FINAL REPORT OF THE HIGH-LEVEL CONSULTATION

I. INTRODUCTION

1. The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) took the initiative to organize a High-Level Consultation on Rural Women and Information from 4 to 6 October 1999. Financial support was received from the Governments of France, Italy, the Netherlands and Norway. The aim of the Consultation was to facilitate - at international policy-making and technical level - an exchange of views on the value of information as a decision-making and operational tool to support the role of rural women in agricultural and rural development. The objective was to examine the "Strategy for Action for policies meeting the challenges of both food security and gender equality - The role of information". The Strategy, prepared by the Secretariat, aims at informing more broadly policy-makers, planners, the media and the general public of the roles and responsibilities of men and women in agricultural production so as to ensure an equitable allocation of resources to the people who play a key role in food security.

2. The Strategy for Action falls within the framework of the follow-up to the World Food Summit (WFS), where the Heads of State and Government committed themselves to "ensure an enabling political, social and economic environment (...) based on full and equal participation of women and men" (Commitment 1 of the WFS Plan of Action). To this end, they set themselves several objectives including that of achieving "gender equality and empowerment of women" (Objective 1.3). This objective specifies that Governments "will improve the collection, dissemination and use of gender-disaggregated data in agriculture, fisheries, forestry and rural development" (paragraph f.).

The Strategy for Action focuses on a key area of the FAO Plan of Action for Women in Development (1996-2001), approved by the Conference in 1995 (C 95/14-Sup.1, Rev.1), relating to the availability, accuracy and use of quantitative and qualitative data and information on rural women. Such a strategic orientation is also found in the Beijing Platform for Action adopted at the Fourth World Conference on Women in 1995, which includes the objective of "generating and disseminating gender-disaggregated data and information for planning and evaluation" (Strategic Objective H.3, paras. 206-209).

II. CONDUCT OF THE CONSULTATION

3. The High-Level Consultation was attended by 326 participants, 43 of whom were members of government representing Ministries of Agriculture and for the Advancement of Women (or equivalent) from 111 FAO Members. The participants also included representatives of the United Nations system, intergovernmental and non-governmental organizations, as well as development agents, communication and media experts, and social scientists from Africa, Asia, Latin America and the Caribbean, and the Near East (see list of participants).

4. The High-Level Consultation was opened by the Director-General of FAO. Speakers at the inaugural session included Her Excellency Ms Laura Balbo, Italian Minister for Equal Opportunity; Ms Angela King, Assistant-Secretary General of the United Nations, Special Adviser on Gender Issues and Advancement of Women; and Her Excellency Ms Elizabeth Diouf, First Lady of Senegal, President of the International Steering Committee for the Economic Advancement of Rural Women.

The keynote addresses were followed by a multimedia presentation and the inauguration of an exhibition. Both of these emphasized the actual and potential contribution of women to agricultural and rural development and food security, and the information needed for policy-makers and planners to formulate agricultural policies and programmes that are better tailored to existing production systems and social structures.

The High-Level Consultation appointed by consensus Her Excellency Ms Hafsatu Thiero Diarra, Minister for the Promotion of Women, Children and the Family of Mali, as Chairperson; His Excellency Prof. Paolo de Castro, Minister for Agricultural Policies of Italy, as Vice-Chairperson; and Ms Fatimah Hasan. J. Hayat, Permanent Representative of Kuwait to FAO, as Rapporteur.

5. The Strategy for Action was reviewed in the general debate that took place in the afternoons of Monday 4 and Tuesday 5 October 1999. Two technical panels were held in the mornings of Tuesday 5 and Wednesday 6. One moderated by Her Excellency Ms Margareta Winberg, Minister for Agriculture and Minister for Gender Equality Affairs of Sweden, the other by Ms Angela King, UN Assistant Secretary-General and Special Adviser on Gender Issues and Advancement of Women. The discussion panels addressed the following issues respectively:

• Gender equality in policies and planning - nature and scope;
• Dissemination of gender-specific information - methodologies and approaches.

6. A number of documents were prepared on issues associated with gender-specific information and sex-disaggregated data, and communication between policy-makers and rural populations. Besides the Strategy for Action, these included:

• Participation and information - The key to gender-responsive agricultural policy;
• Voices for change - Rural women and communication;
• Filling the data gap - Gender-sensitive statistics for agricultural development;
• Gender issues in land tenure.

