Submitted by Deborah Wendiro on Mon, 24/07/2017 - 12:06 Permalink
In my last response on How do we get more political will to address these challenges? I pointed out how the political will was nurtured in several areas and highlighted shortcomings.
Food security is not only in the enhancing increased cassava production but in ensuring holistic comprehensive access to safe, wholesome, quality and quantity of a variety of food all the time. The approach should be systemic and nurturing, persistent and supportive. There should be linkages within and across all sectors and there should be value-good prices so we do not live off women's blood.
There are reports of promiscuous behavior among women parliamentarians in Uganda! Are they just satisfying their 'lust' or using sex to get access? Why would the cream depend in the power of the thigh to get anything done. Is it a personnel failure or national failure? Have the Donors / Funders solved one problem only to create a social economic leprosy?
So I suggest that after we the Bank supports women to produce food, they should be supported to profitably market what remains to get money to buy other requirements. The assumption that there is market out there is wrong and only encourages them to be cheated by schemers and kept as cheap labor to produce cheap food for the market.
I have developed a production process for making lactic acid using cassava as the raw material. Nobody can take it up to invest in it because where is the market. What is surprising is that Uganda Imports 100% of all her lactic acid needs. Certain markets are exclusive especially those that are lucrative. Exclusivity may be intentional or unintentional. Unintentional exclusivity can be solved by bringing together the market and producers which would be done by information and application of science and technology.
This is assignment for another day
Deborah Wendiro
Chairperson UGAWARD
Submitted by Deborah Wendiro on Mon, 24/07/2017 - 12:05 Permalink
Political 'will' has been commercialized to the extent that if one cannot pay the price they will not get political support. Certain factors however enforce political 'will'
The liberalization policies showcase one such factors where the global powers and economic drivers "encouraged" governments with incentives to take up the liberalization policies. I wish to ask one question did these policies succeed in enhancing social economic development? transformation? health? improved livelihoods? etc? Many reports paint an image of deteriorating social economic indicators. Yet there was Political 'will' to implement them. The leaders saw benefit strategically personally and also they facilitated their political carriers (is it?).
Equality threatens political leaders positions. We need to remove the threats or exchange them for a carrot. An example is in the arena of governance (parliamentary representation) I would say that there has been success in getting an increasing number of women representation in parliament and now in high profile jobs (Speaker, Inspector General of Government, Ministers, etc) Why? The answer is archived somewhere in the records of many NGOs supporting women in politics sensitizing masses about the ability of women, even giving funding for women to participate etc. But after the women are in such positions are they able to make thing happen positively for fellow women? No! Why? They are left to fight alone! They become frightened and disillusioned and give up and then they "wear the pants". We them come with the whip and smoother them. Who is to blame?
It is like pouring money into agriculture production, by investing in improved varieties to increase productivity, farm implements to ease their drudgery, distributing them through women's groups so the Funders have more control over their funds, etc. Women take the challenge and produce a lot of cassava for example, too much cassava is produced. The planners sit back to let the market play the game of enabling women benefit from their labour! Politicians are happy because they have managed to deliver on their mandate of having cheap food for urban dwellers (who are a problem). The program is deemed successful by political standards. But there is no food in the homes, household poverty increases, men sell land, women moan and as usual find other tricks to manage. They grow the 'unimproved varieties' which keep long in the soil and cannot be sold at will by the men. the scientists lament 'why do they not take up new high yielding varieties? One woman respondent by the name Amulen in Osukuru Subcounty Tororo District said
"...cassava is now like cotton you grow a lot of it your neighbor has and everybody has ..., but where is the market...?
In this scenario who is to blame?
It is like having a Ministry of Gender Labor and Social Development which has no roots in Ministry of Agriculture Animal Industry and Fisheries, Ministry of Health, Ministry of Public Service, Ministry of Science Technology and Innovation etc. We say "Mainstream Gender in all your programs". Have a gender desk in the ministry etc. They get a woman to WO-man the gender desk. she has no budget because it is mainstreamed into the programs, she is a junior senior officer, so she cannot even demand for the funds...Who is to blame?
