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Sustainable mechanization as a means to empower women processors in Benin










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    Book (stand-alone)
    Empowering women farmers
    A mechanization catalogue for practitioners
    2022
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    Rural women across the world work along agri-food value chains performing numerous agricultural operations. Their work is increasingly affected by land degradation, climate change impacts, and out-migration. It is often unrecognized, unqualified, and unpaid. Moreover, the traditional division of labor often relegates women to manual, time-consuming operations with high degrees of drudgery. The combination of family responsibilities and insufficient access to critical services, information, and technologies, affects women’s work burden and their potential for income generation. For example, fewer rights over land make it more difficult for women to access subsidies, finance, or mechanization. There are three ways in which sustainable mechanization can empower women and respond to their needs:
    • as customers of mechanization service providers - reducing their drudgery, and freeing up time for resting or opting for other social or economic activities;
    • as operators of machinery and equipment or staff of a mechanization hiring services business - offering their service to others to earn an income;
    • as entrepreneurs managing their own mechanization hiring services agribusiness - providing a service for other farmers and generating revenue.
    The goal of this catalogue is to promote and support women’s access to sustainable agricultural mechanization as operators and/or managers. It lists and provides information on market-tested machinery and equipment for crop production and post-harvest operations. This catalogue highlights the potential for smallholder farmers, including women, to earn an income via mechanization hire service. The information for each machine or equipment includes:
    • its function
    • its main features
    • what it is suitable for
    • its technical specifications (key features only)
    • where to buy
    • its pictures.
    The target audience includes extensionists, gender experts, agricultural engineers, government officials, donors, micro-finance institutions, and implementing partners seeking to:
    • promote inclusive agricultural mechanization interventions;
    • reduce women’s drudgery and improve the efficiency of tasks they perform;
    • address gender issues in agriculture;
    • support economic opportunities for women as entrepreneurs.
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    Book (stand-alone)
    Empowering women in Afghanistan: reducing gender gaps through Integrated Dairy Schemes 2015
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    Milk and dairy products are crucial for the daily food security and income generation of Afghan families, and women play an important role in the related activities. Since 2005, FAO is implementing the Integrated Dairy Schemes (IDS) Project, with financial support of the Afghan, German and Italian Governments and IFAD. The aim of the project is to improve food security in Afghanistan by supporting the national dairy sector. The Rural Infrastructure and Agro-industry and Social Protection Divisio ns of FAO, in collaboration with the FAO Representation in Afghanistan, undertook a detailed assessment to investigate the in depth impact on rural Afghan women and their families of the project. The assessment identified lessons learned and actionable recommendations to inform the design and implementation of gender-sensitive and inclusive dairy programmes. This publication draws on the evidence gathered during the implementation of the Project on the multiple benefits on gender equality and wo men’s empowerment. The IDS can be seen as a first stepping stone for a large number of rural women to start establishing a better place for themselves in the Afghan society.
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    Brochure, flyer, fact-sheet
    Women farmers and sustainable mechanization
    Improving lives and livelihoods in the Hindu Kush Himalaya
    2021
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    Women farmers and sustainable mechanization: Improving lives and livelihoods in the Hindu Kush Himalaya Episode I: The Nepal chapter Mountain agriculture is physically demanding and time-consuming. Rural women, who mostly work as subsistence farmers while also performing domestic work and communal activities, often face a poverty trap, undermining their well-being. Despite increasing labor participation in this sector, women remain invisible as active players and agents of change. A range of new and inexpensive agriculture machinery, adapted to local conditions, could potentially enhance labor productivity, reduce work burden and drudgery, and enable women to gain new skills and knowledge that can transform rural gender relations and reduce inequalities. It could also allow them to shift from subsistence to more market-oriented farming. However, the extent to which these technologies are available, suitably introduced (by individual use or via extension services), or adopted by women farmers in the HKH is still not clear. Given this background, ICIMOD and the FAO have come together to organize a series of country-specific (Nepal, Bhutan, and Myanmar) and regional webinars to discuss current mechanization gaps, and identify good practices and possible solutions for improving and facilitating women’s active participation in agriculture. The webinar series The webinar series will discuss strategies contributing to the process of mainstreaming and institutionalizing successful efforts of agricultural mechanization for improving productivity while also reducing drudgery for women farmers. Objectives The specific objectives of the webinar series are:
    • Share lessons learned from projects, programmes, and policies focusing on agricultural mechanization for women in the HKH
    • Showcase successful examples and solutions of agricultural mechanization used in the HKH
    • Identify key actionable solutions and approaches to promote agricultural mechanization in the HKH
    Each webinar will conclude with a call for action to align policy with practice to leverage technology to address the constraints and solutions that women farmers face for sustainable, efficient, and profitable farming.

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