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“WOMEN FARMING WORKERS IN AGRICULTURE SECTOR IN INDIA - A REVIEW”
Mr. Manish Mohod
MBA 1st Year, Department of Business Administration (MBA), Sipna College of Engineering & Technology, Amravati
Prof. D. R. Chawda
Assistant Professor, Sipna College of Engineering & Technology, Amravati Prof. S. S. Gupta
Assistant Professor, Sipna College of Engineering & Technology, Amravati
Abstract- In India in 2009, 94% of the female agricultural labour force in crop cultivation was in cereal production, while 1.4% worked in vegetable production, and 3.72% were engaged in fruits, nuts, beverages, and spice crops. It shows the dominance of women farming workers in agriculture sector in India. These voices need to be heard at both the policy and implementation levels if it is to realize the dream of a progressive India. Women farmers in India perform most of the big farming jobs, from sowing to harvesting, yet their access to resources is less than their male counterparts. Despite their dominance of the labour force women in India still face extreme disadvantage in terms of pay, land rights, and representation in local farmer’s organizations. The research paper tries to find out the issues and problems from the ample available review of literature.
Keywords: Women workers, Farming, problem and issues.
1 INTRODUCTION
According to 2011, World Bank data, only 17.5% of India's gross domestic product (GDP) is accounted for by agricultural production. Yet for a majority of the country, an estimated 72% of the 1.1 billion people who live in rural India, it is a way of life.1 Based on 2012 data, India is home to the fourth largest agricultural sector in the world. India has an estimated 180 million hectares of farmland with 140 million of which are planted and continuously cultivated. Yet India's agricultural profile is shadowed by the controversial impacts of Green Revolution policies that were adopted in the 1960s and 70s with pressure from the United States Agency for International Development and the World Bank.
India's agricultural sector today still faces issues of efficiency due lack of mechanization with poorer conditions of farmers, as well as small farm sizes. In India traditional agriculture is still dominant as many farmers depend on livestock in crop production, for manure as fertilizers, and the use animal powered ploughs. According to 2011 statistics, the average farm in India is about 1.5 acres, minuscule when compared the average of 50 hectares in France and or 178 hectares in United States and 273 hectares in Canada.2 Furthermore, as small farmers face the increasing competition with larger farm operations
an increasing number of men migrate to city centers for higher wages and employment. Women are in turn left to support the family structure and support small farm lifestyle. In rural India, the percentage of women who depend on agriculture for their livelihood is as high as 84%. Women make up about 33% of cultivators and about 47% percent of agricultural laborers.(2006)3 These statistics do not account for work in livestock, fisheries and various other ancillary forms of food production in the country. In 2009, 94% of the female agricultural labour force in crop cultivation was in cereal production, while 1.4% worked in vegetable production, and 3.72% were engaged in fruits, nuts, beverages, and spice crops. In 2011, the agricultural sector workforce in the subcontinent was 75% women. Women's participation rate in the agricultural sectors is about 47% in tea plantations, 46.84% in cotton cultivation, 45.43%
growing oil seeds and 39.13% in vegetable production4. While these crops require labor-intensive work, the work is considered quite unskilled. Women also heavily participate in ancillary agricultural activities. According to the Food and Agriculture Organization, Indian women represented a share of 21% and 24% of all fishers and fish farmers, respectively.
95 Despite their dominance of the
labour force women in India still face extreme disadvantage in terms of pay, land rights, and representation in local farmer’s organizations. Furthermore, their lack of empowerment often results in negative externalities such as lower educational attainment for their children and poor familial health. An estimated 52- 75% of Indian women engaged in agriculture are illiterate, an education barrier that prevents women from participating in more skilled labor sectors.
In all activities there is an average gender wage disparity, with women earning only 70 percent of men's wage. Additionally, many women participate in agricultural work as unpaid subsistence labor. The lack of employment mobility and education render the majority of women in India vulnerable, as dependents on the growth and stability of the agricultural market.
2 A REVIEW: ROLL AND ISSUES OF WOMEN FARMERS
1. An international conference on agriculture debate the multiple challenges faced by women in farms across developing economies, including finding gender-sensitive solutions to reduce drudgery involved in farm work with better technology innovation. From sowing to selling farm products, women’s role in agriculture has been globally recognized, A. Ayyappan (2010), director general of Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR), express views on in the three-day conference will address ways to empower women to achieve higher productivity, and drudgery reduction is an important aspect, he added. Women constitute 43% of agricultural workers in much of the developing world, most of whom are forced to make do with less access to resources such as water, fertilizer and market outlets than men.