So what can Donors / Funding Agencies do? Nurture the Political 'will' at all levels of the value chains and nurse the social ecological systems equally.
Deborah Wendiro
Chairperson UGAWARD
Submitted by Deborah Wendiro on Fri, 14/07/2017 - 15:49 Permalink
Ha ha ha! The leprosy of information dearth has caught every body!
I don't know who is AfDB, DFIs. I know some of the stakeholders. So how can I know what they do? I know the culprit was mentioned by someone from Nigeria who said something about policy and Yinka Adesola also lamented men in critical positions.
To some extent I agree with her but not fully. A woman can be male in action so we need to address policy making processes and how people are recruited into positions. A gender sensitive man can as well do the job. A well articulated and managed project can prevent insensitive people from doing their own thing. So we need to design projects with 'gender lens' as they say; but am saying we need to design them programatically, organically, sensitive to needs of everybody because whether you use the women's lens or not they still remain in the society! Right!
Society places people in its own straight jacket! Okay! Society has its own guidelines that are not made in board rooms. Okay! Do you not know some of the African (Lusoga Dialect in Uganda) sayings like Okulinaana Enyandha tikuliira? meaning being near the sea does not place you at advantage to always eat fish! So what prevents somebody at the source from accessing the critical resources is written in the social ecology of resource utilization.
What prevents me from knowing what is AfDB, DFIs is written in the same manuscript!
I have been angered by the fact that much literature insult subsistence processes, including agriculture, processing, as being backward. Why is it that it has persisted, I wonder? Why do humanity in times of calamity resort to such, have we ever wondered? Is there in nature something called uniformity? I know diversity, I know continuous change. So is there diversity and continuous change in subsistence agriculture, small scale processing, subsistence etc? Yes there is and plenty of it.
Is there innovation in the most 'primitive culture'? The answer is YES! SO why do we not design policies to keep it "small" and "progressive"? Are we surprised that the "beneficiaries of AfDB, and DFIs" do not talk about it? It does not maybe belong to their social ecological framework! They receive it but do not cerebrate it, right! Ha ha ha!
May be there is no effort to encourage reporting because we do not know how the beneficiaries showcase gratitude. In my culture we take to the floor and dance singing praises to the person/institution and that is it!
Deborah Wendiro
Chairperson - UGAWARD
Submitted by Deborah Wendiro on Fri, 14/07/2017 - 15:29 Permalink
But what is gender equality? Is there something called equality in any scenario? One day we were discussing with my sister the issue of capitalism. She said that all of us are potentially capitalists and gave this story. There was a group of street people who received food aid. The donor gave it to the one who seemed most influential and fatherly. immediately the donor left the person set the rules. Give me a commission before I give you some food! The rest of the street people complied without question! Was that equality or something else? Should the donor come and interfere in this social order? Did all of them have access to the donation? Was it proportionate? What should the donor do to ensure that everybody gets the right access - equality?
I wish to ask a few salient questions. Why are the people on the street in the first place? Would they need donation if they are not in this situation? Who ensures equality in the jungle? But what are the rules of the jungle that enable everybody to have equality? I am watching a movie now and that movie is of the jungle where all sorts of animals are looking for food. Do you visualize what happens? The strong ones eat the weak. So the most critical challenge is making jungle laws and policies and expecting them to establish equality. The main challenge is using jungle plumb line to measure equality or equal access.
The challenge is in the creation of the word gender! A social construct that is beyond comprehension at any point in time! Why has society made women become so vulnerable like the small animals that are eaten by the tigers? So should we use the jungle law and say let the strong devour the weak since it is the law of the jungle? Do you know that even within the women's groups the stronger women wear the pants? Why is it so? So what law should we apply to ensure equality?
