Policies & programmes for women in india

Policy and Programmes for empowerment of women farmers:

Challenges for convergence

Dr. Pawan Kumar SharmaSubject Matter Specialist (Agril. Economics)

Krishi Vigyan Kendra PoonchSKUAST-Jammu

• From equal status with men in ancient times through the low points of the medieval period, to the promotion of equal rights by many reformers.

• The history of women in India has been eventful. In modern India, women have adorned high offices in India including that of the President, Prime minister, Speaker of the Lok Sabha and Leader of the Opposition.

• As of 2012, the President of India, the Speaker of the Lok Sabha and the Leader of the Opposition in Lok Sabha (Lower House of the parliament) were all women.

• Active participation of any community in the development process is recognized as a tool for its empowerment.

The changing status of women in India

Indian population is 48.1% women and 51.9% men.

Female illiteracy is 62% whereas the male illiteracy rate is 34%

The labour force participation rate of women is 22.7%, less than half of the men's rate of 51.6%

In rural India, agriculture and allied industrial sectors employ as much as 89.5% of the total female labour.

Key Facts

Women have extensive work loads with dual responsibility for farm and household production.

Women's work is getting harder and more time-consuming due to ecological degradation and changing agricultural technologies and practices.

Women have an active role and extensive involvement in livestock production, forest resource use and fishery processing

Women contribute considerably to household income through farm and nonfarm activities as well as through work as landless agricultural labourers.

Women's work as family labour is underestimated .

There are high degrees of inter-state and intra-state variations in gender roles in agriculture, environment and rural production.

Statistics of women workers in IndiaParticulars Million %

Total women population in India 494.83 100Total Women workers 127.05 25.67548Total women main workers 72.65 14.68181Total women marginal workers 54.4 10.99367Total women owner cultivators 41.3 8.346301Total women Agriculture wage workers 50.09 10.12267Total women Household industry workers 8.08 1.632884Total women other workers 27.57 5.57161Total women in organosed sectors 4.8 0.97003

Total women in Livestock, Forestry, Fishing, Hunting, Plantation, Orchards and activities 1.32 0.266758

Cattle management, Fodder collection, MilkingResponsible for household food and nutrition

security.90% of the hoeing and weeding in food

production.80% of the work on food storage and transport.More than 90% of post harvest management

including food processing, providing water and energy.

More than 60% of harvesting and marketing

Allied Activities carried out by women

Why women in agriculture?

• Eradicating poverty• Ensuring food security• Promoting their own well being• Their increasing stake in agriculture• Decreasing economic contribution• Ownership in livestock, land , etc. is limited

Statistics:• While only 53% of the male population is involved in

agriculture, the corresponding numbers for the female population was a 85% of all rural female workers.

Source: Report submitted to the Working Group Gender Issue, PRIs, PPPs, Innovative Finance and Microfinance in Agriculture in the 11th Five Year Approach Plan

Percentage distribution of workers (main + marginal) according Categories of worker by sex and by sector during 2001 for India.

Women’s constraints to economic empowerment

• Time poverty; women have competing demands on their time due to their productive and reproductive responsibilities

• Limited access to productive resources; less than 10% of registered land titles were under women.

• Lack of access to financial services; women access less than 10% of credit to smallholder agricultural and less than 1% of credit to agriculture. In 2014 on average a woman received Rs. 12 of bank credit per scheduled bank

• Lack of access to markets

Invisibility of Women’s Work

Conceptual Biases in Measurement

Non recognition of Women’s role in decision making

Historical and Complex Causes reinforced by social, cultural, political and religious practices and beliefs

Serious inaccuracies and measurement failure in the recording of the work that women do due to conceptual and operational (enumerators' and respondents') biases at the time of data collection.

Engendering Agriculture reduced to women’s participation in training programs for technology dissemination or micro credit.

Non involvement of women in institutional work

Mainly rural women are engaged in agricultural activities in three different ways depending on the socio-economic status of their family and regional factors. They are work as:

Paid Labourers

Cultivator doing labour on their own land and

Managers of certain aspects of agricultural

production by way of labour supervision &

the participation in post harvest operations.

Evolution of Policy• Gender mainstreaming started from the VI Five Year Plan

when `opportunities for independent employment and income’ for women was recognized as a necessary condition for raising social status of women.

