全球粮食安全与营养论坛 (FSN论坛)

A community cannot grow towards any direction progressively with gender discrimination. A woman nourishes her kid from zero days and a man starts his love after the 290 days. Then, why a man can consider a woman less respectable?

In a real and good life itinerary, a man couldn’t achieve a goal without the contribution of a woman rather in the field or at home. Level of contribution may be differ or equal but the level of respect should be the same. Wages of man and woman should be managed at the line of equality.

A new word has been introduced in the gender discussion and that is “harassment” especially in case of woman. In some countries women used this word to escape the working or threating the men and create unbalance working/professional environment.

1. The zero draft appropriately captures the main challenges of gender equality, reading from part 3 of the zero draft from sections 32-37 provides for gender equality and women's participation, voice and leadership in policy-and decision-making at all level. However, we are supposed to look critically at the 6 thematic areas of the gender equality. Gender-based violence, economic justice and rights, bodily autonomy and sexual and reproductive health and rights, feminist action for climate justice, technology and innovation for gender equality, and feminist movements and leadership. They are all interwoven. For instance, a woman smallholder farmer who is not adequately provided with security could face violence within the home and at farm. Some of our events that covers grassroots inclusion, financing and recommendation can be viewn in the upload. I and III or two things could be picked to enhance the preparation for gender equality.

2. Part two of the zero draft satisfactorily reflects the core principles which should underpin the guidelines.

3. The Nine sections of the part 3 of the zero draft, comprehensively covers the policy areas to be addressed to achieve gender equality and full realization of women and girls' rights but not  adequately cover women and girls' rights to nutrition. This is because, there are so many diseases which had sprang up as a result of inadequate/lack of nutrition on women and girls. There is a programme which I started in my community and will want to take it to other communities and accross the globe if our company is financed. The programme among others skill acquisition and capacity building will teach grassroot women and girls, urban women and youths how to prepare safe food for consumption and for commercial purposes. This will improve both their economic development and health wellbeing. This project when implemented will directly benefit 18000 women and girls directly and 18000 indirectly in Nigeria. It will be extended to other countries globally. Such Previous training among others uploaded in upload II.

4. Part 4 of the zero draft provide all the elements necessary for effective implementation and monitoring of the use and application of the guidelines.

In my opinion gender empowerment should first start in changing perceptions that are strongly rooted in the minds of everyone and not just rural communities.

I recently took mental note of gender mainstreaming in families around me and it was saddening to realise that basic women empowerment issues like access to family finances within a home, property ownership of shared property is low, mind you this is families that have high levels of literacy.

More civic education in my view should be enhanced in all masses not just targeting a section of women in rural areas, true they are most times producers in terms of agriculture and their empowerment is key for achieving food security goals, however if empowerment is done to all masses all gender (male and female and non binary) it will be key to see real change.

For nutrition security there has to be awareness and access at affordable cost to food security (balanced diet and right feeding practices for infants and children), safe drinking water and disease free environment and health care outreach. Over the past decade we have been promoting awareness on health, food and nutrition issues, specifically targeting pregnant women, and mothers with 6 to 24 months old children in villages of Medak district, Telangana state of South India. Other inputs are: homestead gardens with micronutrient dense vegetables and fruits, backyard poultry with high egg-yielding birds, and food processing, preparation of ready to cook complementary food. Impact is assessed through KAP surveys of mothers initially and end-line, acceptance of crop diversification, and BY poultry, and improvement in family diet. Teaching aids like simple pamphlets in local language Telugu helped during the pandemic when centralised meetings could not be held. Results are very encouraging. The work is discussed in the attached paper.

Challenges faced by fisher women of south India specific reference to Andhra Pradesh

Prof. (Mrs.) Vijayakhader, Former Dean, Acharya N.G.Ranga Agricultural University 

Women play a vital role in the operation of India’s fisheries, which provide needed protein for the countries’ people as well as seafood exports. Fisherwomen link producers and consumers via their involvement in every aspect of postharvest handling, processing, and marketing. Increased competition, declining resources and difficult working conditions make their work challenging. While fresh fish marketing and traditional fish processing remain the preferred activities of fisher women in southern states. However, with available post-harvest jobs, the constraints facing fisherwomen who want to advance their socioeconomic status beyond the sustainability level are overwhelming. The major challenges are traditional processing, scarcity of potable water, adverse climate, losses through insect infestation and low profit margins. On a personal level, many of the women suffer from poor health, hygiene and nutrition along with a lack of education, child care, and transportation to carry those long distances to their jobs. This can only be done through education about nutrition, health, sanitation, child care and raring on current technologies and best practices techniques.

