL SECTORS
The work carried out in Costa Rica and other similar initiatives executed in other countries of the region represent a change of view with regard to the traditional approaches to deal with the problems of gender and development. The change does not consist so much in the processes themselves but in the way they are carried out. These processes could be basically summed up into sensitization, training, formulation of policies and strengthening of the institutional capability of the interested organisms. With regard to the adopted methodology, the idea of transversallity was put into practice in the consideration of gender problems, granting it institutional support and inserting it into the social dynamics of the countries involved. This proposal is more global and integral than the traditional approach of projects, which addresses isolated problems of the community.
The more relevant issues of this methodological option can be summed up in the following points:
· It conceives gender problems from a systemic perspective.
· It does not create parallel structures but inserts itself into social dynamics.
· It is not aimed at solving isolated problems but at the consideration of the gender dimension within the mixed farming developing process as a whole.
· It integrates into the existing social relation system, considering all its levels.
· By definition, it is participative, since it is implemented with dialog, joint work and consultations with the social actors/actresses involved.
· It is sited within a specific historical context.
As a hypothesis it could be proposed that `the incorporation of gender dimension within the structure and dynamics of an ongoing process has more impact potential than the partial treatment of specific problems'. Obviously, its validity must be verified after sufficient time has passed between the process of sensitization, training and formulation of recommendations and the process of adoption and consolidation of measures and actions.
The theory is based on the fact that gender dimension, when inserted into the strategic guidelines of the sector, passes on to form part of an integral development plan. Thus, it benefits from its dynamics, integrating into its short, medium and long term targets and objectives. Integration also makes possible the evaluation of achievements and difficulties within the same temporary horizon. Gender dimension becomes a constitutive element of the system instead of adding itself to it or structuring itself as a partial element of global dynamics.
On the other hand, the introduction of gender perspective within the guidelines of the sector makes possible its forming part of the strategic issues, thus strengthening the capability of generating substantial changes in the socioeconomic system structure itself.
Dealing with gender problems from a systemic approach locates them inside an interrelated and coherent totality where economic, political, social and environmental issues interact and affect each other. This makes gender issues foster feedback that will contribute to secure the initiated processes.
Another group of data that targets the actions to be followed is related with women's participation under equal conditions. These could be formulated as follows:
· Women's greater organizational capability, more possibilities of having access to the services offered by the sector.
· More access to information, communication and training, more possibilities of having access to decision making levels.
· More information gives rise to more negotiation capacity.
