IICA and international partners focus on women in rural territories

The Inter-American Institute for Cooperation on Agriculture (IICA) and its partners representing all sectors of the international community have presented a new study that underscores the importance of acknowledging and valuing the care work usually performed by women in rural areas. 

In the document, entitled “The Care Economy in Rural Areas of the Americas: Collective Actions to Reduce Gender Gaps,” a variety of actors, speaking with a single voice, call for increased collective actions by all the institutions involved in the rural milieu.  

The objective is to help build societies that afford women and men the same opportunities to participate and make decisions within agrifood systems. 

The document was presented during the Fifth Meeting of the Permanent Forum of Female Ministers, Deputy Ministers and Senior Officials of the Americas (FOPEMA), a space promoted by IICA in which women political leaders discuss and propose priority gender and women’s issues in a sector that has traditionally been almost entirely male-dominated. 

At previous meetings, the ministers established the issue of care and the care economy as one of the major gender gaps in rural areas. 

“At IICA, we know that it is essential to build societies in which women and men have equal opportunities to participate and make decisions within agrifood systems. To that end, the Institute’s Gender Equality and Youth Program produced this publication on care to promote the inclusion of this issue on the inter-American agenda for agrifood systems, and to form part of the Sustainable Development Agenda and other hemispheric and global commitments,” said the organization’s Director General, Manuel Otero. 

“Gender inequalities are numerous, profound and severe, particularly in the rural milieu of the Americas. For that reason, since 2021 IICA has held a series of forums with senior agricultural officials and rural leaders, part of a collective effort to contribute politically and technically to reducing the gaps faced by women in rural areas,” he added. 

Priscila Zúñiga, Manager of IICA’s Gender Equality and Youth Program, commented: “Given the continued existence of challenges such as very limited shared responsibility for care, the poor coverage of the services available, and the invisibility of women’s work in agriculture, collaborative action involving different actors – promoted by initiatives such as IICA’s Hemispheric Partnership for Food Security and Sustainable Development in the Americas, and the Declaration for the Rights of All Women, Adolescents, and Girls in Rural Areas of the Americas and the Inter-American Decade for the Rights of All Women, Adolescents, and Girls in Rural Settings in the Americas – is essential to address the inequalities and promote a line of joint action designed to foster gender equality and sustainable development in all rural communities across the continent.” 

The document presents a series of empirical research and case studies that offer different perspectives on how care responsibilities affect, and are affected by, economic, social and political dynamics, and suggest ways of promoting more democratic and inclusive political participation and representation. 

In rural areas of the Americas, the care provided by women is a key contribution not only to agrifood production, but also to social cohesion and community wellbeing. 

The disproportionate burden of care borne by women prevents them from accessing better opportunities for personal and professional development, and perpetuates a cycle of inequality that needs to be addressed as a matter of urgency. The starkness of the situation was underlined by the COVID-19 pandemic, which exacerbated existing inequalities. 

The publication points out that the redistribution of care has assumed great importance because, historically, such activities were relegated to the private sphere and seen as tasks associated mainly with women. This failure to recognise care as work has made it invisible, with the result that it is neither quantified nor remunerated. 

In the context of agrifood systems, care not only entails maintaining the health and wellbeing of producers and their family units and preserving rural communities, but also includes care for minors, persons with disabilities and the elderly, as well as self-care. 

The articles develop the concept of the care economy, based on the fact that work generates wellbeing for people and also value, so it can be considered an economic good or service. 

The publication concludes that, although women are affected the most, the solution to the problem does not depend exclusively on their actions, but on the participation of all the institutions in the system. 

The continued existence of challenges such as the very limited sharing of care responsibilities, the poor coverage of the services available, and the invisibility of women’s work in agriculture underscores the need for collaborative action by various actors, as promoted by initiatives such as IICA’s Hemispheric Partnership for Food Security and Sustainable Development in the Americas. 

Collective action is therefore essential to address the inequalities and to promote a line of action designed to foster gender equality and sustainable development in all rural communities across the continent. 

The document is thus a contribution to the assessment of the true situation of rural women. It identifies the structural gaps that reproduce gender inequalities and aims to promote the change needed to guarantee equality for all people in agrifood systems. 

The publication is designed to serve as a source of inspiration for formulators of public and private initiatives, academics, technical staff and a variety of actors linked to rural life, so that the issue of care becomes a core element of the efforts to achieve equality among all people, the reduction of gender gaps, food security, and the health and wellbeing of rural populations. 

The other institutions that worked on the preparation of the publication with IICA were the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC), UN Women, the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD), the World Bank, the CAF-Development Bank for Latin America and the Caribbean, the Network of Rural Women of Latin America and the Caribbean, the Inter-American Commission on Women (CIM), the BBVA Microfinance Foundation and the Fundación Complutense de Madrid (FGUCM).