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Do we need a gender lens for climate risk management?

Compelling discussion, commentary, stories on agriculture within thriving ecosystems.

This post is part of the Agriculture and Ecosystems Blog’s month-long series on Resilience.

Variation in agricultural output, due to climatic shocks, is a significant source of risk in agriculture.  It’s also a significant constraint to both agricultural growth and food security. Are men and women affected differently by climate risk? If so, do policies then need to specifically address women’s needs in addition to men’s needs?

My colleague Joshua Gill and I investigated the effect that farm assets and access to irrigation may have on male and female farmers in the face of climate variability in a recently released study financed by BMZ.

Farmers working in Mali. Photo: P.Casier/CCAFS Farmers in Mali. Photo: P.Casier/CCAFS

Climate variability affects production

In rain-fed production systems around the world, including in the Segou region of Mali, there is increasing evidence that climatic variability through changes in temperature, rainfall, and the frequency of drought and flood are part of a longer term deviation from historical trends. Rainfall is now 12 percent below the 1920-1969 average while temperatures increased 0.8 Celsius since 1975.

We find that this climate variability has real adverse consequences on the production possibilities of farmers in Mali.  In particular, higher temperatures (measured by degree days) significantly reduce men and women’s marketed surplus.  Marketed surplus is the portion of the harvest that farmers take to market to exchange for other goods, so decreases in marketed surplus reduce income available to finance basic needs and a more diverse diet for their families.

How are men and women affected?

The effects of climate variability on agricultural output are larger for men, primarily because men cultivate more land than women.  Men also cultivate in the primary rain-fed agricultural season and may have access to irrigation.  Alternatively, women often cultivate in the dry season on smaller plots where they have access to some well water.

We also find that both irrigation and farm capital including tools and machines can mitigate the effects of climate variability. For men, access to irrigation allows them to partially offset production losses due to climate variability, but low access to irrigation for women does not permit the same type of risk mitigating strategy.

Women also have unequal access to farm assets.  Without access to critical farm assets, women can not as effectively mitigate the adverse impacts of climate variability.

Policy implications

From our results, it is clear that gender is of central importance to climate smart agricultural policy. If women are able to gain access to appropriate resources, such as irrigation and farm assets, this could offset many of the negative effects of climate variability on their own plots.  Yet women have much less control over farm assets in Mali than men do.

To increase resilience in the face of climate change, improving access for women and men to technologies, such as irrigation, and assets, such as farm tools, will be central to the formulation of climate change adaptation programs.