The IFOAM Study on Organic Agriculture and Women’s Empowerment and the IFOAM Training Module on Gender in Organic Agriculture
It is IFOAM’s goal to facilitate equal participation of women in the Organic Agriculture movement. In this context, a new IFOAM study investigates the ways in which OA can contribute to the empowerment of rural women, and identifies lessons learned for future work on the basis of a collection of analytical case studies from around the world.
To complement the IFOAM Training Manual Series, the IFOAM Gender Module provides information on using a gender sensitive approach in
Organic Agriculture. The training module describes the main gender
issues for small-scale organic farmers in tropical
regions. It is available for download in English , French and Spanish .
A day-long program of cultural events, presentations and discussions at
IFOAM's 16th Organic World Congress (Modena, June 2008) highlighted the
important roles the women play in organic agriculture. Download the report.
Compared with conventional agriculture, women have played a
more prominent role in the development of Organic Agriculture and the organic
sector organizations. It is often the woman in the farm household who initiates
the process of conversion to organic. All over the world women are taking
leading roles in the development of organic, as farmers, consumers,
researchers, traders, and advisors, or in the organization of the organic
sector (e.g. Southeast Brazil, Sweden,
Thailand, USA).The IFOAM Africa Office (IAO) has collected case studies from women in organic agriculture in Burkina Faso, Senegal, Uganda, Ghana and Zimbabwe. Read the case studies on the IAO page.