In the fishing areas of the southern maritime state of Andhra Pradesh, women dominate the retail fresh fish trade for their livelihoods. The major recommendations to benefit the fisher women  are: 1) better marketing facilities for fish venders; 2) appropriate training materials for fish marketing groups on post-harvest technology aimed at improved handling fish quality and value; 3) the most important step to increase the purchasing power by introducing supplementary occupations; 4) technologies for processing low cost fish in to value added products which are in demand from different parts of the country and abroad; and 5) in aquaculture extension programs for fisher women should be one of the target groups.                                   

Suggestions on the draft of

“CFS VOLUNTARY GUIDELINES ON GENDER EQUALITY AND WOMEN’S AND GIRLS’ EMPOWERMENT

in the context of food security and nutrition”

Self Employed Women’s Association (SEWA) is a member based organisation of women workers from informal sector in India. 2/3 of the membership is from rural areas and majority of whom are small and marginal women farmers. Moreover, 75% of SEWA’s membership is associated to the food systems. Although, world over the discussions on food systems heavily focus on producers, at SEWA we strongly believe that the Food systems in itself forms a circular economy with informal sector women workers involved at each and every stage. This includes the producers (Small and marginal farmers, share croppers, plantation workers, fishers, agricultural laborers etc.), the food processors (cleaning, sorting, grading, processing, etc.), distributors, sellers (vendors and hawkers, street vendors, natural markets, staff in super markets etc.), chefs (professional, home-based workers preparing snacks and condiments, catering staff etc.), consumers as well as waste / garbage recyclers who then make fertiliser from waste which goes back to soil to produce food.

Women shoulder around 60-65% of responsibilities in the Food systems. Despite this huge number, women are not only facing the challenge of their voices not being heard, but also they are hardly having any visibility in entire Food Value Chain System. Therefore, institutionalizing gender equality and gender transformative approaches in our homes, our farms, our communities, and in entire Food Value Chain System has become utmost important. Also, for the workers involved in such integrated food system, access to food is a basic right and hence food security is also a human right.

Therefore, with the objective to offer a platform to the informal sector women workers to bring forth their issues and challenges but also best practices and innovative solutions, SEWA organized national, regional and Global dialogues with women participants from the countries of Global South and a diverse audience constituting appropriate policy makers, private sector organizations, grassroot workers’ organizations, philanthropic foundations, scientists, academicians, Govt. representatives, CSOs, economists and individual consumers.

We organised, a consultation meeting on 23rd and 25th of October regarding the CFS draft on CFS VOLUNTARY GUIDELINES ON GENDER EQUALITY AND WOMEN’S AND GIRLS’ EMPOWERMENT in the context of food security and nutrition. The draft in its present form and gave a brief background and then discussed each point and the actions in detail. After presenting and explaining each point feedback was sought from each of the members present. Following suggestions were received from SEWA and the women led organisations of Farmer’s Forum Network run by SEWA in India.

POINTS OF SUGGESTIONS

Small and marginal women farmers constitute larger pie of women farmers who are not visible and voices are not heard. So organising is a key for collective strength which leads to understanding self worth, developing courage and building agency among women. So members based women’s organisations should be promoted to ensure participation and building agency.

Inclusive informal sector women owned and managed Capacity Building agencies shall be promoted which help them grasp easily through participatory learning and teaching modules and methodologies.

Sister to sister approach in Cross Learning helps in easy grasping and adoption among cross country and regional learning.

Participation of women should be ensured in local governance besides being involved in policy and decision making. Men should be sensitized to ensure the participation of women.

Sensitization of men should be included in women empowerment approach.

Motivation and awareness and empowerment of women in rural areas and in tribal areas regarding equality and leadership is important. The existing network of organizations can be used for changing the gender norms that prevent women from assuming leadership roles and in raising their voices.

Training of women with regards to technology is necessary so that they can access schemes and benefits that are available for them, through technological platforms.

Women’s participation should be ensured not only in policy making but in implementation as well.

In public distribution of goods through shops/centers, etc. many times women hesitate because of the crowd and wait and by the time there turn comes the goods finish, and many times because of social norms are also not allowed to go to these places. There should be committee at Gram Sabha to monitor the safety of women and for addressal of harassment cases. Women members from organizations working at grassroots who are actively working women should be part of these committees.

