Gender Crop Diversification And Nutrition In Irrigation Catchment Areas In The Central Dry Zones In Myanmar Implications For Agricultural Development Support

Author : Ragasa, Catherine,Mahrt, Kristi,Aung, Zin Wai,Lambrecht, Isabel,Scott, Jessica
Publisher : Intl Food Policy Res Inst
Page : 56 pages
File Size : 54,7 Mb
Release : 2020-07-08
Category : Political Science
ISBN : 8210379456XXX

Get Book

Gender, crop diversification, and nutrition in irrigation catchment areas in the central dry zones in Myanmar: Implications for agricultural development support by Ragasa, Catherine,Mahrt, Kristi,Aung, Zin Wai,Lambrecht, Isabel,Scott, Jessica Pdf

This report describes the baseline data collected from 1,835 men and women respondents in 998 households in two irrigation sites in the central dry zone in Myanmar to help diagnose, design, and test interventions to enhance the Myanmar Agricultural Development Support Project’s impacts on gender equality and nutrition. Baseline data show large gender gaps, in which fewer women than men achieved adequacy in all 11 indicators of empowerment. Eighty-nine percent of women versus 64 percent of men respondents were not empowered, and 66 percent of dual-adult households have gender gaps. The main contributors of disempowerment among women were high tolerance and acceptance of intimate partner violence, lack of work balance, and low membership in groups, especially influential groups. Although 95 percent of respondents owned smartphones, women were less likely than men to access Internet or social media through their phones. Thirty-nine percent of respondents received rice-related information and half received health-related information. Nine to 14 percent of respondents attended agriculture- or health-related training courses. Women were significantly less likely to receive agriculture and nutrition-related information and training than men. The dietary diversity score, a common indicator of diet quality and a good proxy for nutrition, is low in the sample. The individual dietary diversity score was 4.32, with no significant difference between women and men and no major differences between irrigation water users and other households. Dairy, nuts and seeds, eggs, vitamin-A-rich fruits and vegetables, and other fruits are not commonly or frequently consumed by a majority of respondents. Beans and dark leafy vegetables, which are relatively abundant in the study context, are consumed by only 38–48 percent of the respondents on a daily basis. Nutrition education highlighting dietary diversity can help the sample communities achieve better nutrition. Overall, most women and men in the sample communities employ good sanitation practices, but more people need to be sensitized on proper garbage disposal, drinking water treatment, and proper and more frequent handwashing.

Author : Catherine Ragasa,Kristi Mahrt,Zin Wai Aung,Isabel Lambrecht,Jessica Scott
Publisher : Unknown
Page : 0 pages
File Size : 54,6 Mb
Release : 2020
Category : Electronic
ISBN : OCLC:1355371396

Get Book

Gender, Crop Diversification, and Nutrition in Irrigation Catchment Areas in the Central Dry Zones in Myanmar by Catherine Ragasa,Kristi Mahrt,Zin Wai Aung,Isabel Lambrecht,Jessica Scott Pdf

Author : Myanmar Agriculture Policy Support Activity (MAPSA)
Publisher : Intl Food Policy Res Inst
Page : 29 pages
File Size : 42,9 Mb
Release : 2022-04-19
Category : Political Science
ISBN : 8210379456XXX

Get Book

Impact of a gender and nutrition behavioral change communication amid the COVID-19 crisis in Myanmar’s Central Dry Zone by Myanmar Agriculture Policy Support Activity (MAPSA) Pdf

