CFS 51: UN Joint Side Event on Achieving Gender Equality, Food Security and Nutrition - Multi-Stakeholder Initiatives and Approaches

In a hugely significant step, the Committee on World Food Security formally endorsed the Voluntary Guidelines on Gender Equality and Women’s Empowerment in Food Security and Nutrition at CFS 51, following a two-year multi-stakeholder negotiation process.

The Voluntary Guidelines (VGs) recognise that gender equality and women’s empowerment are critical to the progressive realisation of the right to adequate food and essential to achieving all Sustainable Development Goals (SDG), in particular SDG 5 Gender Equality. The VGs provide concrete policy guidance based on good practice and lessons learned on gender-responsive policies and programmes. They can be applied based on national contexts and realities and in support of national and regional initiatives for gender equality. All stakeholders addressing food security and nutrition, gender equality and women’s empowerment can use the extensive and multi-dimensional VGs.

Operationalising the Voluntary Guidelines on Gender Equality and Women’s Empowerment in the Context of Food Security and Nutrition 

In this context, the United Nations’ Joint Programme on Rural Women’s Economic Empowerment (JP RWEE) held a side event at CFS 51 to share multi-stakeholder experiences and good practices which can be considered relevant to the implementation of the VGs.  
Dan Ericsson, State Secretary to the Minister for Rural Affairs, Sweden, opened the event, noting that while women produce nearly half of the world’s food, their roles are yet to be appropriately recognised. Further, we are still far away from achieving SDG5 and if current trends persist, over 340 million women and girls will live in extreme poverty by 2030, and nearly a quarter will experience moderate to severe food insecurity. Renate Hahlen, European Commission Principal Administrator, highlighted that gender equality, women's and girls’ empowerment, food security and nutrition are complex and include sensitive and interconnected issues. Navigating these different layers requires knowledge, experience and collaboration.
 
Following these remarks, two of the JP RWEE national coordinators from the six participating countries shared experiences that can be considered good practices relating to operationalising the VGs.
 
Women’s Cooperatives as Vehicles for Change
 
John Bosco Murangira, JP RWEE National Coordinator, presented women’s cooperatives as vehicles for change in empowering women and achieving food security in Rwanda. As found by the JP RWEE phase one final evaluation, the cooperative approach emerged as a powerful transformative element of the programme, contributing to women’s advancement as economic actors and building women’s social capital. Key aspects of the cooperative approach included capacity and skills development, access to informal and formal credit and financial services, as well as inputs and agricultural technologies. Through cooperatives, women could engage with multiple actors involved in economic empowerment. Ensuring groups became formally structured and registered with the government brought them into the mainstream, opening greater access to formal credit, information, services, and economic opportunities. Also key was linking rural women with local government actors, including local extension services, and involving them in local development planning processes.

The cooperative approach also enhanced women’s leadership and participation, with 84% of the supported groups led by women and some cooperative members gaining leadership positions in national women’s councils and local government bodies.

Capacity building the women farmers in agriculture production led to women producing higher quality produce in greater quantities, enabling them to engage with markets beyond small-scale local markets. Critical to this was advocacy with suppliers and off-takers on engaging with women’s producer organizations. As collectives, women could enter formal contracting to supply their produce to larger buyers offering premium prices. Ten cooperatives could sell their produce to Africa Improved Foods, a major national foods manufacturer in Rwanda, whilst others engaged with the government’s homegrown school feeding programme.

Engaging Men and Boys for Social Norm Change

Ms Rachana Bhattarai, National Coordinator for the JP RWEE in Nepal, spoke about deeply embedded social norms in communities. These norms discriminate against women and girls and act as barriers to realizing their rights and empowerment. Women cannot travel to markets and are often excluded from accessing inputs and services for agriculture production. At meal times, they eat whatever is left over.

The JP RWEE has used gender transformative approaches such as the Gender Action Learning System (GALS) to challenge and change discriminatory norms. The programme engages men and boys as a strategy, including male faith leaders and local leaders. The GALS approach enabled families to sit together, analyse their household dynamics and envision a more equitable future. The endline qualitative assessment in Nepal found that, due to the programme interventions, men were taking on domestic chores such as child caring, sharing agriculture activities and making economic decisions with their wives. Participatory methodologies such as the Farmer Field School approach also built women’s technical capacity in agriculture production while dealing with issues such as access to and control over resources. At the local government level, change was also brought about through capacity building local government in gender-responsive planning and budgeting and through dialogue platforms between rural women and local government. As a result, women’s needs and perspectives were taken into account and local governments subsequently allocated budgets which have enabled women to access the inputs and services they need to increase their production and access markets.
Local leaders also supported women to stand for leadership positions in local elections.

As a direct result of the JP RWEE, food production increased by almost 300 percent within women’s farmer groups supported by the programme. There was a 100 percent increase in the quantity and frequency of vegetable consumption. Ninety-seven percent of supported households attained the minimum acceptable diet and improved their food consumption score.

The programme’s effects on various aspects of empowerment were measured by the Women’s Empowerment in Agriculture Index. This index measures women’s empowerment, agency and inclusion in the agriculture sector. Women achieved greater empowerment across all the indicators measured. Overall, across the indicators, women were 20 percent more empowered and there was an average increase of 15 percent in gender parity within households. The proportion of rural women with empowerment in control over income at the end of the programme was 97 percent.

After a round of questions and answers, the CFS Chairperson, Ambassador Gabriel Ferrero, closed the event, stating that the Voluntary Guidelines are a major step forward in the gender equality agenda and called on stakeholders to adopt guidelines to push gender equality.