GENNOVATE

Permanent URI for this collectionhttps://hdl.handle.net/10568/105926

See website: https://gennovate.org.

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Now showing 1 - 20 of 62
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    Not raised ‘to make big decisions’: Young people’s agency and livelihoods in rural Pakistan
    (Journal Article, 2022-05-04) Petesch, Patti; Badstue, Lone B.; Rahut, Dil Bahadur; Ali, Akhter
    We examine young people's testimonies about their capacity to make important decisions and their livelihood experiences from agricultural communities that span Pakistan's countryside. Our analysis is guided by theories of agency that focus on how a young person's capacity to identify and act on goals is mediated by their local opportunity structure – shaping their household relations, livelihood choices, and prevailing social norms. We apply comparative and contextual qualitative analysis methods to our dataset of 12 village cases, which include 24 sex-specific youth focus groups. We also present a secondary survey analysis. We find high rural employment levels among young men in recent years, and a decline in rural young women's employment from already low levels. The young study participants mainly observe limited capacity to make important decisions. They repeatedly attribute this to expectations of strict deference to elders and other norms about their gender, young age, junior household position, marital status, and socio-economic standing. They also report negotiating and resisting confining norms; however, young women's agency appears especially constrained by norms that discourage their physical mobility and visible economic roles. We examine two villages where some youth express healthier levels of agency and more desirable economic opportunities than others, and the significance of kinship relations and fluid norms in this environment. We call for models of young people's agency that register more effectively the importance of household relations, the gatekeeper role of elders, and the contextual and fluid properties of norms, as these dynamics both constrain and enable young people's agency.
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    Caste-gender intersectionalities in wheat-growing communities in Madhya Pradesh, India
    (Journal Article, 2022-01-02) Farnworth, Cathy Rozel; Bharati, Preeti; Krishna, Vijesh V.; Roeven, Lara; Badstue, Lone B.
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    Engaging men in gender-equitable practices in maize systems of sub-Saharan Africa
    (Brief, 2020) Farnworth, Cathy Rozel; Badstue, Lone B.; Cole, Steven M.
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    Towards gender-inclusive innovation: Assessing local conditions for agricultural targeting
    (Journal Article, 2022-03) López, Diana E.; Frelat, Romain; Badstue, Lone B.
    The importance of gender norms in agricultural innovation processes has been recognized. However, the operational integration of these normative issues into the innovation strategies of agricultural interventions remains challenging. This article advances a replicable, integrative research approach that captures key local conditions to inform the design and targeting of gender-inclusive interventions. We focus on the gender climate across multiple contexts to add to the limited indicators available for assessing gender norms at scale. The notion of gender climate refers to the socially constituted rules that prescribe men’s and women’s behaviour in a specific geographic location—with some being more restrictive and others more relaxed. We examine the gender climate of 70 villages across 13 countries where agriculture is an important livelihood. Based on data from the GENNOVATE initiative we use multivariate methods to identify three principal components: ‘Gender Climate’, ‘Opportunity’ and ‘Connectivity’. Pairwise correlation and variance partitioning analyses investigate the linkages between components. Our findings evidence that favourable economic or infrastructure conditions do not necessarily correlate with favourable gender normative conditions. Drawing from two case-study villages from Nepal, we highlight opportunities for agricultural research for development interventions. Overall, our approach allows to integrate local knowledge about gender norms and other local conditions into the planning and targeting strategies for agricultural innovation.
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    Women Farmers and Agricultural Innovation: Marital Status and Normative Expectations in Rural Ethiopia
    (Journal Article, 2020-11) Badstue, Lone B.; Petesch, Patti; Farnworth, Cathy Rozel; Roeven, Lara; Hailemariam, Mahlet
    Sustainable agricultural development depends on female and male smallholders being effective farmers. This includes the ability to access or control resources and make the best decisions possible agro-ecologically, economically, and socially. Traditionally, gendered studies on innovation practice focus on female- versus male-headed households. In this paper, we focus on married women in acknowledged male-headed households and women heading their own households to examine how marital status influences women’s capacity to innovate in their rural livelihoods. Using data from eight community case studies in Ethiopia, we used variable-oriented and contextualized case-oriented analysis to understand factors which promote or constrain women’s innovative capacities. We use Kabeer’s Resources–Agency–Achievements framework to structure our findings. Single women are more likely to own land and experience control over their production decisions and expenditures than married women, but engage in considerable struggle to obtain resources that should be theirs according to the law. Even when land is secured, customary norms often hamper women’s effective use of land and their ability to innovate. Still, some single women do succeed. Married women can innovate successfully provided they are in a collaborative relationship with their husbands. Finally, we find that gender-based violence limits women’s achievements. The article concludes with recommendations.