In instances of domestic violence, counselling is needed for both genders. With regards to this formation of collective groups and taking this forward will really be helpful.

Many times, the girls miss out on formal education and access to higher education is not available for them at village level. Groups of youth should be formed at village level at village level to provide coaching to girls and women.

Women’s markets should be created and there should be better facilities for women in the market. (Example: Seed Bank)

There is need to create awareness, have education and training so that women can use their traditional seed varieties and make seed banks for them and sell.

Women should be part of the decision-making bodies at all levels for the agriculture and allied policy making bodies not separate for women cell but mainstream decision making bodies. Activities like the purchase of fertilizers and seeds and marketing should be done by women as well.

There should be a policy to ensure that if the husband of a women dies, she has access to legal rights as a legal heir and she has excess to government schemes.

Schemes are needed to provide access to land to women who are landless workers.

When women wish to take loan, banks insist that land should be in their name so there should be policies and schemes by which banks can give loans to landless and women.

Many women are landless workers. There should be for women who are landless workers so that they can get access to land, finance and government schemes.

The names of women should be there in land records.

Society should accept name of women in land records and other productive assets as they are making great contribution in areas like fishing processing and farming.

Women have lot of responsibilities, and it is to be seen how these responsibilities can be shared at home and for doing outside work. It needs to be seen how to increase the decision-making capacity of women. Structural changes are needed to increase their decision-making capacity.

Training needs to be given to women regarding nutrition (Poshak Ahar). There here should be decision making committees to distribute food kits. There is a need to conduct trainings in diet and nutrition and can explain its importance.

Awareness should be created among women regarding various types of vitamins such as A, B, C, D.

Social protection is very important for development of women leaders individually and collectively.

Many schemes of government for farming/ agriculture do not reach women farmers who the marginal and poor. Therefore, participation of women farmers should be ensured for designing social protection schemes to give access to social protection to agriculture workers.

From my few years experience as a teacher within institutions of higher learning; trainer for both government and private sector field officers and rural communities through conventional and FFS methodology, as well as personal journey as a woman scientist in the area of climate change and food security, has enabled me to understand the following: 

1. Rural men and women require capacity building more than financial aid. The capacity building should not capitalise on women and girls but include both genders. This is because when we empower women and leave out men, women don't stay in isolation and their development will be slowed down and even stopped by their male counterparts. That means, if we really need to empower our girls and women, men should be part and parcel of all the programs. Once the man is empowered and knows what women and girls need, he will provide support to the women in his house and community even if it is just "peace of mind alone" and women will flourish because women play the driving role in most food security issues within our societies.

2. Members of rural communities work differently from urban residents. In the rural areas people like working as a group. One day training might not be adequate considering their education levels and cultural differences. It would be effective if the trainings/mentorship consider a training format which is experiential and long term with followup sessions. Bringing up mentors from the local leadership to continue the mentorship process can work better than one time mentorship and financing then after few years everything is long forgotten.

3. Rural girls and women are powerful (despite their education levels), they are very receptive to empowerment but the empowerment process needs to be gradual and sustainable. Gate keepers needs to be fought first through empowerment rather than rules and regulations.

English translation below

Bonjour,

Mes compliments s'adressent à toute l'équipe et les rédacteurs de cette ébauche qui a touché tous les aspects.

Ci-après ma modeste contribution;

1/ Intensifier les campagnes de sensibilisation et de compréhension du concept genre en mettant l'accent sur les trois dimensions essentielles en tant qu'un concept sociologique, une méthodologie d'analyse, et une approche de développement et outil de changement.

2/ Mettre en place une stratégie de communication et de plaidoyer sur les droits économiques, sociaux, culturels et politiques des femmes qui cible les décideurs, les employeurs et la population locale (hommes, femmes et jeunes).

3/Appuyer les programmes de l'économie sociale et solidaire par les outils de la descrimination positive pour l'intégration des exploitations familiales et le secteur non organisé dans la dynamique économique nationale.

4/ Mettre l'accent sur les indicateurs et les mécanismes de suivi et de coordination.

5/ Renforcer l'intégration de la dimension genre dans les projets de coopération.

6/ Valoriser et diffuser les résultats de recherche à l'échelle nationale et régionale.

7/ Privilégier l'organisation des femmes et des filles rurales en structures institutionnelles et les doter des moyens de production et logistique.

Lamia AYADI

Direction de la Coopération Internationale

Ministère de l'Agriculture, des Ressources Hydrauliques et de la Pêche.

