One of the biggest tools we can use to address the barriers rural women face is about transforming gender norms and focusing on engaging men to change the way women can act in the household and community. The Agriculture Extension Support Activity, funded by USAID’s Feed the Future in Bangladesh and implemented by Dhaka Ahsania Mission (DAM) has seen that working not just on access to agriculture extension for poor women farmers, but also on transforming gender norms, can help solve some of the main problems women face.
CARE as a technical partner of the project see impacts on time poverty. The triple burden of productive work, household chores, and caring for children and the elderly means that in developing countries, women often work 16 hours a day. A 2016 evaluation of gender impacts shows that women who had an opportunity to take part in gender dialogue sessions and used daily time use tools with their husbands had on average 1-2 hours more leisure time than the control group. 76% more women who had access to this opportunity got leisure time at all compared to the control women.
One of the major change in the social believe is recognition of the women as ‘farmer’. One of the male group member of the ‘PAKSHIA HAWLADER BARI’ producer group of Potuakhali district acknowledge and state that – “we (male person of the family) only do 40% of the work for mung bean cultivation which are mainly related to land preparation and seed sowing. All other work done by them. We didn’t recognize this earlier but during the daily time use session this fact has been come out.” Not only the male group members but also the female members had the same realization after the session. As a result of such change, women farmers are now more confidant to communicate with extension worker – both public and private. Sub Assistant Agriculture Officer in Bhola mentioned that women now a days ask him for more suggestions through mobile phone calls and sometimes requests for an onsite visit.
In addition to helping the women get more time, the project also saw that women were able to overcome barriers to participating in leadership. It has been found that 28 were elected out of 116 female member of the groups contested for local electoral office this year. Women in the project are 69% more likely to be involved in production decisions, and 124% more likely to have participate in decisions about household spending than women who were not a part of the project.
Tania Sharmin
National Technical Coordinator, CARE
USAID Agricultural Extension Support Activity Project
السيدة Tania Sharmin
One of the biggest tools we can use to address the barriers rural women face is about transforming gender norms and focusing on engaging men to change the way women can act in the household and community. The Agriculture Extension Support Activity, funded by USAID’s Feed the Future in Bangladesh and implemented by Dhaka Ahsania Mission (DAM) has seen that working not just on access to agriculture extension for poor women farmers, but also on transforming gender norms, can help solve some of the main problems women face.
CARE as a technical partner of the project see impacts on time poverty. The triple burden of productive work, household chores, and caring for children and the elderly means that in developing countries, women often work 16 hours a day. A 2016 evaluation of gender impacts shows that women who had an opportunity to take part in gender dialogue sessions and used daily time use tools with their husbands had on average 1-2 hours more leisure time than the control group. 76% more women who had access to this opportunity got leisure time at all compared to the control women.
One of the major change in the social believe is recognition of the women as ‘farmer’. One of the male group member of the ‘PAKSHIA HAWLADER BARI’ producer group of Potuakhali district acknowledge and state that – “we (male person of the family) only do 40% of the work for mung bean cultivation which are mainly related to land preparation and seed sowing. All other work done by them. We didn’t recognize this earlier but during the daily time use session this fact has been come out.” Not only the male group members but also the female members had the same realization after the session. As a result of such change, women farmers are now more confidant to communicate with extension worker – both public and private. Sub Assistant Agriculture Officer in Bhola mentioned that women now a days ask him for more suggestions through mobile phone calls and sometimes requests for an onsite visit.
In addition to helping the women get more time, the project also saw that women were able to overcome barriers to participating in leadership. It has been found that 28 were elected out of 116 female member of the groups contested for local electoral office this year. Women in the project are 69% more likely to be involved in production decisions, and 124% more likely to have participate in decisions about household spending than women who were not a part of the project.
Tania Sharmin
National Technical Coordinator, CARE
USAID Agricultural Extension Support Activity Project