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    Gender Norms and Poverty Dynamics in 32 Villages of South Asia
    (Journal Article, 2020-09) Petesch, Patti; Badstue, Lone B.
    The poverty dynamics of a community, and the social arrangements and opportunities that shape these dynamics, constitute important dimensions of well-being. This paper explores local understandings of and experiences with moving out of poverty and with remaining poor by employing the concept of gender norms, or the various social rules that differentiate women’s and men’s roles and conducts in society. The data demonstrate regularities in the influence of restrictive gender norms on understandings of poverty transitions, as well as how these norms are negotiated and bend to accommodate more gender-equitable practices on the ground. Our approach draws on feminist conceptions of gender norms that highlight their fluid and contextual properties, comparative case study methods, and a dataset of 32 village cases from five countries of South Asia. Villagers mainly associate movements out of poverty and chronic poverty with men and their capabilities to expand their earnings and assets despite limited work opportunities. Yet, our evidence from women’s life stories reveals examples from diverse contexts of women who exercise major roles in agriculture and actively work to improve the well-being of their families. However, these experiences rarely alter normative beliefs and practices that entitle men to control women and family resources.
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    Continuity and Change: Performing Gender in Rural Tanzania
    (Journal Article, 2021-02-01) Badstue, Lone B.; Farnworth, Cathy Rozel; Umantseva, Anya; Kamanzi, Adelbertus; Roeven, Lara
    Tanzanian legislation for women’s rights is a product of decades of indigenous women’s struggles and considered amongst the most progressive in Africa. However, implementation has been problematic and some elements in the current discourse appear to push back against gender equality with an essentialist framing of women and men as naturally different. This paper draws on the perspectives of 144 women and 144 men, in four rural communities in different regions of Tanzania, to build an understanding of how they perceive gender equality, and how their perceptions relate to decision-making, women earning incomes, women as homemakers, and control over assets. Understanding gender as a performance we contextualise our analysis through a historical overview of women’s struggles to secure rights from colonial times to the present day. We find that while local discourse appears to embrace the idea of gender equality, practice remains quite different with the threat of sanctions restricting the scope for re-negotiation of gender. The paper demonstrates how the continuous performance, reproduction and renegotiation of gender takes place as part of everyday life, as women and men seek to secure their personal well-being in a context of limited cultural and economic options.
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    From Working in the Fields to Taking Control: Towards a Typology of Women's Decision-Making in Wheat in India
    (Journal Article, 2021-06) Farnworth, Cathy Rozel; Jafry, Tahseen; Bharati, Preeti; Badstue, Lone B.; Yadav, Ashok
    Women in India perform a range of roles in wheat-based agricultural systems. However, data remain sparse. Cultural norms which construct men as farmers serve to conceal women’s contributions from researchers and rural advisory services. We use data from communities in four Indian states, selected to exemplify high and low gender gaps, to provide insights into how women are challenging norms which privilege male decision-making in order to participate in innovation processes. We hypothesized the transitioning of women from labourers in wheat to innovators and managers of wheat is likely to be far from straightforward. We further hypothesized that women are actively managing the processes unleashed by various sources of change. We use the concept of doxa—ideas and actions in a society that are taken for granted and are beyond questioning—as an analytic lens to help us understand the ways in which women deploy their agency to secure their goals. Our analysis allows us to develop a ‘A typology of women’s strategies to strengthen their managerial decision-making power in wheat’.
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    GENNOVATE: Enabling gender equality in agricultural and environmental innovation
    (Presentation, 2017-12) Elias, Marlène; Badstue, Lone B.
    Presented by Marlene Elias (Bioversity International) and Lone Badstue (CIMMYT), as part of the Capacity Development Workshop hosted by the CGIAR Collaborative Platform for Gender Research, Amsterdam, 7-8 December 2017
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    Using vignettes to explore gender dimensions of household food security and nutrition
    (Presentation, 2018-09) Elias, Marlène
    Presented by Marlene Elias (GENNOVATE / Bioversity International), as part of the Annual Gender Capacity Development Workshop hosted by the CGIAR Collaborative Platform for Gender Research, Addis Ababa, 27-28 September 2018.
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    GENNOVATE: Enabling gender equality in agricultural and environmental innovation - Study concepts and methodology
    (Presentation, 2018-07-12) Elias, Marlène; Rietveld, Anne M.