I think we should create alternative financing approaches. Nature does that. When the tigers over consume the small animals they reach a time when they food is so scarce the tigers die off - they call it natural selection or something like that. The main challenge is using the same plumb line.
Lets get another one aimed at women. This plumb line enable women to move money from one business to another. It should enable them to be themselves - women who have multiple roles. I hear you say is she mad? No am not!
I know women have succeeded through such processes. They grow crops and sell some of them when they need money, process some of them to keep for later time, process some of them and sell to generate money to buy other requirements - clothes, health services, transport, friends, mother's love, bread and sugar, school fees, meat and duck, etc. Is there organic financing that responds to such needs? In a subsistence economy, I quote;
"...Cassava is mainly grown by women in small fields as a mix of plants of up to 15 cultivars that are largely maintained by vegetative propagation of stem cuttings. Since everyone in the area is essentially a cassava farmers and since there are hardly any market opportunities, the harvesting of cassava for household consumption is done on a piecemeal basis throughout the year. Most of the planting is done in direct relation to the piecemeal harvesting. This results in fields with a mix of plants of different cultivars and different ages..." Mkumbira et al, Euphytica 132: 7-23, 2003
Do they do this due to lack of knowledge, lack of choice, or prudent management of their resources? Humans (read women) create agro-ecosystems to enhance indirect benefits. Even food security is a multifaceted problem. In the development situation obtaining we need to manage nature as we promote development.
How would I manage gender equality in agriculture finance for these women?
It is a social ecology problem of policy development and development financing. The answer is rooted in that excerpt from Mkumba et al, 2003. They need knowledge, they need choices, they need to belong to society, they need self actualization. If have seen women who started off spread but are now focused. Why? because they now have knowledge, and choices, and enabled tomanage their resources.
Deborah Wendiro
Chairperson - UGAWARD
Financing mechanisms
Submitted by Deborah Wendiro on Mon, 24/07/2017 - 15:09 Permalink
I still highlight the breadth of agriculture finance. The value chain stretches from farm to fork. That tortuous journey goes via transport industry, water and environment, energy, manufacturing, etc through market dynamics that are beyond the control, however minimal, of the women and other vulnerable groups.
The driver should be the will to enhance income that goes to the farmers especially women. We need to first strip off the transferred costs such as those to service an obtuse innovation system. Let the infrastructure be available easily. I have been enhancing access by conducting technology evaluation clinics whereby I go with the woman and look at the technology or invite a team of scientists and engineers to brainstorm with the woman and design a machine for her. This reduces the chance of her buying inappropriate machinery, or incurring costs of transport to look for machinery. I have facilitated fabrication of a fruit dryer, a banana juicer whereby after the bananas are peeled and enzymes are applied the woman presses out juice. So the bank could finance some of these activities as a way of financing agriculture.
The gender desks in all ministries that bear on agriculture should be resourced and networked (functionally reporting to the Ministry of Gender, Labor and Social Development) to enable them provide services to the women in a systematic and timely way.
In order for women to get access to technologies and markets, there should be exhibitions that are technology and product oriented. For example I have developed a production process for making lactic acid from cassava. They are not taking it up because "...where is the market? Those who use it are invisible. To make them visible we hold an exhibition during which we showcase some of the products and production processes that require lactic acid. When the women come to see they evaluate the whole process and are able to identify 'markets' they may even click deals there and then.
So how can we say this is a financing mechanism and how can they pay back?
I have found out that processing aids and additives are one of the most critical non-price factors preventing industrial growth in developing countries. Uganda for example imports 100% lactic acid, 100% enzymes, and 100% pectin etc - very important in food processing and preservation. Are you surprised that post harvest loss is high?
Financing viable enterprises is mutually rewarding to the creditor and debtor.
ONE MAIN REASON WHY WOMEN'S BUSINESSES FAIL IS NOT BECAUSE THEY ARE NOT ACTUALLY VIABLE BUT BECAUSE:
Deborah Wendiro
Chairperson UGAWARD