The Gendering of Farmers
When considering gender and IPM,
first of all it should be realized that the scientists themselves
are gendered and therefore work in a gendered manner, despite the
fact that science is supposedly value neutral
[ii]
. Moreover, farmers are also gendered. Although
in many settings globally the farmer is conceived as male, and women
may even deny that they farm, in practice, women make up a very significant
percentage of those who work the land in most southern countries.
In sub-Saharan Africa in particular, women carry out the majority
of agricultural labor. However, most agricultural scientists are men,
and as such, rarely consider women as professional farmers, nor do
they think that since women typically farm different crops and/or
carry out different farming tasks from men they are also likely to
have their own specific knowledge about agriculture, species, varieties,
and the land. Thus, when scientists fail to take women’s knowledge
into consideration, they are losing a vital resource.
Necessity of Involving Women
The results
of omitting women from agricultural training have been shown to be
negative in a number of ways
[iii]
. Our research in the IPM CRSP sites has dispelled
the myth that women do not participate in pest control. On the contrary,
in many of our sites they have considerable involvement. IPM CRSP
research in Mali has shown that when farmer field schools (FFS) were
limited to men, women believed it was necessary to use chemical pesticides
more than men did and had these applied to their plots in the same
fields where their husbands were using IPM techniques
[iv]
It is
not only in Mali that women play a significant role in pest control.
Research at the Uganda IPM CRSP site shows that women have an important
role in pest management
[v]
and that they are increasingly taking a predominant
part in farming decision-making along with the increase in female-headed
households. In Albania, the men spend the summer as migrant laborers,
leaving the women behind to look after the farms. In Bangladesh, women
may be in purdah but this does not stop their vegetable production.
If
this is the case, then it is clear that women farmers need technical
support as much as men do. However, because they are not conceptualized
as professionals, they have much less access to information about
agriculture than men. There are few women extension workers, and most
tend to work on domestic rather than agricultural issues. Male extension
workers rarely provide information to women even in those cultural
settings where mixed-sex groups are not a problem. Field days cater
largely to male contingents. It is rare to have special provisions
for women to attend, such as separate days for those countries where
women and men do not mix.
Results Show Women Share Information
The IPM CRSP group is very aware of such issues. For this
reason, the program has made a special effort not only to include
women farmers wherever possible in all technological transfer, including
their farmer field schools (FFS), but also to use women scientists
and women extension agents as much as is possible. In Mali, for instance,
almost no women signed up for the first FFS, simply because they did
not feel welcomed in what they saw as a male environment. As a result,
while village men in general started to learn about IPM techniques,
the female population had very little awareness of them. IPM CRSP
then took steps to include women in the schools by consulting with
them to discover the best method of doing so. When they asked for
separate schools, special FFS were established for them. Once these
were under way, the female population of the village in general also
started to understand the downside of using pesticides and wanted
to adopt IPM techniques. In other words, when only males participated
in the FFS, information about the techniques trickled around to other
male non-participants, but not to women. When women were included
in the schools, female non-participants also learned about IPM. The
result was that most villagers cut down on pesticide usage, and environmental
and human health improved, as did the economic levels of those who
adopted IPM techniques instead of pesticides. Further positive effects
were that women were able to farm without having to ask their husbands
for help and that fewer trees were cut down as women found themselves
able to gain cash from their farming rather than having to rely on
selling firewood (Harris).
In Uganda,
a survey of the IPM villages showed that in addition to economic and
health benefits, those women and men farmers who have attended farmer
field schools are not only producing their crops using IPM technologies,
but in addition are more able to articulate their problems and collaborate
on finding their own solutions than either men or women who have not
attended the schools. As a result, in those places where the majority
of the FFS participants are women, the women show considerably more
initiative and awareness of important issues such as health and the
environment than do their menfolk.
The Guatemalan
IPM CRSP site has concentrated on non-traditional export crops. A
majority of the women involved in this farming said that the money
from selling them had allowed them to improve their family diet; they
further believed that they and their children were benefiting financially
from the IPM project
[vi]
. In Ecuador, community-based education with rural
youth persuaded them to adopt IPM techniques over pesticide use for
those who were farming. Those people who did not farm themselves,
including most of the young women, strongly encouraged their brothers
not to use pesticides. Women who attended the educational sessions
learned about the dangers of pesticides and of the importance of separating
clothes used for spraying from the rest of their clothes, as well
as the importance of protecting themselves while washing their "spraying
clothes"
[vii]
.
Reasoning Through Principles of IPM
In
Ecuador as well as the Philippines, the IPM CRSP has started to explore
innovative distance-learning models of technological transfer for
men and women farmers. These methods encourage participants to reason
through the principles of IPM for themselves. They are therefore more
likely to have a higher adoption rate than by using more traditional
methods
[viii]
. Another aim of this type of technology transfer
model is to involve farmers as active participants in the project,
not merely as passive recipients of scientific knowledge.
The above examples highlight the way the IPM CRSP has approached
gender issues and is working to include both men and women farmers
as active collaborators in its projects.
