Accra, Jan. 30, - Gender
inequality in Africa is pervasive and its semblance in Ghana is manifested in
the way some women farmers in Northern Ghana have difficulties accessing
production assets and extension services due to socio-cultural barriers.
The cultural discrimination
against women in terms of access to land culminates in the small plots of land
apportioned to women, because ownership is vested in men, who act as the
trustees of the land and by virtue of that have the greater share of the land.
In most parts of the Northern
regions, particularly in the three sampled districts (East Mamprusi (Northern),
Garu-Tempane (Upper East), and Wa East (Upper West) where a survey on gender responsiveness to
agricultural extension delivery, conducted by the Council for Scientific and
Industrial Research-Science and Technology Policy Research Institute
(CSIR-STEPRI) with support from the USAID-APSP, men inherit land but women can
only hold land in trust for their male sons who are still young and unable to make
decisions on their own.
The control of the use of the
land is transferred to the male children as and when they become matured.
In terms of access to labour, the
surveys revealed that, men have more access to labour than women because it is
encumbered on women to help on their husband’s farm.
The socio cultural inhibitions
results in women cultivating smaller acreages of farm which is economically
disincentive for women to use tractors.
The study also revealed that
there were certain crops that were known to be cultivated by predominantly
males. For instance male farmers cultivate maize crop and adopt related
technologies while females cultivate soyabean and adopt soyabean related
technologies.
Some of the reasons for the
‘gendered crops’ is that the male headed households are responsible for the
food security needs of the entire family which is provided by the cultivation
of maize as the main food staple in the covered areas
Also men are more economically
endowed than the females and are able to afford the relatively high cost of technologies and
inputs required in maize cultivation.
The reason for the high number of
women involved in the cultivation of soya beans is that its cultivation requires
less expensive technologies and inputs.
It was observed that women were
already burdened with huge household chores and had limited time for
technologies that require additional time, and will resort to less laborious
crops or varieties.
In terms of extension service to
farmers, the same skewness is prominent and attributable to socio-cultural
factors. Women in some parts of the study areas cannot directly seek the
services of agricultural extension agents without the permission of their
husbands or at least, the tacit approval of the husband.
This, it was observed did not
inure to the benefit of the woman farmer and the effort to improving the
general food and nutrition security of the nation.
It was also evident in the study
that there were few women agricultural extension agents in all the three
surveyed districts, which does not promote easy access of women to agricultural
extension agents.
In communities where the norms
frown on direct women – men interaction, one would have thought that the
involvement of women in the delivery of extension services would have better
presented by women to women.
The above limitations against
female farmers can be overcome if extension package delivery is gender
responsive as evidenced in the Agricultural Development and Value Chain
Enhancement (ADVANCE) program.
The ADVANCE Program sponsored by
USAID aims at facilitating a transformation of Ghana’s agricultural sector in
selected agricultural staples including maize, rice and soybean.
The overall goal is to achieve a
greater degree of food security among the rural population in Northern Ghana
while increasing competitiveness in the domestic markets.
The program built the capacity of
smallholder farmers to increase the efficiency of their farm business with
improved production technologies such as improved seed varieties and
post-harvest handling practices.
Using the ADVANCE Program as a
case study, we conducted a piece of research to understand how gender
differences affect decision making processes at the household level in terms of
access to production assets, adoption and use of improved technologies for
improved agricultural productivity.
The study findings indicate that
generally, extension delivery services are biased against women. This is evidenced
by men being giving consideration first in extension and rural advisory
services because of their resource endowment.
Men had more access to land and
had relatively bigger farms sizes than women. Men could access extension
officers outside community in situations where there were no extension officers
in the communities because the men were more mobile than women.
Some females accessed extension
through men house heads because of socio cultural inhibitions on women engaging
frequently with men who were not their spouses or family people.
The ADVANCE Program made serious
efforts at implementing approaches and innovations aimed at significantly
boosting productivity and reducing cost of technologies/inputs which helped to
break down the cultural and economic barriers hindering especially females in
cultivating ‘male’ crops.
The study examined the effect of
ADVANCE extension services and input support on crop income of maize and
soybean in three districts in the Northern regions of Ghana including Garu –
Tempane, Wa East and East Mamprusi.
The study found that agricultural
programmes that deliberately targeted gender in extension activities benefited
females better. The new socio cultural and financial dynamics resulting from
the gendered extension delivery by the ADVANCE value chain program led to
significant improvement in women empowerment.
Financially empowered women were
able to overcome some of the cultural barriers to access production resources
such as land, seed and extension services. The average percentage increase in
access to land was estimated at 6.4% for those women beneficiaries.
The women who benefited from
ADVANCE program had increased their farm yields by 22.9% per acre for maize and
13.8 % per acre for soybean resulting into improved incomes.
One of the ways extension
services were given to some women was through the use of existing groups mainly
formed to execute different tasks like the Village Savings and Loan Schemes. It
would be good to strengthen such groups in order to enhance better
communication between extension agents and potential women beneficiaries.
The study recommended that
Ministry of Food and Agriculture (MoFA) and its Development partners break
gendered allocation of crop types through women empowerment programmes.
This can be achieved through the
use of advocacy groups at the local level and most importantly to tackle strict
traditional gender roles and socio-cultural barriers limiting women access to
production resources.
MoFA extension delivery system
could use male champions to increase women access to extension and rural
advisory services.
By: Dr Wilhemina Quaye, Masahudu
Fusieni and Dr Paul Boadu
CSIR-Science and Technology
Policy Research Institute
GNA
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