Experts say that by providing these basic services to women, agriculture productivity could grow 20-25% to meet food security and reduce hunger at a time when food import bill is soaring.5
2. According to a release by the Rome-headquartered Global Forum on Agricultural Research (2011), one of the event sponsors, improved access to women in agriculture could bring down
the number of hungry people by 12-17%, or 100-150 million. In India, the gender dimension in agriculture and its link with nutrition is revealed by the numbers.
Nearly 40% of Indian children and one- third of Indian women are underweight, according to the 2005-06 National Family Health Survey. Some 80% of rural women are involved in farming activities, weeding, transplanting and harvesting with rudimentary tools.
3. The Directorate of Research on Women in Agriculture (DRWA), part of ICAR (2013), is preparing a nationwide drudgery index to measure the time and frequency of the participation of women in agricultural operations.
4. Improved technology will reduce the work load and improve efficiency in agricultural operations, said Krishna Srinath (2013), director at the Bhubaneswar-based DRWA.
“Today, much of the equipment is not customized for women. Our mandate is to refine technology (with) a gender perspective,” said Srinath (2013).
5. The Central Institute of Agricultural Engineering has begun an exercise to customize tools for women.
But a far bigger challenge would be to expand the reach of these products, said Pritam (2015) Chandra, director of the Bhopal-based institute. “India needs to step up resources to find solutions faster.
We need to set up the right foundation to scale up the agenda,” he said.
6. In one of the article published on 31, March 2014, highlighted 6 Challenges facing women in farming (2014). These are as follows6:
1. Access to land: Women produce 80 percent of crops and own about one percent of land. This illustrates the lack of security in ownership, and in most cases of the one percent that own smaller plots to men that are less fertile.
2. Access to funding: Women tend to face greater challenges when it comes to securing credit. They are generally less experienced with the ins and outs of borrowing from an institution, and without assistance and support they find it difficult to access much needed funding. Women receive seven percent of the agricultural extension services and less than ten percent of the credit offered to small-scale farmers.
96 3. Limited access to new practices:
Most agricultural extension focuses on large-scale commercial farming with limited research conducted on small farming techniques, which are often owned by women.
4. Limited access to technological advancements: Most advanced technology includes ploughs, cultivators, planters, harvesters and irrigation equipment. Most of these advancements are aimed at a male specific audience, with improvements aimed to accommodate their requirements.
5. Less market opportunities: Lack of market research and information limit women farmers to market opportunities.
Women are confined to local markets where prices are generally lower than in urban markets.
6. Lack of infrastructure: Access to transport and logistics would improve the mobility of women farmers and they could sell more of their farm produce in time.
7. In the article published by Mrinal Pande (2017)7, titled “The invisible women farmers”, lastly she quote that, At a time when fundamentalism and neo- fascism are on the rise and unfettered consumerism and trade treaties are eroding old communities and threatening the environment, when measures like the ban on animal slaughter are impacting the dairy industry and destroying jobs, diseases due to the contamination of earth and water are erupting everywhere can we afford to sustain gender barriers between human beings unquestioningly?
When not just the politicians and media persons but also the farmers regard the impoverished sea of women farmers as a faceless void, they deny them their humanity while diminishing their own.
8. In the article published in Business Line by Hema swaminathan (2017)8, titled “Women Farmers Need Policy Attention” highlighted that, Women have made significant contributions to agriculture in India. The current situation of rural transformation has brought to light women’s roles in agriculture.
Typically, any discussion on this topic tends to focus on the most obvious trends; the proportion of women working in the agricultural sector as self- employed, unpaid help or wage labour.
What is ignored is an important and
interesting shift in women’s roles: women are increasingly participating in farms as managers and decision-makers. One of the principal drivers pushing women into farm management is male out-migration from rural to urban areas in search of a better life. But what happens to women left behind in these rural households?
Migration is an important strategy for livelihood diversification, particularly for rural households. In India, short-term migration, not permanent migration, is responsible for worker mobility, with studies showing men are more likely to migrate than women. Certainly, there will be some labour adjustment in the households left behind in the migrant’s origin community. How this is managed will depend on household size and structure (joint or nuclear family), social norms, and expectations of men and women’s responsibilities. It is reasonable to expect that these factors will affect men and women differentially.
