Transcript Presentation: Food Security

Food security: the impact
of food prices on women
Marc Wegerif
Oxfam International
Karigirwa
• Widowed
• Insecure land
• Weather changes
• Failing crops
Despite this
• Produces
• Supports her
children and
orphans
• works with other
widows some of
whom are HIV+
• Planting trees
The perfect storm
• Women caught between:
– Increasing food prices
– Climate Change driven
environmental stresses
– Impact of HIV and Aids
(more care giving by women,
more new infections among
women)
– Existing and continuing
marginalization
The food price problem
Foodfood
insecurity
is not
new for
• Prices of basic
stuffs rose
in some
cases by over
100% frommillions
early 2007
to midthe
2008
around
world, it is
structural
(as is
• Poor families spend
up to 80%
of the
incomes on food so
feel the pressure
more of women) and
oppression
mustcosts
be dealt
such
• Increased import
hurt with
manyaseconomies
• At least 119million more people going hungry
• Small farmers not benefiting from higher prices as many
(70% in Tanzania) are net consumers and the terms of
trade have worsened for the farmers
• Despite recent fuel price decreases food prices,
especially in many rural areas, have remained high
•
•
•
Are we looking in the
Gendered power
right places?
operates at all levels
from household to
community to national
Our analysis of the food
crisis must be at all levels
and not stop at the
household door
To go beyond
generalizations we must
understand the impact on
women in poverty:
– In the home
– The farm; and
– The market.
Women in the home
•
•
•
•
•
•
Women and girls first to
eat less and eat worse
Girls first to be pulled
out of schools
52% of married
Increase in forced
women of
in girls
India
marriages
suffer from
Women first to miss
properanaemia
health care
More of women’s time
to make rather than buy
Increased psychological
stress (e.g. child care)
Food Crisis Impact
• Main providers of food
• Access/control of fewer
resources and less food
• Less decision making
power
• Responsible for most
domestic work
• Pressure on time
fetching, making, cooking
and working.
Women on the farm
• Majority of workforce in
agriculture
• Insecure tenure
• Less and worse quality
land than men
• Limited access to credit
and extension services
• Less access to storage
and transport
infrastructure
• More vulnerable to
corruption
•
•
•
•
•
More time needed to
produce sufficient crops
Marginal
land
gives less
In Africa
women
options
receive only 7%
of extension
Vulnerable
to increased
services
and
exploitation
as workers
10% of credit
to
small-scale
Worsening
terms of
farmers
despite
trade
for
women
being the as
small
producers
majority
of small
Womenfarmers
not benefiting
from interventions
Women in the market
• Earn lower wages
• Often in informal
economy or temporary
informal jobs
• Don’t get benefits of
those formally employed
• Less power to negotiate
in markets when buying
and selling
• More vulnerable to
corruption
•
Larger
of
In theproportion
Philippines,
women’s smaller
“women make up the
incomes
to food
majoritygoing
of those
in the
• Unable
to benefit
informal
sector, from
some
increased
prices
27 million.
They have
• Vulnerable
increased
no social to
security,
no
exploitation
protection as
… workers,
workers
traders
consumers
in thisand
sector
are
eating
less
While
women
lostand
out less”
(Women
Thrive
Big business
profited
2007-08
- Nestle’s
sales grew
9%
Worldwide,
2008)
- Tesco’s profits up by 10%
- Monsanto 26% increase in revenue
- Some grain traders and speculators
making massive profits
Drivers of food prices increases
• Bio-fuel industry, especially maize for ethanol as in
the USA (contributing 30-70% of increases)
• Climate changes putting pressure on production in
some areas
• Growing middle classes increasing demand for food
(meat) and fuels
• Unfair trade regimes, in particular ‘northern’
subsidies, undermined investment in agriculture in
Africa and other developing countries.
Climate Change in the mix
• Marginal land that women often have access to
becoming more unviable
• Increasing conflicts that often have a gendered impact
• Displacement that always has a disproportionate impact
on women and children
• Water and other natural resources that women collect
are becoming more scarce; taking a longer time,
distance, and risk to find
• Women not in decision making on CC responses
• Higher vulnerability and mortality of women in disasters
(The 1991 floods in Bangladesh killed 140,000 people of
which 90% were women)
Women the obvious solution
“If our goal is to improve economic
development, we must invest in women as
economic and social agents in the
agricultural economy” Amrtya Sen
• We all know that investing in women is good for
development, good for children, good for communities
• But we still sadly and amazingly have programmes that
are gender blind or at least partially sighted
• Example fertilizer subsidies
Resolve the Food Crisis By
Focusing on Women
• Our analysis of the food crisis in every country and
region must be gender differentiated, focus on the
impact on women, and not stop outside the household
• Interventions must be explicitly focused on women
ensuring that women benefit and that the worst impacts
on women are addressed
• Involve, listen and respond to women in poverty during
the analysis and design, delivery and monitoring of
interventions
• Be responsive to the specificities of each context as
gender relations manifest and impact in different ways
Specific recommendations
• Cash/food vouchers for women
• Support to women small farmers, food vendors,
informal workers, pregnant or nursing mothers
• Early childhood nutrition and school feeding with
specific measures to ensure girls benefit
• Provide incentives for keeping girls in school
• Improve HIV and Aids care and support
• Increase women’s land tenure security
• Improve women’s access to and control of credit,
agricultural inputs, storage facilities, and technologies
• Listen to women in poverty and strengthen women’s
organisations and women’s leadership in organisations
Feminization of responses
• The causes of and responses to this food crisis – and
climate change - have been beyond the control of
women
• Success will require not just the delivery of better
services for women, it is about women being able to
assert their rights and gain greater control of their lives
• Especially for women to have more control over
fundamentals like securing food and the environment for
survival today and in the future