Global Forum on Food Security and Nutrition (FSN Forum)

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Ms. Mar Maestre

Member since
Organization: Institure of Development Studies
Country: United Kingdom
Field(s) of expertise:
I am working on:

- Leveraging agriculture for nutrition in South Asia (LANSA): research partnership working together to research how agriculture and food-related interventions can be better designed to improve nutrition, particularly for children and adolescent girls in South Asia. My area of research assesses the effectiveness of agri-food value chain-based interventions in delivering nutrition outcomes for poor people in rural areas in three countries (India, Pakistan and Bangladesh). It will involve ten case studies in the three countries, analysing, among others, the role rural women play in agri-food value chains, both as consumers and producers (in terms of gender and access to food, household decision-making and workloads, and innovation along value chains). The initial findings will be ready by September 2016 (http://lansasouthasia.org/)
- Urbanisation and changing food systems: addressing the nutrition transition: new research on the interlinking challenges that urban areas face when creating a sustainable and nutrient-rich food system. We focus on four cities or towns from Africa and South Asia to understand how migration and mobility, informality and pluralism and household decision-making interact with food and nutrition
- Market Systems and Unpaid Care work: DFID and SDC funded research that assesses how unpaid care work interacts with value chain development interventions, providing guidance to donors, such as IFAD, to understand what unpaid care work is and how it interacts with markets, along with tools for analysis and practical examples of programme interventions that target problematic aspects of care through facilitation approaches. Attached the draft report and policy brief (still pending to be edited and formatted by the communications team) (https://beamexchange.org/practice/research/womens-economic-empowerment/…)

This member contributed to:

    • Dear all, 

      Following the post below from Sangeetha, I want to highlight the role that markets, informal sector and SMEs play in ensuring nutrition-sensitive value chains. 

      On the framework we have developed, as part of LANSA, we have focused on assessing the pathways for delivery of nutritious foods (what we are calling post-farm gate). The framework can be used by practitioners, donors, policy makers, to understand how to make agricultural value chains and markets more efficient when delivering nutritious food. It starts assessing the value chain from the consumer  perspective (analysing if the targeted households are choosing to purchase and eat the nutrient-dense target food) and then assesses the supply side (looking if tehre are aligned interests for actors, both private and public, to produce and distribute the products). 

      The framework has been used for 12 case studies in South Asia, assessing different market pathways (food fortifcation, promotion of dairy value chains, social enterprises, public-private partnerships, pulibc distribution of food). We will be presententing the initial findings on 25-26 April, including all the example and specific recommendations. Please, RSVP by 17th April to confirm you place.

    • Dear all,

      I just completed research on unpaid care work dynamics and market systems programmes. While it didn’t target nutrition directly, the implications of the research are clearly linked to it. We have identified the key factors that often undermine women when unpaid care work is heavy, excessive or invisible, within value chain programmes, and the consequences for both the agriculture value chain and for women of not addressing these. Unpaid care can intersect often with agriculture or nutrition related programmes or policies through impacts on time, mobility and agency:

      ·        Time:  the more that women increase or decrease time in one sphere directly affects the time available in others.

      ·        Mobility: some women’s responsibilities can limit their mobility and ability to, for example, find stable employment.

      ·        Agency: if unpaid work is not seen as contributing, it can lead to women’s limited control over resources or undermine their self-esteem.

      Our research highlighted the need to address the problematic aspects of care provision if we are to generate sustainable changes that support women’s economic empowerment. We also explored tools to understand this, and more importantly, strategies to address it, highlighting the potential of using systems thinking to facilitate change following participatory processes.

      The report is not published yet, but it will offer a range of pathways for programmes to facilitate changes to address problematic aspects of unpaid care work, including how to influence norms, through a combination of short- and longer-term changes that contribute to the long-term vision. A key recommendation is to combine interventions to directly address unpaid care, with others that support changes in the agricultural value chain to adapt to existing care responsibilities can be an effective approach. There are successful programme examples that show how, by combining short-term changes or 'quick wins' (e.g. increased recognition of care or adapting market activities to care) with longer-term changes, the underlying constraints can be addressed, even those that seem challenging, such as influencing social norms.

      You can find more information about our work here: https://beamexchange.org/practice/research/womens-economic-empowerment/unpaid-care-work/ or contact me, as we will publish the report very soon