Social behavior change communication (SBCC) interventions on gender and nutrition are now commonly implemented, but their impact on diet quality and empowerment is rarely assessed rigorously. We estimate the impact of a nutrition and gender SBCC intervention on women’s dietary diversity and empowerment in Myanmar during an especially challenging period—the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic. The intervention was implemented as a cluster-randomized controlled trial in 30 villages in Myanmar’s Central Dry Zone. Our analysis employs data from the baseline survey implemented in February 2020 and a phone survey implemented in February–March 2021 and focuses on women’s dietary diversity and sub-indicators of the project-level women’s empowerment in agriculture index (pro-WEAI). Two indicators of women’s empowerment―inputs to productive decisions and access to and decisions over credit―improved, indicating that SBCC interventions can contribute to changing gendered perceptions and behaviors; however, most of the empowerment indicators did not change, indicating that much of gendered norms and beliefs take time to change. Women’s dietary diversity scores were higher by half a food group out of 10 in treatment villages. More women in treatment villages consumed nuts, milk, meat or fish, and Vitamin A–rich foods daily than in control villages. We show that even in the setting of a pandemic, a SBCC intervention can be delivered through a range of tools, including household visits, phone-based coaching, and voice-based training, that are responsive to local and individual resource limitations. Gender messaging can change some gendered perceptions; but it may take more time to change deeply ingrained gender norms. Nutrition messaging can help counter the declines in dietary quality that would be expected from negative shocks to supply chains and incomes.

Author : Myanmar SSP Working Paper
Publisher : Intl Food Policy Res Inst
Page : 39 pages
File Size : 53,6 Mb
Release : 2021-12-02
Category : Political Science
ISBN : 8210379456XXX

Get Book

Myanmar's microfinance sector, agriculture, and COVID-19: Emerging insights and new challenges by Myanmar SSP Working Paper Pdf

This Working Paper takes comprehensive stock of the impacts of the first two waves of COVID-19 (in Q2 and Q4 2020) on the microfinance sector in Myanmar. We discuss potential impact pathways, review policy responses to the crisis, and present new quantitative analysis based on a set of surveys with respondents throughout the agricultural value chain. Additionally, we briefly review impacts since the military takeover on February 1, 2021. Overall, various disruptions to the microfinance sector, particularly during peak periods of COVID-19, significantly reduced overall lending from April 2020, onward. These disruptions, along with disruptions to external financing, led to greater informal borrowing, likely greater indebtedness, and lower food security. However, policy responses and financing accommodations to microfinance institutions (MFIs) in Q2 and Q3 2020 cushioned the sector against widespread insolvency. The events since the military takeover are creating new challenges, exacerbating the aforementioned impacts, and raising new risks of MFI insolvency and broader crises around food security, indebtedness, and poverty. Considering these findings, stakeholder recommendations underscore the importance of easing the movement of international and domestic goods. Efforts should be focused on meeting the MFIs’ need for loanable funds through mechanisms such as exchange rate hedging, credit guarantees, and loan enhancement, while continuing to encourage flexibility around existing financing. When the time comes for a full recovery, there should be a focus on facilitating additional financial injections so that MFIs can more effectively restart lending operations.

Author : Lambrecht, Isabel,Sproule, Katie,Synt, Nang Lun Kham,Ei Win, Hnin,Win, Khin Zin
Publisher : Intl Food Policy Res Inst
Page : 26 pages
File Size : 48,7 Mb
Release : 2020-07-02
Category : Political Science
ISBN : 8210379456XXX

Get Book

Project-level Women’s Empowerment in Agriculture: results from cognitive testing in Myanmar by Lambrecht, Isabel,Sproule, Katie,Synt, Nang Lun Kham,Ei Win, Hnin,Win, Khin Zin Pdf

When designing and evaluating policies and projects for women’s empowerment, appropriate indicators are needed. This paper reports on the lessons learned from two rounds of pretesting and cognitive testing of the project-level Women’s Empowerment in Agriculture Index (pro-WEAI) in a total of five States/Regions in Myanmar. We assess if respondents understand the modules as intended and which questions require modification based on the cultural context. We find that the questions also present in the abbreviated WEAI are generally well understood, particularly on instrumental and group agency. The challenge to respond to hypothetical and abstract questions did become apparent in the domains representing intrinsic agency, and was problematic for questions on autonomy and self-efficacy. Also, the internationally validated questions on attitudes towards domestic violence were too abstract, and responses depend on the scenario envisioned. We also suggest including an adapted version of the module on speaking up in public, to reinforce the domain on collective agency. Our findings provide an encouraging message to those aspiring to use pro-WEAI, but emphasize the need for continued attention for context-specific adjustments and critical testing of even those instruments that are widely used and deemed validated.