9. S Chandrasekhar (2017)9 (Indira Gandhi Institute of Development Research) and Soham Sahoo (University of Gottingen), analysed data from the National Sample Survey Organisation’s (NSSO) Survey on Land and Livestock Holdings. This survey was conducted in rural India from January to December 2013 covering 35,000 households across two visits. For the first time in India, the NSSO survey collected information on short-term migrants and if any household member was an operator of the land cultivated by the household. An operator could be either a main or an associate operator and is one who makes major or minor decisions, respectively, about the household operational holdings.
Estimates from our data show that in 2013, 11.8 million women and 85 million men aged 15-65 were the main operators.
Our results further suggest that women are less likely than men to be either main or an associated operator. Interestingly, in households with a short-term migrant, women are more likely to be an operator.
This suggests that in the absence of men (although we do not know the sex of the migrant from the survey; literature indicates that migrants are mostly male), women are making farming decisions.
10. In the Article published by World Economic Forum (2017)10, titled
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“It’s time to recognize and empower India’s women farmers” it is expressed that, the empowerment of Indian women will not be complete without empowering those who are living at India's last periphery. These are the women farmers of India, whose voices often go unheard owing to their gender, and who struggle to establish their identity at a grassroots level due to patriarchal traditions and gender socialization. These voices need to be heard at both the policy and implementation levels if we are to realize the dream of a progressive India. Women farmers in India perform most of the big farming jobs, from sowing to harvesting, yet their access to resources is less than their male counterparts. Closing this gender gap is essential in order to accelerate the pace of growth in the agriculture sector. Article further added that, Thus an inclusive approach, all the way from policy to implementation, is essential to bring women working in agriculture into the mainstream and to empower them with direct access to knowledge of improved agricultural practices. It is also important to observe how increasing male migration away from villages has brought about significant changes to the work village women do, both at the household and societal level.
For example, migration from rural Bihar is high and has steadily increased over the past 30 years. The proportion of migrant workers to total workers in the region has increased from 15.7% in 1998- 99 to 25.5% in 2009-10.
11. An Article by Sanna Blomgren (2016)11, titled “It's Time to Recognize Women Farmers” recognized that, there are a lot of initiatives in India aimed at the empowerment of small farmers.
However, they are often formed to fit the average male farmer, which means that they fail to address the specific needs of women farmers. Taking care of the household and the children result in women having less time and opportunity.
Furthermore, if women are not recognized as farmers in the first place, they will still be overlooked when new projects for farmers’ empowerment are initiated.
Women play a vital role in food production, not only in India, but around the world. However, due to patriarchal structures they do not have equal access
to land ownership. In India, 80% of all rural female workers are in agriculture, but only 9.4% own land. We know that if women could improve their economic and social status it generates more productive farms and decreases child malnutrition. If women were to be given equal access to productive resources, they could yield 20- 30 % more. She added that, If women farmers are not recognized, if they do not have access to productive resources, if they do not have access to proper education, who will feed the next generation?
12. In the article published in livemint (2017)12, titled “Female farmers gaining ground in rural India” it is emphasised that, Gender roles in tradition-bound rural India are slowly changing with women having to take control as large numbers of working-age men migrate to cities for jobs and amid a wave of suicides by male farmers battling to provide for their families.
Acknowledging the growing role women play in India’s key agricultural sector, state governments, farming groups, and private industry are starting to train women to lead farms, teaching them about crops, irrigation, and finance. It is further added that, repeated studies show that when women control the family’s finances, they invest more in their children, businesses and communities, which can be a step out of poverty. Article also highlighted that, A report by the charity Oxfam released in January, titled An Economy for the 99 per cent, said more than 40% of 400 million women living in rural India—a third of India’s 1.2 billion population—work in agriculture.
According to official data, women make up more than a third of India’s agriculture workforce, yet only about 13% of farmland is owned by women. United Nations studies have indicated closing the gender gap in agriculture could lift an estimated 100 to 150 million people from 800 million globally out of the clutches of hunger. Campaigners hope a set of United Nations global goals agreed in 2015 and aiming for gender equality by 2030 could help elevate women’s role in rural India with a commitment to give women equal access to decent work, education, and healthcare.