    This presentation was given during a webinar hosted by CGIAR Collaborative Platform for Gender Research on July 12, 2018. Marlene Elias and Anne Rietveld of Bioversity International gave the presentation.
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    Strengthening women in wheat in India: Technical Guidance Note
    (Presentation, 2018-09) Farnworth, Cathy Rozel
    Presented by Cathy Farnworth Rozel (GENNOVATE / CIMMYT), as part of the Annual Gender Capacity Development Workshop hosted by the CGIAR Collaborative Platform for Gender Research, Addis Ababa, 27-28 September 2018.
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    Local normative climate shaping agency and agricultural livelihoods in Sub-Saharan Africa
    (Presentation, 2018-09) Petesch, Patti
    Presented by Patti Petesch (CIMMYT/GENNOVATE), as part of the Annual Gender Scientific Conference hosted by the CGIAR Collaborative Platform for Gender Research, Addis Ababa, 25-27 September 2018.
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    Ladder of power and freedom
    (Presentation, 2018-09) Petesch, Patti
    Presented by Patti Petesch (GENNOVATE), as part of the Annual Gender Capacity Development Workshop hosted by the CGIAR Collaborative Platform for Gender Research, Addis Ababa, 27-28 September 2018.
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    Fortifying the foundations for gender in AR4D
    (Presentation, 2018-09) Badstue, Lone B.
    Presented by Lone Badstue (CIMMYT/GENNOVATE), as part of the Annual Gender Scientific Conference hosted by the CGIAR Collaborative Platform for Gender Research, Addis Ababa, 25-27 September 2018.
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    Gendered aspirations and occupation among rural youth in agriculture and beyond: a cross-regional perspective
    (Presentation, 2018-09) Elias, Marlène
    Presented by Marlene Elias (Bioversity International / GENNOVATE), as part of the Annual Gender Scientific Conference hosted by the CGIAR Collaborative Platform for Gender Research, Addis Ababa, 25-27 September 2018.
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    Livestock innovations, social norms, and women’s empowerment in the Global South
    (Journal Article, 2022-03-22) Galiè, Alessandra; Najjar, Dina; Petesch, Patti; Badstue, Lone B.; Farnworth, Cathy Rozel
    Livestock have strong empowerment potential, particularly for women. They offer millions of women in the Global South the opportunity to provide protein-rich foods for home consumption and sale. Livestock provide women with income and opportunities to expand their livelihood portfolios and can strengthen women’s decision-making power. Fully realizing livestock’s empowerment potential for women is necessary for sustainable livestock development. It requires, though, that gender-equitable dynamics and norms are supported in rural communities. We draw on 73 village cases from 13 countries to explore women’s experiences with livestock-based livelihoods and technological innovations. Our analysis follows a gender empowerment framework comprised of four interdependent domains—recognition of women as livestock keepers, access to resources, access to opportunities, and decision making as a cross-cutting domain—which must come together if women are to become empowered through livestock. We find improved livestock breeds and associated innovations, such as fodder choppers or training, to provide significant benefits to women who can access these. This, nonetheless, has accentuated women’s double burdens. Another challenge is that even as women may be recognized in their community as livestock keepers, this recognition is much less common among external institutions. We present a case where this institutional recognition is forthcoming and illuminate the synergetic and empowering pathways unleashed by this as well as the barriers that remain.
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    TH5.4: Women Farmers and Agricultural Innovation: Marital Status and Normative Expectations in Rural Ethiopia
    (Video, 2021-10) Badstue, Lone B.; Petesch, Patti; Farnworth, Cathy Rozel; Roeven, Lara; Hailemariam, Mahlet
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    Making room for manoeuvre: addressing gender norms to strengthen the enabling environment for agricultural innovation
    (Journal Article, 2020-05-18) Badstue, Lone B.; Elias, Marlène; Kommerell, Víctor; Petesch, Patti; Prain, Gordon; Pyburn, Rhiannon; Umantseva, Anya
    Local gender norms constitute a critical component of the enabling (or disabling) environment for improved agricultural livelihoods – alongside policies, markets, and other institutional dimensions. Yet, they have been largely ignored in agricultural research for development. This viewpoint is based on many years of experience, including a recent major comparative research initiative, GENNOVATE, on how gender norms and agency interact to shape agricultural change at local levels. The evidence suggests that approaches which engage with normative dimensions of agricultural development and challenge underlying structures of inequality, are required to generate lasting genderequitable development in agriculture and natural resource management.