Plan Focus

6th Five Year Plan Shift from Welfare to Developmental Issues

7th Five Year Plan Raising Economic and Social Status of Women

8th Five Year Plan Increased Emphasis on Economic Activities

9th Five Year Plan From Development to Empowerment

10th Five Year Plan From Women Alone to Gender Mainstreaming

11th Five Year plan Propose to Move Towards a Holistic Approach

Persistence of Partial/ Compartmental Approach

• Three components of Gender Mainstreaming Approach. – Women’s Empowerment – Capacity Building – Access to Inputs as well as technology and resources

• Need for a coordinated approach across Ministries

• Schemes undertaken by the various Ministries will ultimately converge towards the goal of women’s empowerment.

• Introduction of Component Plan for Women in all development plans during the Ninth Five Year Plan was a step in this direction.

Tasks for Gender Mainstreaming in

Agriculture

Main Ministries

Role of Ministry of Agriculture

Women’s Empowerment (human capital formation, exposure, leadership, autonomy, Self esteem, and food security)

MoA, MoRD, Social

welfare, HRD, Health

Gender Focused Strategy for Agri. Growth (main contributor along with other Ministries)

Capacity Building in Agriculture (dissemination of information and technology)

MoA Various Extension and Training Programmes (Almost the sole contributor)

Access to Agricultural Inputs (including land, water and credit besides agri-inputs).

MoRD, MoA, MoEF

Access to Agricultural Inputs, Formation of SHGs, Marketing Facilities (partial contributor with MoRD and MoEF having a major control over property rights regimes).

Why we need policies for Women farmers

• Changing demographics of agriculture - growing feminisation as men move to non-farm.

• 53% of all men workers, 75 % of all women workers, 85% of rural women workers are in agriculture.

• More than 20% of rural households de facto female-headed. Many women managing farms without male support.

• Women are 40% of agricultural workforce & % rising. The face of agriculture is increasingly female

Hence achieving agricultural growth targets will depend increasingly on policies that increase the

efficiency of women farmers

Policies and Programmes for women farmers

National Research Centre for Women in Agriculture (NRCWA).

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The Indian Council of Agricultural Research established the NRCWA in the month of April 1996 at Bhubaneswar and has since been upgraded as the Directorate of Research on Women in Agriculture (DRWA) from the year 2008.

DRWA is carrying out basic, strategic and applied research on various gender related issues in agriculture; a repository of gender disaggregated data and documentation; technology testing and refinement; drudgery assessment and reduction; gender sensitive extension approach; capacity building of scientists and functionaries; efficient resource management; and gender mainstreaming.

Programmes with special components for women

Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA),

Swarnjayanti Gram Swarozgar Yojana (SGSY) now restructured as National Rural Livelihood Mission (Aajeevika) and

Indira Awaas Yojana (IAY).

The implementation of these programmes is monitored specifically with reference to coverage of women.

Having Quantitative measurement

Having limited Quantitative measurementPradhan Mantri Gram Sadak Yojana (PMGSY)

During the year 2012-13 (up to 27th Dec. 2012) total employment of 134.76 crore person days were reported to have been generated.

The employment generated for women were reported as 71.88 crore persondays which is 53.34% of total employment generated under this Programme.

Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA),

To increase participation rates of women workers in MGNREGA, the Ministry has suggested

MGNREGA Operational Guidelines 2013

Individual bank/post office accounts min the name of all women MGNREGA workers and their wages directly credited to their own account for the number of days worked by them.

Identify widowed women, deserted women and destitute women who qualify as a household under the Act, to ensure that they are provided 100 days of work.

To ensure that pregnant women and lactating mothers (at least up to 8 months before delivery and 10 months after delivery) are given works which require less effort and are close to their houses.

To conduct time and motion studies to formulate gender, age, level of disability, terrain and climate sensitive Schedule of Rates (SoRs) and to ensure accurate capturing of work done by women at worksites.

To ensure that at least 50% of the worksite supervisors (mates) at all worksites are women.

To ensure that worksite facilities such as crèches, drinking water, shade etc. are provided through convergence with Women and Child Development Schemes like ICDS.

To encourage participation of women groups, including Self Help Groups in awareness generation, capturing demand, planning, implementation, monitoring and maintenance of works.

