Gender discrimination and its impact on income, productivity, and technical efficiency: evidence from Benin

This paper examines the occurrence and impact of gender discrimination in access to production resources on the income, productivity, and technical efficiency of farmers. Through an empirical investigation of farmers from Koussin-Le´le´, a semi-collective irrigated rice scheme in central Benin, we find that female rice farmers are particularly discriminated against with regard to scheme membership and access to land and equipment, resulting in significant negative impacts on their productivity and income. Although women have lower productivity, they are as technically efficient as men. The findings suggest that there is considerable scope for improving the productivity of women through increasing their access to production resources

Assessment of smallholder seed groups performance and market linkages in Southern Malawi. Series Paper Number 12

ICRISAT in partnership with the Rural Livelihoods Support Project was implementing a two year project since 2009 to promote production of groundnuts and pigeon peas in Chiradzulu and Thyolo districts. The project was providing start-up seed of improved pigeon peas and groundnut varieties and technical advice. The variety received for pigeon peas was ICP40 while for groundnuts farmers were given Nsinjilo and CG7. The groups were multiplying the seed and sharing the seed on pass-on scheme. This study was thus conducted to assess the performance of the smallholder seed groups and explore opportunities for linking with the market for seed through the agro-dealer network and other initiatives as marketing outlets for seed. The study methodology involved interviews with selected agro-dealers operating in the project area and focus group discussions with selected farmer groups involved in seed multiplication. In total the study involved nine community seed groups, six in Chiradzulu district and three in Thyolo district and three agro-dealers (2 from Chiradzulu and one from Thyolo). The groups were clear of their objectives to multiply seed to increase access to seed within their communities and engage in small scale seed business. The outcome of these activities would be increased production of pigeon peas and groundnuts and improved livelihoods and incomes. The membership composition for the visited groups shows that most groups were involving more women than men. This means that women were being actively engaged in seed multiplication for the legumes as such they would be primary beneficiaries of the accrued benefits of the project support. Community members joined the groups on voluntary basis based on their willingness to participate in growing the crop. The project provided training to some of the groups in Chiradzulu and in Thyolo. But some groups did not yet receive training. For the groups that received training, the training mainly comprised of crop management aspects. For most groups, the seed support was received once when they started in 2009 and they have been able to multiply it and pass on to others and realized some excess seed for sale. Most of the groups had been able to realize some significant and increasing harvest in the two years so that other farmers have also benefited from the produced seed including sale of excess produce by some groups. For example, Nankuyu group (a group of 20) in Chiradzulu district produced 500kg of pigeon peas in 2009/10 season and increased to 1000kg in 2010/11 season. A number of other farmers also benefited from the produced seed as the groups have been able to share the seed with other farmers thereby expanding access to improve seed of both groundnuts and pigeon peas. This means that the objective of increasing access to seed to other needy farmers was being realized through these groups. The study has highlighted a number of challenges faced by the groups during the two years which affected their production levels. These included lack of training and extension services; late distribution of seed by the project; poor weather; occurrence of pests and diseases; and poor storage condition and storage pests for both pigeon peas and groundnuts. The groups also faced a number of marketing challenges which included: low production limiting the amount for sale; no linkage with reliable and competitive markets; lack of information on profitable market opportunities; high transport costs to markets in the city; and poor road network The seed groups have not yet had any interactions with agro dealers in the area or any other organized seed marketing organizations. However the interviewed agro-dealers are eager to link up with the seed groups to purchase from them the seed and sell in their input retail outlets as long as the seed is of good quality and prices are not exorbitant. The main constraints affecting the seed trading for the agro-dealers include: lack of adequate capital to buy seed stock and run their business; high transport costs; and competition with large seed companies. The groups indicated that the market available is mostly for grain and not seed as the local seed market is not developed and linkages are not yet developed. Apart from selling to vendors and local markets, some groups (e.g. Nankuyu group) have been able to explore and link up with larger buyers with support from ICRISAT. They have been able to sell their grain produce for pigeon peas collectively to Export Trading in Blantyre with assistance from the project and this has helped them to realize better returns. Overall the groups have not been very successful as smallholder seed producing groups. The ICRISAT support may have provided the start-up seed and increased access to good seed for the targeted communities but the groups were not systematically developed and supported to become sustainable seed producing groups. The main reasons include lack of or inadequate training on seed production and government standards and requirements for seed production. Almost all farmer groups interviewed from the two districts indicated that they are not aware of the requirements for seed production as prescribed by either government or seed companies. There is need to link the farmer groups in the project area to organizations which focus on producing and marketing improved seeds in tandem with requirements for seed production as prescribed by either government or seed companies. This can be attained if the farmer groups are linked to organizations such as Association of Smallholder Seed Multiplication Action Group (ASSMAG). The project supported groups can get organized into Seed Multiplication Action Groups (SMAGS) in the districts or join the existing SMAGs and access marketing linkages that has already been developed. ASSMAG works collectively through groups at different levels and ASSMAG coordinates production trainings, seed certification activities, seed processing and seed marketing-related issues of all the member groups. This would be of benefit to the farmer groups in the project area. To achieve maximum benefits and ensure sustainable small scale seed groups the following needs to be taken into consideration: Training of farmers on group dynamics, production technologies and practices; Facilitation of governance issues for sustainability; coordinated effort on marketing; sourcing of foundation seed and distribution to farmers; organizing inspections and seed testing

