When you sit down for a meal, you probably do not think of your food as a form of currency. Farms are not often viewed as investment properties in rural areas in developing countries where female farmers are the stockbrokers in this market. Forget about the C-suites of Wall Street! Business deals are happening on the fields on farms in places like Bangladesh and Burkina Faso. These enterprising women need your help.
Throughout the world, female farmers have a significant role in agriculture, Yet gender disparities persist, especially, in the agricultural sector in developing countries. Based on a recent report from UN Women , female farmers account for more than 40 percent of the agricultural workforce, and yet they own less than 13 percent of the world’s land, earning just a fraction what their male counterparts do. In many developing countries, these inequalities exist as barriers to accessing resources such as land, technology and machinery, education, and credit. These constraints continue to disempower women in rural areas and hinder their potential to improve food security and alleviate poverty.
Climate change will only continue to produce devastating environmental shocks to food systems throughout many rural communities. These shocks threaten to further destabilize these already weakened communities in which many female farmers live in. Now is the time to invest in women. If female farmers had the same access to the same resources as men, the population of hungry people worldwide could be reduced by 150 million people. This is an ambitious goal, but it could happen if governments and organizations worked together to change laws, policies, and programs to fully support the social and economic advancement of women in the agricultural sector.
Financial inclusion of women through microfinance is one way to target rural women and bridge the gender gap. As for many smallholder farmers, especially female farmers, one key challenge is access to financial services such as savings, insurance, and loans. These services help alleviate poverty and improve food security because they enhance investment and create employment opportunities for the participant. As a result, when women have access to such services, there are large spillover effects. Women are able to lift themselves, their families and communities out of poverty as many of them start their own businesses and generate steady income by using their own crops as a form of collateral.
Microfinance initiatives, which encourage women and support social transformation in developing countries such as Bangladesh and Burkina Faso, are already taking place.
Organizations like PROOFS (Profitable Opportunities for Food Security) in Bangladesh and CNFA (Cultivating New Frontiers in Agriculture) in Burkina Faso are just a few co-creators of this transformational change. Each of these organizations have provided the financial backing for female farmers to break cultural and social norms in their countries to become success stories in the agricultural sector.
Female farmers such as Jahanara Begum from Bangladesh has worked with PROOFS despite both criticism and skepticism from her community and even from her own family to become a Farm Business Advisor. She gained credibility not only as a successful farmer but also as a businesswoman as a result of selling vegetable seeds, fertilizers, and pest management tools to other farmers. PROOFS was a major catalyst in improving her economic situation their assistance in helped her expand her consumer base and later on she was able to secure a loan from a bank to expand her business by working more directly with private companies.
Fatima Nadinga from Burkina Faso is another good example of a smallholder farmer using microcredit to fight poverty and improve food security. Through the training program offered by CNFA, Fatima has acquired the knowledge and skills to use grain as a form of collateral to receive credit from financial institutions. The main advantage of this microfinance system is the farmer does not have to sell all of their harvest at one given time and instead have the option to invest in their farms which the end result is a more income. Also, farmers have the added advantage of selling crops at a higher price.
These examples are just a few but demonstrate the strong impact microfinance can have on female farmers by empowering their financial independence and autonomy in their communities. Women like Jahanara and Fatima show us that great change can truly start with just one seed and grow a more equitable future.
There needs to be a continued commitment to integrating gender-based initiatives in agriculture that prioritize the financial and social needs of women. The following are ways that you can help support the empowerment of women in agriculture, especially in rural areas:
- Continue to increase female farmer’s access to finance through services/products as well as opportunities for increased financial literacy. Support these initiatives through donating or volunteering your time to organizations such as CNFA
- Subscribe to the newsletter of microfinance organizations such as PROOFS to support current projects and get information on how you can continue to help
- Join the #FillTheGap campaign to continue to help bridge the gender gap in agriculture