The Blue Growth Blog, run by the Fisheries and Aquaculture Department at FAO, reflects on recent activities related to women and their role in the sector.

Across Liberia’s Montserrado County, a special programme is enabling market women to take their businesses — and their lives — to the next level.

Mahabat Botasheva is the enthusiastic leader of a group of five women in the village of Blagoveshenka in Jalal-Abad province, Kyrgyzstan. Last year, the women started a business in potted flowers. This is the story of how it took root, and how it’s growing.

Zoila Esperanza Morán never learned how to read or write. As the eldest girl in a family of two sisters and a brother, she never had a chance to go to school. “Education is not important for women,” her mother would say. And so Zoila spent her childhood helping with chores at home, until the age of 15, when she was married off without her consent.

A new e-learning course from the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) provides specific guidance for ensuring that the Voluntary Guidelines on the Responsible Governance of Tenure of Land, Fisheries and Forests in the Context of National Food Security (VGGT) are implemented in a gender-equitable way.