Videos, audio materials and fact sheets explaining the contribution of rural women to agriculture and food security were also produced. An Internet stand was available for participants to visit the "Gender and Food Security" site and the Web page especially set up for the Consultation.

III. OUTCOME OF THE CONSULTATION

7. The following major points relate to the statements made by the delegates during the general debate:

• The delegates unanimously recognized that the convening of the High-Level Consultation was timely and crucial to support the advancement of rural women. They also recognized that the Strategy for Action prepared by the Secretariat was a useful and important tool for Member Countries to improve the gender-sensitivity of their programmes.
• Recognition of the importance of rural women and of their contribution to agricultural production and food security was clearly expressed. The majority of countries have developed strategies for action in favour of rural women and/or have paid increasing attention to the implementation of measures based on gender specificities.
• These policies and strategies have mainly been oriented towards shaping an enabling environment for the advancement of rural women: training, access to production services and improvement of tools and equipment in rural areas.
• While recognizing the crucial contribution of rural women to food production and the national economy, as well as the increasing feminization of agriculture in many developing countries, delegates acknowledged that several constraints and barriers continue to exist for rural women, preventing the full realization of their potential and the reduction of poverty. Women are very often the victims of environmental degradation, war, violence, displacement and social exclusion.

8. As regards the Strategy for Action, the delegates provided guidance on how to focus more closely on issues related to the production, dissemination and utilization of information on rural women to enhance gender equality and food security. They stressed in particular:

• the mobilization of all stakeholders, including rural women and men, at all levels and all stages of the information process;
• the use of methodologies that take gender specificities into account, and of participatory and decentralized approaches;
• the conduct of national surveys on rural women and time-use surveys to determine the respective contributions of rural men and women and identify the obstacles to food security and gender equality;
• the training of data producers and users and linkage between the two to identify information needs and solutions;
• the selection of economic and social indicators, the setting up of databases on rural men and women at regional and national levels, and a monitoring system, for example the establishment of an obversatory for women entrepreneurs;
• the establishment of information networks and the creation and reinforcement of communication channels among rural women themselves and between rural women and government planning institutions, through the extensive use of the media;
• the development of sensitization, mobilization and advocacy activities in favour of rural women, such as the celebration of World Rural Women's Day, for policy-makers and the general public.

9. Improved information and data facilitate the formulation and implementation of agricultural and rural development policies which take gender specificities into account and thus promote social justice and equal respect of human rights. These policies should be oriented towards:

• empowering rural women by giving them the right to speak and greater visibility, while increasing their representation in political and professional arenas;
• building the technical skills of rural women so as to reduce their workload, increase their earnings and enable them to become active stakeholders in the development planning process;
• adopting legal and administrative measures to improve social benefits and basic health facilities in rural areas and to facilitate the access of rural women to productive resources, such as land which is the key resource for agricultural production;
• facilitating the access of rural women to basic services and resources, such as education at all levels, training, literacy, technology and information to enhance their vocational skills;
• providing special support, such as credit, under poverty reduction programmes so that rural women can set up their own enterprises and income-earning activities, in particular in the smallholder sector.

IV. FOLLOW-UP TO THE CONSULTATION

10. The findings of the High-Level Consultation will be considered and examined to contribute to the mid-term review of the implementation of the Platform for Action of the Fourth World Conference on Women (Beijing + 5). This review takes place in the year 2000. They will also serve to formulate the follow-up to the present FAO Plan of Action for Women in Development which expires in 2001.

11. The next stages in the follow-up to the Strategy for Action will be:

• submission of this report, for information, to the upcoming sessions of the Council (117^th) and the Conference (30^th) in November 1999;
• dissemination of the proceedings and findings of the High-Level Consultation on the "Gender and Food Security" Web site and by publication of a report;
• closer coordination of development activities, on the one hand, among the Rome-based UN Agencies (FAO, IFAD, WFP) and, on the other, with other UN partners to promote gender-responsive programmes, using existing international and national networks and mechanisms;
• adoption by FAO of interactive strategies to bring the issue of rural women to the attention of the international community and support initiatives to improve training for rural women at national level;
• continued training by FAO in gender analysis and production of information materials;
• development of national strategies of communication and utilization of existing information networks, and the opening up of North-South and South-South dialogue on the subject;
• promotion of active partnership with the media to improve the targeting and packaging of information on rural women and elaboration of a dissemination strategy geared towards both the general public and the more specialized audiences.