Conference Agenda

We propose a symposium organised around the question of how we can enable gender- and social transformative change in agri-food systems so they become more just, sustainable and climate resilient.

Climate change affects men and women in different ways. Structural inequalities (formal and informal) limit women’s access to resources, services and agency, which makes women are more negatively affected by climate change or have more limited resilience capacities. If climate-smart and climate-resilient interventions do not adequately take gender differences into account, they might exacerbate gender inequalities in food systems. At the same time, women’s contributions are critical to make food systems more resilient to the negative impacts of climate change, given their specialized knowledge, skills and roles in agri-food systems. Increasing the resilience of food systems requires going beyond addressing gender gaps and gendered vulnerabilities to climate change to create an enabling environment that supports gender equality and women’s empowerment, by removing structural barriers and rigid gender norms, and building equal power dynamics, as part of a process of gender transformative change.

In the first presentation, we will show how addressing key structural constraints to equality and empowerment in agrifood systems – that are rooted in policy and discriminatory (formal and informal) social and economic institutions, including norms- can contribute to establish more equal access to resources, exercise of agency, and desirable outcomes in a sustainable way. In a second presentation, we will define the relationship between gender inequalities and climate change, and discuss what strategies have proven effective for reducing gender inequality through climate action. These two presentations draw on background papers by the CGIAR GENDER Impact Platform for the Report on the Status of Rural Women in Agri-food Systems by FAO (to be) published in April 2023. In a third presentation by a young scholar, it will be shown that using a gendered intersectionality lens contributes to a nuanced understanding of the uptake of climate smart agricultural practices and highlights a need for targeted interventions informed by social, cultural and economic factors.

The presentations will be followed by a discussion including a policy maker from the Department of Environmental Affairs in South Africa, who is also an African negotiator for climate change, the presenters and the audience. The discussion will focus on how researchers and policy makers can strengthen and support the voice, agency and negotiations of women that are working towards reducing gender inequality through climate action.

Inequalities by gender and intersecting sources of social differentiation in agri-food systems persist. Despite decades of development and theoretical assessment efforts calling for multiscale approaches to addressing inequalities in agri-food systems, common approaches remain specific to a scale rather than holistic.

In this paper, we make the case that achieving lasting equality and empowerment in agri-food systems requires transformative change. This depends on fostering an enabling environment for equality and empowerment across multiple nested scales. ‘Deeper’ institutionalized constraints that are interrelated at the scales of the state, markets, communities, household and individuals need to be relaxed to establish equal access to resources, exercise of agency, and desirable outcomes in a sustainable way.

We review emerging thinking about key structural constraints at each scale – rooted in policy and discriminatory (formal and informal) social and economic institutions (including norms) – and their relevance for transformative change in agri-food systems. We compile evidence of the status and evolution of these constraints and evidence of what works to relax them. We demonstrate how multiple structural constraints to equality at different nested scales are interdependent and mutually reinforcing and provide examples of how holistic approaches tackling constraints at multiple scales can contribute to transformative change.

We provide recommendations that suggest changes in policy, market systems, collectives and norms, and across scales. We emphasize the need for inclusive processes of tailoring and prioritizing holistic approaches for fostering an enabling environment, awareness of potential negative consequences for women and disadvantaged groups, and acknowledgement that transformative change is inherently political.

Climate change affects every aspect of the food system, including all nodes along agri-food value chains from production to consumption, the food environments in which people live, and outcomes, such as diets and livelihoods. Men and women often have specific roles and responsibilities within food systems, yet structural inequalities (formal and informal) limit women’s access to resources, services and agency. These inequalities affect the ways in which men and women experience and are affected by impacted climate change. In addition to gender, other social factors are at play, such as age, education, marital status, and health and economic conditions. To date, most climate change policies, investments, and interventions do not adequately integrate gender. If climate-smart and climate-resilient interventions do not adequately take gender differences into account, they might exacerbate gender inequalities in food systems by, for instance, increasing women’s labor burden and time poverty, reducing their access to and control over income and assets, and reducing their decision-making power. At the same time, women’s contributions are critical to make food systems more resilient to the negative impacts of climate change, given their specialized knowledge, skills and roles in agri-food systems, within the household, at work and at the community level. Increasing the resilience of food systems requires going beyond addressing gendered vulnerabilities to climate change to create an enabling environment that supports gender equality and women’s empowerment, by removing structural barriers and rigid gender norms, and building equal power dynamics, as part of a process of gender transformative change.

Addressing the complexity of food system sustainability calls for an approach that connects intersectional perspectives (Ng’endo and Connor 2022). Intersectionality focuses on understanding the interconnectedness of multiple and overlapping identities (Lokot and Avakyan, 2020). These include socioeconomic status, age, race, nationality, language, religion, caste/class systems, disability, location, and gender. Combined, these intersectionality factors shape people’s relative vulnerability and how they build resilience by adapting to various socio-ecological changes (Erwin et al., 2021). This includes climate change, which in turn differentially shapes people’s food and nutrition security experiences (Williams-Forson and Wilkerson, 2011). Thus, using an intersectionality lens can contribute to a more nuanced understanding of the uptake of Climate Smart Agricultural (CSA) practices in agrifood systems.

There are multiple examples of CSA practices happening at the local level, which stand to benefit from implementing intersectionality as a key ingredient. This is because intersectionality highlights the need for targeted interventions informed by context-specific social, cultural and economic factors. Incorporating bottom-up approaches from diverse geographies, as opposed to solely relying on top-down approaches, is a key step in fostering food system sustainability at high-level decision-making forums (Ng’endo and Connor 2022). The One CGIAR’s Initiative on Climate Resilience (ClimBeR) has partnered for change with a local NGO leading climate-resilient advocacy efforts in Kenya, the Centre for Minority Rights Development (CEMIRIDE). Through a joint ongoing ClimBeR-CEMIRIDE effort, we share a case study of community leaders with a mix of socio-cultural-economic indicators from two indigenous groups in Baringo County located in the Rift Valley region of Kenya, the Ogiek and Endorois people, who are predominantly foresters and pastoralists, respectively. The stories tell various initiatives from different perspectives, for example, tree planting from an adult male perspective versus an adult female with special needs perspective, providing intersectionality of gender with disability. At the intersection of gender and age is seed-saving from a female youth perspective, contrasted with that of a female adult perspective on intercropping pasture with sorghum, the latter being an indigenous drought-tolerant crop.

After presentations of Symposium Paper 1, 2, and 3, the discussant, Pemy Gasela, a policy maker from the Department of Environmental Affairs in South Africa who is also an African negotiator for climate change, will briefly talk about her work and engagement in negotiations for climate change.