TWENTY-FIVE YEARS OF RESEARCH ON WOMEN FARMERS IN AFRICA: LESSONS AND IMPLICATIONS FOR AGRICULTURAL RESEARCH INSTITUTIONS; WITH AN ANNOTATED BIBLIOGRAPHY

Gender Issues and the Adoption of Maize Technology in Africa:
An Annotated Bibliography

Cheryl R. Doss and Amy McDonald

Introduction

As new technologies for maize production become available in Africa, a number of gender issues arise. To what extent do
women farmers adopt these technologies? How do the constraints faced by women farmers affect their decisions about
technology adoption? How does the adoption of technology affect women farmers and how does it change the dynamics
of labor and resource allocation within the household?

Unfortunately, few of these questions have been directly addressed with regard to maize technologies in Africa. However,
the following annotated bibliography includes a wide range of articles that provide some insights into these issues,
including articles on women and farming in Africa, technology adoption, maize farming in Africa, and household
decision-making.

In instances where the majority of articles in an edited volume are relevant, the book, rather than the individual articles,
is cited in the bibliography. In instances where only one or two articles are relevant, the specific articles are cited.

Abbott, S. 1976. Full-time farmers and week-end wives: An
analysis of altering conjugal roles. Journal of Marriage
and the Family. Pp. 165-73.

Decision-making patterns among the Kikuyu of Nigeria
(where maize is the staple crop) are analyzed with special
attention focused on the contrast between cultural
expectations and verbal reports of actual decision patterns.
Reports about decision-making processes suggest that
women possess more decision-making power, either
individually or jointly with their husbands, than expressed
under the cultural ideal. Factors including labor migration
(and the subsequent absence of the husband), homestead
structure, phase in the domestic cycle, control of valuable
resources, and the employment status of the wife all have
the power to override traditional expectations. This article
concludes that women’s real decision-making power may
extend beyond what is often indicated in surveys or
interviews, which may reflect cultural ideals more than
actual patterns of behavior. Understanding how decisions
are made and who makes them are essential for the
planning of research and development projects.

Adams, A. 1993. Food insecurity in Mali: Exploring the
role of the moral economy. IDS Bulletin 24(4): 41-51.

Understanding local systems of mutual insurance is
important to designing strategies for famine prevention and
development efforts. In Mali, the center of Bambara social
and economic organization is the household. A household is
composed of individuals who negotiate between collective
and individual interests in the process of farming common
fields and consuming grain from a common granary.
Through exchange and social investment, households
attempt to spread their risk. Within the village, households
spread risk through their relation to lineage households,
nonlineage households, artisans, and age-set groups.
Beyond the village, households maintain relationships with
migrant workers, in-laws, and local traders. In the early
stages of widespread food crises, nonmarket transfers are
very common and vital. If a crisis continues for a sufficient
length of time, however, households limit aid to immediate
family members and the ability of nonmarket transfers to
cushion food insecurity diminishes. Those excluded from
nonmarket transfers tend to be households with insufficient
production that are marginalized from exchange networks
because they are unwilling or unable to invest in social
strategies and institutions that mediate nonmarket
exchange. Women and men play different roles in managing
risk. Women maintain close social ties with their natal
families and villages, while men’s links are with age-based
groups and lineage ties.

<<   29   30   31   32   33   34   35   >>

More intriguing information