Author : Lambrecht, Isabel,Mahrt, Kristi,Cho, Ame
Publisher : Intl Food Policy Res Inst
Page : 38 pages
File Size : 41,9 Mb
Release : 2021-12-10
Category : Political Science
ISBN : 8210379456XXX

Get Book

Women and youth in Myanmar agriculture by Lambrecht, Isabel,Mahrt, Kristi,Cho, Ame Pdf

Women’s and youth’s roles in agriculture vary across contexts and over time. Limited quantitative information is available on this topic from Southeast Asia in general, and particularly from Myanmar. We use nationally representative data to document women’s and youth’s involvement in agriculture in rural Myanmar. First, we show that women and youth contribute substantially to agriculture. Women in farm households perform 39 percent of household farm labour days, and 43 percent of agricultural wage workers are women. Twenty-seven percent of adults performing household agricultural work are youth and 22 percent of agricultural wage workers are youth. Yet, women’s farm wages are 29 percent lower than men’s farm wages. Youth’s farm wages are 17 percent lower than farm wages of non-youth for men, but we don’t find similar wage differences for women. Second, we find a significant gender gap in land rights, but the share of women who have land rights is still sizable. Nineteen percent of adult men are documented landowners compared to seven percent of adult women. Few youth have land rights, but the likelihood increases with age. Third, we explore cropping patterns. No crops are grown exclusively by men or women, but rice is more often and vegetables are less often cultivated by households where men are the sole agricultural decision makers. Finally, we focus on access to credit. Women receive loans less often than men (21 percent vs. 26 percent) and youth rarely receive loans (4 percent). Women’s loans are more often aimed at alleviating basic needs, such as food and health expenditures. Men’s loans are more often aimed at investment in productive activities, especially farming. The evidence suggests that including men, women and youth equally in agricultural projects and policy making is critical to advance equity and achieve development goals.

Author : Lambrecht, Isabel,Mahrt, Kristi,Ragasa, Catherine,Wang, Michael,Ei Win, Hnin,Win, Khin Zin
Publisher : Intl Food Policy Res Inst
Page : 10 pages
File Size : 41,8 Mb
Release : 2020-05-27
Category : Political Science
ISBN : 8210379456XXX

Get Book

A gender-transformative response to COVID-19 in Myanmar by Lambrecht, Isabel,Mahrt, Kristi,Ragasa, Catherine,Wang, Michael,Ei Win, Hnin,Win, Khin Zin Pdf

On 27 April, the Myanmar Government published the COVID-19 Economic Relief Plan (CERP) which aims to mitigate COVID-19’s impact on the macroeconomic environment and the private sector and to ease the impact on laborers, workers, and households. The CERP action plan should pay explicit attention to gender discrepancies to avoid unintentional harm or aggravating existing gender inequalities.

Author : Laia Domenech, and Claudia Ringler
Publisher : Intl Food Policy Res Inst
Page : 128 pages
File Size : 42,5 Mb
Release : 2024-06-27
Category : Social Science
ISBN : 8210379456XXX

Get Book

The impact of irrigation on nutrition, health, and gender: A review paper with insights for Africa south of the Sahara by Laia Domenech, and Claudia Ringler Pdf

Author : Laia Domenech
Publisher : Intl Food Policy Res Inst
Page : 28 pages
File Size : 51,5 Mb
Release : 2013-04-11
Category : Social Science
ISBN : 8210379456XXX

