Bioversity International’s gender agenda gains momentum

Today, as we celebrate International Women's Day, it’s a good time to recognize the urgent need to better understand how gender plays out in smallholder farming systems and forest communities. This is crucial to developing effective strategies for the conservation and use of agricultural and forest biodiversity for food security.

Today, as we celebrate International Women's Day, it’s a good time to recognize the urgent need to better understand how gender plays out in smallholder farming systems and forest communities. This is crucial to developing effective strategies for the conservation and use of agricultural and forest biodiversity for food security.

'The Gender Agenda: Gaining Momentum' is the UN theme of this year's celebration and it could not be more timely as Bioversity International launches its Gender Research Fellowship Programme. Through this programme, five research fellows in countries in Sub-Saharan Africa, Central Asia, and South and Southeast Asia will study the differences in women's and men's knowledge, skills and management practices regarding tree resources in connection with the following research projects led by Bioversity International and carried out with local partners:

Burkina Faso: Threats to priority food tree species, drivers of resource losses and mitigation measures

•    Fellow: Ms Mawa Karambiri
•    National partner institute: Institut de l’Environnement et de Recherches Agricoles (INERA), Burkina Faso

Cameroon, Congo Basin: Beyond Timber: Reconciling the needs of logging industries with those of the forest-dependent people

•    Fellow: Ms Yvonne Kiki Nchanji
•    Partner institute: Centre for International Forestry Research (CIFOR)

Central Asia: Conservation of fruit tree diversity for livelihoods and nutrition

•    Fellow: Mr Kanaat Musuraliev
•    National partner institute: Innovation Centre of Phytotechnologies of National Academy of Sciences of the Kyrgyz Republic, Kyrgyzstan

South and Southeast Asia: In situ and on-farm conservation of wild and domesticated tropical fruit tree diversity

•    Fellows: Ms Faridah Aini Muhammad; Mr Narasinha Hegde
•    National partner institutes: Department of Agriculture, Malaysia; Life Trust, India.

When it comes to trees, women and men have different needs, interests, perspectives and aspirations. They make different but equally valuable contributions to the conservation and sustainable management of biodiversity. Women and men also derive distinct benefits from natural resource use. According to the World Bank, women in forest communities derive 50% of their income from forests, yet, they typically have less access than men to the institutions that govern forest management and use.

"When researchers go out in the field and contact local communities, they often speak to the head of the household – and in most cases this is a man. This means they are hearing only half of the story, and risk excluding the part of the story narrated by the most vulnerable part of the community: the women,” explains Marlène Elias, Bioversity International's Gender Specialist for the Management and Conservation of Forest Genetic Resources Program (part of the CGIAR Research Program and Trees, Forests and Agroforestry).

Starting in April, the fellows will address this gap in research on tree and forest resources and record and share women’s insights and perspectives from communities in countries across the developing world, in both moist forests and dry woodland areas.