Thread by @IPESfood

📚 This #InternationalWomensDay, a little reading on the West African context 👇🏾

Our partners spent 3 years preparing our report on the transition to #agroecology in West Africa. It was (and remains) abundantly clear how critical #women are to this transition 🌿

🧵Thread /1

"#Women produce between 40-80% of food in the region and playing a leading role in local #food distribution and street vending in West Africa." #IWD2021

📖 ipes-food.org/_img/upload/fi…

/2

🔎 But data measuring the share of food produced, processed & sold by women remains inherently complex & varies across countries. In fact, “quantifying the share of food produced by women involves making many arbitrary assumptions about gender roles in the production process.” /3

"Assessing gendered work in West African #foodsystems remains difficult as women may qualify their roles differently than men, e.g. re: survey data, women may cite ‘caring for household’ as their primary responsibility, despite significant contributions to food & farm work." /4

"Men & women generally don't produce food separately from one another, but with complementarities between their work & skills. They may engage in distinct cropping or livestock rearing patterns (e.g. cultivating specific crops or tending to different types of livestock)..." /5

"... but men & women may also cultivate the same crops for different levels of consumption (e.g. household, local, export)." /6

In West African food systems, "#women may also contribute at various stages of production, processing, & retail without their work being attributed as such, for example, if they are contributing as part of the family or as non-wage workers."

🔎 ipes-food.org/_img/upload/fi…

/7

❗️ "Women play a vital role in the food system in spite of persistent inequalities and obstacles to accessing production assets & services – inequalities which leave
women & their families more vulnerable to food insecurity." @unwomenafrica @FoodSystems /8

"West #Africa remains a region where Gender Inequality
Indices are among the highest in the world (@FAO, 2014). Family farming systems tend to reinforce gender inequalities as they are rooted in traditional patriarchal structures ..." /9

"Meanwhile, the shift towards large-scale commercial
#farms has reinforced male-dominated activities and positions."

@threadreaderapp unroll!

[FYI: @Afsafrica, a little reading on #IWD2021 ✊🏾]