National Rural Livelihood Mission (NRLM)

A Self Help Group (SHG), of 10-20 women in general (5-20 in difficult areas) is the primary building block of the NRLM institutional design. NRLM would promote SHGs with exclusive women membership.

NRLM is working with groups of exclusive women membership because it recognizes that women are marginalized in the economy, in polity and in society.

NRLM will especially focus on women headed households, single women, women victim of trafficking, women with disability and other such vulnerable categories.

An important component of NRLM is the Mahila Kisan Sashaktikaran Pariyojana (MKSP) which aims at supporting women farmers.

MKSP seeks to reduce drudgery for women farmers.

During the year 2012-13 (upto 22-01-2013) out of 5,69,912 swarojgaris assisted, 4,77,944 swarojgaris (83.86%) were women.

Mahila Kisan Sashaktikaran Pariyojana (MKSP)

Aims at providing assistance for the construction of houses to the people Below the Poverty Line in rural areas.

Priority is extended to widows and unmarried women. IAY houses are to be allotted in the name of women members of the household or, alternatively, in the joint names of husband and wife.

The total number of Dwelling Units sanctioned during the period 2012-13 (upto 22nd November, 2012) was 2215637 out of which 1329550 (60%) houses were sanctioned in the name of women and 561962 (25.36%) houses were sanctioned jointly in the name of husband and wife.

Indira Awaas Yojana

Enhancing role of women in Indian agriculture

1. Skill empowerment. • By training in the area of various operations:

Field operations Conservation of biodiversity Nutritional bio-security Vocational training Organic farming

2. Technology development for women

Designing of tools for various field operations

b. Animal husbandry i. Artificial insemination. ii. Veterinary knowledge

c. For side income i. Mushroom cultivation ii. Floriculture

3. Creation of self help groups a. For financial support b. For generation of employment

4. Projection of contribution of women by collecting and analysing data a. Collection and display of data b. Projection of successful women in agriculture c. Representation of their contribution in economic terms

5. Providing Financial Powers a. Giving representation in land holdings

Recommendations to enhance women’s land access Improving claims in family land Enhance legal awarness on inheritance laws

(e.g. Hindu succession (amendment) act, 2005) Provide legal support services (also financial help) Ensure recording ,women’s inheritnance shares Improving access to public land Issue comprehensive directive: all land transfers (for

poverty alleviation, resettlement, etc) recognize women’s claims

Give women individual or group titles not joint titles with husbands.

Use group approach: distribute land to poor rural women as a group in a group patta. Each woman in group have use rights but not right to dispose off land.

Improving access to land via market

Subsidized credit to poor for land purchase or lease

Encourage group formation for land purchase or lease by poor women, & group cultivation.

MONITER ACCESS: Gender disaggregated data for land ownership and use

Recommendations to improve efficiency of women farmers

Agricultural infrastructure. Gender-sensitive technical support, extension, information on new agricultural practices to women farmers

Encourage land pooling for cultivation (since 72% of farms are marginal, < 1 hectare)

Encourage group investment in equipment etc via subsidized credit to women farmers working in groups

Advance production credit specifically for women farmersEnsure women’s access to input and marketing cooperativesWomen’s effective presence in village decision-making bodiesGender sensitizing through the media, educational insitutions,

etc.

• Agricultural infrastructure. Gender-sensitive technical support, extension, information on new agricultural practices to women farmers

• Encourage land pooling for cultivation (since 72% of farms are marginal, < 1 hectare)

• Encourage group investment in equipment etc via subsidized credit to women farmers working in groups

• Advance production credit specifically for women farmers

• Ensure women’s access to input and marketing cooperatives

• Women’s effective presence in village decision-making bodies

• Gender sensitizing through the media, educational insitutions, etc.

Strengthening factual basis of gendering knowledge

• Women’s predominant engagement within the household/family and in non-monetised contributions requires visibility through new methods and measures .

• Data collecting agencies, especially the Statistical Commission need to revise the definitions and methods of bringing visibility to women’s contributions and constraints .

• Conceptualising of plan and policies is limited by lack of gendered data on – Difference in regional characteristics see table– Cultural specificities– Contributions to Savings , Revenues

THANKS