Get Book

The Impact of Irrigation on Nutrition, Health, and Gender by Laia Domenech Pdf

Agriculture in Africa south of the Sahara (SSA) is still largely rainfed. SSA also exhibits the lowest crop yields for major staples in the world, largely due to low use of irrigation and fertilizer. Rainfed agriculture poses growing production risks with increased climate variability and change. At the same time, smallholder irrigation in the region developed rapidly over the past decade, albeit starting from very low levels. In addition to largely demand-driven irrigation development by smallholders, there is a significant push by donors for large-scale irrigation development, as well as some push for smallholder irrigation. There has also been a long-standing debate about whether irrigation in SSA should be large scale or small scale to achieve its potential. However, given the potentially high rewards, but also high possibility of failure, the assessment of irrigation potential must go beyond large scale versus small scale to integrate concerns regarding environmental sustainability, resource use efficiency, nutrition and health impacts, and women’s empowerment. The hypothesis underlying this review paper is that how irrigation gets deployed in SSA will be decisive not only for environmental sustainability (such as deciding remaining forest cover in the region) and poverty reduction, but also for health, nutrition, and gender outcomes in the region. The focus of this paper is on the health, nutrition, and gender linkage. We find that to date, few studies have analyzed the impact of irrigation interventions on nutrition, health, and women’s empowerment, despite the large potential of irrigation to affect these important variables. Irrigation interventions may have differential effects on different members in the household and in the community, such as irrigators, non-irrigators, children, and women. Measuring and understanding such differences, followed by improving design and implementation to maximize gender, health, and nutrition outcomes, could transform irrigation programs from focusing solely on increased food production toward becoming an integral component of poverty-reduction strategies.

Author : Cheryl Doss
Publisher : Intl Food Policy Res Inst
Page : 22 pages
File Size : 50,6 Mb
Release : 2013-04-05
Category : Social Science
ISBN : 8210379456XXX

Get Book

Data Needs for Gender Analysis in Agriculture by Cheryl Doss Pdf

To support gender analysis in agriculture, household surveys should be better designed to capture gender-specific control and ownership of agricultural resources such as male-owned, female-owned, and jointly owned assets. This paper offers guidelines on how to improve data collection efforts to ensure that women farmers are interviewed and that their voices are heard. Researchers need to clarify who should be interviewed, how to structure the interview, and how to identify which people are involved in various activities, as owners, managers, workers, and decisionmakers. It is important not simply to assume that one particular person does these activities based on social norms, but instead to ask the questions to allow for a range of answers that can demonstrate how the gender patterns in agriculture are changing. To assist in these efforts, the paper provides an overview of relevant questions to include, emphasizing that whenever questions are asked about ownership and access to resources, answers should be associated with individuals. Finally, collecting data on the institutions that are related to agricultural production and marketing allows analysis of the gender-based constraints and opportunities that they present.

Author : Kosec, Katrina,Doss, Cheryl,Slavchevska, Vanya
Publisher : Intl Food Policy Res Inst
Page : 6 pages
File Size : 49,8 Mb
Release : 2020-10-13
Category : Political Science
ISBN : 8210379456XXX

Get Book

Gender and rural transformation by Kosec, Katrina,Doss, Cheryl,Slavchevska, Vanya Pdf

Rural transformation is central to the broader structural transformation process taking place in developing countries — fueled by the globalization of value chains, changing food systems, new technologies, conflict and displacement, and climate change, among other factors. Rural transformation refers to the process whereby rural economies diversify into nonfarm activities, agriculture becomes more capital-intensive and commercially oriented, and linkages with neighboring towns and cities grow and deepen (Berdegué, Rosada, and Bebbington 2014). It can bring about fundamental changes in the way businesses and households organize, such as the commercialization and diversification of agricultural production; increased agricultural productivity; migration; and the emergence of a broader set of rural livelihood activities.

