Food, fuel and financial crisis:Effects on the participation of rural

women in the African agricultural economy

Samuel Sey, Program Officer

Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa

Female and male rural actors are impacted differently by crisis

• Women’s access to financial services are more limited;

• Women face greater challenges in access to and ownership of land for production;

• Women and other disadvantaged groups are more vulnerable to agricultural risks; they disproportionately bear the brunt of crisis in the current free market regime;

• Effects are felt most seriously at the households level where women have the greatest responsibility for welfare and social reproduction.

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AGRA’s Program for Africa’s seed system• Focuses on ecology based breeding to take into account local

problems like drought, maturity, color, storability, cook ability, pest and disease resistance, grain size and shape;

• Some projects are specifically looking at development of varieties tolerant to drought. Crops being considered for this constraint are maize, beans, sorghum, cow peas and rice;

• Develop drought tolerant /early maturing seed varieties;

• The focus is to improve resilience of smallholder farmers, the majority women in their production in the face of crisis.

Agro-dealers stock small packages of inputs to fit the needs of the smallholder farmers

Market Access program

• AGRA’s Market Access helps to:– Reduce transaction costs– Promote value addition– Increase demand of food

staples through alternative uses

– Promote an enabling environment for local and regional trade of food staples

Improving male and female capacities to optimize incomes increases their ability to weather crisis

Traditional Grain Storage in Mali

Improved Grain Storage facility in Tanzania used warehouse receipt system

THANK YOU