98 13. “Empowering Women in
Agriculture” an article published by M.S.
Swaminathan (2013)13, expressed his view in two points in relation to this article which merit clarification. First, the Bill is a Private Members’ Bill introduced by me in the Rajya Sabha and not a Government Bill. Secondly, a woman farmer has been defined in the draft Bill as below:
Explanation: The term “farmer” will include, but not limited to, agricultural operational holders, landless cultivators, agricultural labourers, planting labourers, pastoralists, sharecroppers and tenants.
The term will not include corporate entities operated by or involving farmers.
In case of landless farmers migrating or moving from one State to another, if anyone stays in a State for at least six months, such person may be considered as a farmer in that particular State.
“Woman farmer” means and includes, irrespective of marital status or ownership of land, any woman who is a farmer as defined in subsection (c) of section 2 and includes
(i) Any woman living in rural area and primarily engaged in agricultural activity, though occasionally engaged in non-agricultural activity;
or
(ii) Any woman living in urban or semi- urban areas and engaged in agriculture; or
(iii) Any tribal woman directly or indirectly engaged in agriculture or shifting cultivation or in the collection, use and sale of minor or non-timber forest produce by virtue of usufructory rights.
Thus, the definition is comprehensive but the author is correct in pointing out that according to existing practices and policies agricultural credit is only calculated on the basis of land-holding and the potential for kharif and rabi crops. Thus, all landless people including women have a problem. Having other assets such as livestock or goats or hens does not entitle the person to credit, whether male or female.
2.1 Problems Faced by Farming Women From the analysis of the Review of literature few of problems identified which are as follows:
1. Lack of Social Status: It is mainly observed in the review of literature that women farming workers are lagging in recognition in the society. They are not getting social status which they deserve in the context of India. Agriculture industry and farming are not complete without the need of women workers, in this scenario the women workers in farming should get and social status.
2. Health Suffers: Another major problem which is faced by the women farming workers are the health issues.
They are working in very critical condition in rural area. They have compromise with their health also to earn some income.
Women workers didn’t get proper food, rest and improper sanitation infrastructure, this leads to the unhygienic working condition for the women workers in farming.
3. Overworked: Women are the backbone of any family, in rural area also the role of the women are now not just limited to house work, they have to move out of the house and work to earn and contribute to financial empowerment of the family.
Farming working women are also balancing the family work together, they are overworked due to balancing the family life mentally as well as physically.
4. Discrimination: Women farmers were still operating under greater constraints than men as they had less access to information, technology, land, inputs and credit which leads to discrimination. Their multiple roles also constrained their time and mobility with a higher proportion of them being illiterate and engaging in subsistence agriculture without being up to date with current technologies. The focus on increasing production of cash crops is achieving by providing men with training, information, and access to inputs and services. This male bias has been demonstrated in farmer training centres, which are established to provide residential training on technical subjects.
Like most other locations where farmer training is conducted, they do not provide separate washing and sleeping accommodations for men and women, which has prevented women from attending much training at the centres.
Further, extension services from the Government were and still are staffed predominantly by men as there are
99 probably not enough qualified women who
are able to take up these positions at the field level.
5. Travelling: Travelling is the main issue in India for farming working women as improper transportation facility available at the rural area. Due to which the travelling time for working women is high and which leads to less productivity.
There is very less focused by concerning authorities is on the travelling options for working women in rural area.
6. Safety: All the above issue leads to the safety of the women farming workers. The most important issue for these women is because of their unorganized structure hence they are invisible. It leads to the insecurity to these women working in rural area.
3 CONCLUSION
India's agricultural sector today still faces issues of efficiency due lack of mechanization with poorer conditions of farmers, as well as small farm sizes. In India traditional agriculture is still dominant as many farmers depend on livestock in crop production, for manure as fertilizers, and the use animal powered ploughs. From ancient time in farming women are playing important role as that of mans. Their contribution in every functional area of farming is not less than man. Even statistics says that, women produce 80 percent of crops and own about one percent of land. But still there a position in agricultural economy is very insignificant and dominated by men’s.
They are not getting more role indecision making related to strategy formation in the agriculture sector from household to national level. So now there is need to make some remarkable changes to recognize the role of the women in farming sector either by general or statutory intervention. As women’s are those whose day starts before sunrise and continues after sunset.
REFERENCE
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