Author : Johnson, Nancy L.,Balagamwala, Mysbah,Pinkstaff, Crossley,Theis, Sophie,Meinzen-Dick, Ruth Suseela,Quisumbing, Agnes R.
Publisher : Intl Food Policy Res Inst
Page : 36 pages
File Size : 42,6 Mb
Release : 2017-02-23
Category : Political Science
ISBN : 8210379456XXX

Get Book

How do agricultural development projects aim to empower women? Insights from an analysis of project strategies by Johnson, Nancy L.,Balagamwala, Mysbah,Pinkstaff, Crossley,Theis, Sophie,Meinzen-Dick, Ruth Suseela,Quisumbing, Agnes R. Pdf

Increasing numbers of development agencies and individual projects espouse objectives of women’s empowerment, yet there has been little systematic work on mechanisms by which interventions can enhance women’s empowerment. This gap exists because of the lack of consensus on indicators as well as the lack of attention paid to measuring the effects of different types of interventions on empowerment. This paper identifies the types of strategies employed by 13 agricultural development projects within the International Food Policy Research Institute’s Gender, Agriculture, and Assets Project Phase 2 (GAAP2) that have explicit objectives of empowering women. We distinguish between reach, benefit, and empowerment as objectives of agricultural development projects. Simply including women does not necessarily benefit them, and even activities that benefit do not necessarily empower. To identify strategies to empower women, we build on the domains included in the Women’s Empowerment in Agriculture Index (WEAI) and are working with the GAAP2 portfolio of projects to develop an empowerment metric that is applicable in the project setting (a project-level WEAI, or pro-WEAI). We have identified the following potential domains to be included in pro-WEAI: input into production decision making, control over resources, control over income, leadership, time, physical mobility, intrahousehold relationships, individual empowerment, reduction in gender-based violence, and decision making on nutrition. The GAAP2 projects address these domains through a wide variety of activities that can be grouped into four main types: (1) direct and indirect provision of goods and services; (2) forming or strengthening groups, organizations, or platforms and networks that involve women; (3) strengthening knowledge and capacity through agricultural extension, business and finance training, nutrition behavior change communication, and other training; and (4) changing gender norms through one-way awareness raising or two-way community conversations about gender issues and their implications. In general, projects with activities in more activity areas target more domains of empowerment, and most projects target a core set of six empowerment domains. With the exception of intrahousehold relationships, which is always targeted by activities designed to influence gender norms, projects target domains with different types of activities or combinations of activities. This setup suggests that there may be no one-to-one link between a specific activity and empowerment benefits, and that implementation modalities will determine whether and how an activity contributes to women’s empowerment. The effectiveness of these project strategies will be assessed using both quantitative and qualitative methods throughout the GAAP2 research project.

Author : Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations
Publisher : Food & Agriculture Org.
Page : 72 pages
File Size : 46,7 Mb
Release : 2023-05-08
Category : Technology & Engineering
ISBN : 9789251372272

Get Book

Gender, water and agriculture by Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations Pdf

The economic contribution of women to agricultural and irrigation activities and to the livelihoods, well-being and food security of families and communities is often unrecognized, invisible and mostly undervalued. Moreover, the role of women in fetching, preserving and managing productive and non-productive water often goes unrecognized and understudied. This assessment aims to shed light on the different contributions and benefits of women and men in relation to agricultural roles, responsibilities and resources, focusing mainly on productive agricultural resources, including water, to inform more efficient, equitable and gender-responsive programmes in the future in the context of the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (SIDA) project.

Author : C. R. Panabokke
Publisher : IWMI
Page : 62 pages
File Size : 41,9 Mb
Release : 1989
Category : Crop diversification
ISBN : 9789290901150

Get Book

Irrigation Management for Crop Diversification in Sri Lanka by C. R. Panabokke Pdf

Author : Senen M. Miranda
Publisher : IWMI
Page : 111 pages
File Size : 54,9 Mb
Release : 1989
Category : Crop diversification
ISBN : 8210379456XXX

Get Book

Irrigation Management for Crop Diversification in Indonesia, the Philippines, and Sri Lanka by Senen M. Miranda Pdf