Agriculture and the food sector are critical to food and nutrition security. They not only produce food for growing populations but also contribute to economic empowerment. However, food systems at all levels – global, domestic, and local– are expected to be highly affected by the COVID-19 crisis. Though both women and men participate in the food system as producers, processors, and traders, they will likely be impacted differently. As such, crises and policy responses can either exacerbate or reduce pre-existing gender gaps.
Through their research, Catherine Ragasa and Isabel Lambrecht offer their perspectives on how the COVID-19 crisis and related policy responses could create both challenges as well as opportunities for gender equality in the food system. The full publication of their research is available to view in Food Security.
Women and food supply chains
In recent decades, modern food supply chains have expanded rapidly across developing countries. They have not only changed the way food is produced and traded but also affected the welfare of individuals engaged in supply chains.
Women constitute a large portion of the labor force in many food supply chains and in many cases, their participation has led to significant increases in income and empowerment. However, the COVID-19 crisis and its economic fallout are likely to have a regressive effect on gender equality.
The pandemic has already severely affected global supply chains and the long-term negative impacts are expected to result in a significant setback for women’s income-generating opportunities and empowerment.
To mitigate these setbacks, the private sector and governments will need to develop short- and long-term responses that encourage and target women-owned companies or those with large shares of women and youth workers.
Additionally, proactively stimulating demand and expanding local and regional markets could protect livelihoods overall. In the current crisis, the government, the private sector, and researchers have the opportunity to work together to provide timely and strategic market intelligence to guide business and investors. Doing so with a gender lens means paying particular attention to markets with strong multiplier effects on rural development and women and youth employment.
The growing population’s continued demand for food offers a great incentive for increased investment and production. Thus, maintaining food supply chains and allowing agricultural inputs and services to move freely during the crisis are key.
In many countries, the COVID-19 crisis has already incentivized governments to encourage homestead production, urban farming, seed production, and agriculture-oriented labor-intensive public work programs. For example, Myanmar’s government is using social media and demonstration plots and distributing vegetable seed kits to actively encourage homestead food production.
However, in many cases, government support has not effectively reached women in the food system. Women-managed enterprises are generally constrained by a lack of access to finance and assets and by entrenched gender norms. Recently, Myanmar increased loans to farmers at lower interest rates, but women were less likely to obtain such loans as they are unlikely to be listed as the owner on the required land certificate. Because of these constraints, intensified support for local food production does not automatically benefit women without explicit targeting.
Gender and food systems in policy responses
COVID-19 policy trackers show that less attention goes to agricultural and food sectors than to other sectors and that agricultural ministries are conspicuously absent from national and subnational COVID-19 response committees. Furthermore, the policy trackers do not account for gender sensitivity and very few countries explicitly target women or gender balance in their policies.
Myanmar’s COVID-19 Economic Relief Plan includes support for farmers, small agri-processors, seed farmers, and agri-businesses. However, it has no explicit gender targeting. As such, where men are considered the household head and main income earner, women miss out on relief packages, information, and technical support. Globally, such policies perpetuate gender norms around women’s roles as caretakers rather than as producers, workers, or entrepreneurs.
Opportunities for positive change
Applying a gender lens to policy measures that mitigate the impact of COVID-19 on food systems can aid in designing a more appropriate and effective response and avoid unintentional harm or aggravation of gender inequalities. Doing so effectively means including women as active decision-makers, as beneficiaries, and in statistics through the collection of sex-disaggregated data.
Social and cultural structures change quickly in crisis contexts, providing opportunities to redefine gender norms and power relations. Thus, documenting and sharing good practices during the COVID-19 crisis could help harness sustained changes toward greater gender equality and evolving social norms.
Catherine Ragasa is a Senior Research Fellow at the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI), based in Washington, DC. Isabel Lambrecht is a Research Fellow in the Development Strategy and Governance Division (DSGD) of IFPRI, based in Yangon, Myanmar.
This blog post was prepared by Michael Wang, Mickey Leland International Hunger Fellow in DSGD of IFPRI, based in Yangon. The analysis and opinions expressed in this piece are solely those of the authors.