La TUNISIE

Hello,

My congratulations are extended to the whole team and the editors of this draft that covered all aspects.

Here is my modest contribution.

1) To intensify campaigns aimed at raising awareness and understanding of gender by focusing on its three essential dimensions being a sociological concept, an analytical methodology, and an approach to development and a tool for change.

2) To implement a communication and advocacy strategy for women's economic, social, cultural and political rights that is intended for decision makers, employers and the local communities (men, women and young people).

3) To support social and solidarity economy programmes through positive discrimination tools to integrate family farms and the informal sector into the national economic dynamics.

4) To focus on indicators, follow up and coordination mechanisms.

5) To strengthen gender mainstreaming in cooperation projects.

6) To promote and disseminate research results at national and regional levels.

7) To give priority to the organisation of rural women and girls within institutional structures and to provide them with the means of production and logistics.

Lamia AYADI

Directorate for International Co-operation

Ministry of Agriculture, Water Resources and Fisheries

TUNISIA

Dear FSN Forum Team,

Please find our comments on the zero draft of the CFS Voluntary Guidelines on Gender Equality and Women’s and Girls’ Empowerment attached for your consideration. These comments have been collected from the ICSF members and staff. Please let us know if you need any additional information from us.

Kind regards,

Elyse  

Message from the facilitator

Dear all,

We are already well on our way in our consultation process, what a journey! 

First of all, I would like to thank each of the participants for the numerous and valuable contributions we have received, and I invite those who have not yet done it to post their comments as soon as possible, as our online Consultation for the development of the CFS Voluntary Guidelines on Gender Equality and Women’s and Girls’ Empowerment in the Context of Food Security and Nutrition will close soon on 23 November. 

All comments coming from the regional and the electronic consultations address diverse topics covered in the Zero Draft. As you will understand, collecting elements from the various regions of the world, without reducing the complexity or neutralizing the differences, as well as taking into consideration local experiences that can represent good practices and inspire effective policy actions, is the biggest challenge. In this sense, your contributions are of great support to our work!

Just to mention some of the latest remarks received on the FSN Forum, I quote some interesting suggestions on access to financial resources, like those from John Ede (Nigeria), who proposed to promote financial literacy specifically for women farmers, and Laura Fernandez Lord (Spain) whose articulated comments relate to access to financial services and technology. Nawal Abdel-Gayoum Abdel-Rahman (Sudan) suggested supporting women with rewarding and non-pressurizing financing terms for capital recovery. He also pointed out another priority objective for policy action, that is to provide a stable, safe and clean environment for women and girls. 

On education, Lizzy (Nigeria) reminded how poor education limits women’s food security and nutrition among other needs, and she suggested that nutrition sensitive agriculture should form part of the curricula for a healthier motherhood. Amin Abu-Alsoud from JICA Palestine outlined the crucial issue of gender mainstreaming in public advisory and extension services to avoid technical and marketing information gaps in agriculture. 

Finally, İlkay Unay-Gailhard (Germany) emphasized how the influence of social and cultural norms on career choices are often neglected in policy making. She suggested that policies aimed to achieve gender equality and the full realization of women’s and girls’ rights in the context of food security and nutrition should be designed to induce changes not only in rural but also in urban areas.

On the regional consultations’ side, I inform you that the recording of the Regional Consultation for Africa, held on 21-22 October, and the Co-chairs’ summary of this event are both available on the webpage of the regional consultations. The meeting was attended by 115 participants and we are grateful for the valuable and inspirational remarks by distinguished keynote speakers H.E. Nyeleti Brooke Mondlane, Minister of Gender, Children and Social Action of Mozambique; H.E Ambassador Josepha Sacko, Commissioner for Agriculture, Rural Development, Blue Economy and Sustainable Environment of the African Union Commission and Mr. Haile Menghestab, Regional Director for Southern Africa, WFP. 

With regards to the regional consultations for the Near East and North Africa, and the one for the Asia-Pacific region, recordings are available here, while the Co-chairs’ summaries will be published soon. I invite those who have participated in these events and who want to add elements to the discussion, to do so by signing in or registering to the FSN Forum. All contributions received to the online consultation will be considered as those collected during the regional events in the elaboration of the preliminary First Draft of the Voluntary Guidelines. 

Now let me go back to the final preparations for the last of the regional consultations, the one for North America. I am sure it will give us further interesting perspectives on the Zero Draft. I will update you on these last events soon, stay tuned and please, don’t forget to post your contributions!

Marina Calvino