A Gendered Analysis of the Effect of Peanut Value Addition on Household Income in Rongo and Ndhiwa Districts of Kenya

Agriculture constitutes a significant amount of the Kenya’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP). However, a major characteristic of Kenyan agriculture is the predominance of primary production with a high concentration of women in the sector. Peanut production for instance is widespread in western Kenya under rural crop production system; serving as a cover, subsistence and commercial crop. As a commercial crop, peanut has the potential of generating income for rural households and thus help in reducing poverty and improving livelihoods. Moreover, higher incomes can be obtained through value addition activities. Despite the known benefits from value addition, farmers produce and market peanuts with little or no processing. Using survey data from 310 randomly selected peanut producers from two divisions; Ndhiwa and Rongo; a Propensity Score Method (PSM) was used to determine the gendered effect of peanut value addition on household income. From the results, farmers were found to undertake only one form of value addition, shelling. Although they appreciated the higher profitability associated with other forms of value addition like processing, inadequate capital to purchase processing equipment was a major constraint. The PSM results suggest that value addition raises household per capita income by Kshs.88 per day. Male headed households recorded higher levels of income compared to female headed households. This indicates that potential exists in peanut value addition as a possibility to raise farmers’ household incomes. However, a diversity of value adding options should be promoted for adoption by farmers to sustainably improve peanut farmers’ livelihoods

Enhancing Pigeonpea Productivity and Production in Eastern and Southern Africa

In ESA, Tanzanian and Malawian NARS implemented the pigeonpea research and development activities in close partnership with ICRISAT-Nairobi, farmers, NGOs, CBOs and all other major stakeholders. The project was implemented in Babati (Manyara Region), Karatu (Arusha Region) and Kilosa (Morogoro Region) districts of Tanzania. In Malawi, on-farm research and promotion activities were carried out in 14 districts spanning from Southern (Balaka, Blantyre, Machinga, Mwanza, Zomba), Central (Kasungu, Mchinji, Ntcheu, Ntchisi, Salima), and Northern (Chitipa, Karonga, Mzimba, Rumphi) regions during the Phase 1. During this phase, a major success was on fast tracking the release of two medium duration pigeonpea varieties (ICEAP 00557 and ICEAP 01514/15) in Malawi. The new releases in Malawi were a landmark because there had been no released medium duration pigeonpea varieties in the past. With this, the number of pigeonpea varieties released in Malawi rose to six (2 short, 2 medium and 2 long duration group). In Tanzania, 2 medium (ICEAP 00554, and ICEAP 00557) and 2 long duration varieties (ICEAP 00053 and ICEAP 00932) are being evaluated under National Performance Trials (NPT) and are in final stages of the release process

Enhancing Chickpea Productivity and Production in Eastern and Southern Africa

The chickpea research and development activities were conducted in three ESA countries, namely, Ethiopia, Kenya and Tanzania with due involvement of NARS, ICRISAT-Nairobi, progressive farmers, NGOs, and all major stakeholders. The project was implemented in Gimbichu, Minjar-Shenkora, Moretna-Jiru, Dembia and Sodo weredas (districts) of Ethiopia; four districts of Tanzania, namely Misungwi, Kwimba, Shinyanga and Kishapu districts of Lake Zone; and the rift valley districts of Bomet and Nakuru in Kenya. The major success was on fast track release of nine chickpea varieties in the three target countries, viz., Ethiopia (1), Tanzania (4) and Kenya (4). The new releases in Tanzania are a landmark as this is the first official release of chickpea in the country; Kenya had only one variety released in 1986

Socioeconomic Assessment of Pigeonpea and Groundnut Production Conditions – Farmer Technology Choice, Market Linkages, Institutions and Poverty in Rural Malawi. Market Institution and Policy Research Report no.6

The Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) of the United Nations (2008) reports that about 850 million people worldwide went hungry each year from the years 2002 to 2007. Furthermore, the United Nations (2008) reports, as the international financial crisis deepens, for the first time in history, one billion people were expected to go hungry in 2009. Agricultural growth is said to be the most effective means of addressing poverty. Consistent with this notion, the Department for International Development (2003) estimated that a 1% increase in agricultural productivity could reduce the percentage of poor people living on less than 1 dollar a day by between 0.6 and 2 percent. No other economic activity generates the same benefit for the poor. In Malawi, agriculture remains an important component of the economy; employing 85 percent of the labor force, accounting for about 39% of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) and 83% of Malawi’s foreign exchange earnings (Chirwa 2007). The agricultural sector is subdivided into sub-sectors; estates and smallholder farmers. The latter accounts for 78% of the cultivated land and generates about 75% of Malawi’s total agricultural output, suggesting that Malawi’s agriculture is largely smallholder agriculture. More than 72% of the smallholder farms are less than one hectare, a size too small to achieve food self sufficiency at the household level with the current rudimentary farming methods. This notion is consistent with the Benin et al.(2008) report, that Malawi is the third most densely populated country in mainland sub-Saharan Africa (at 2.3 rural people per hectare of agricultural land) after Rwanda (3.8 people per hectare) and Burundi (2.7 people per hectare). Such small land holdings are a serious challenge to the transformation of Malawi’s agriculture. The principal crops grown in Malawi are maize, tea, sugarcane, groundnut, cotton..........