Disempowerment by Gender in Agriculture: Evidence and Implications for Interventions

Emily Mutea, American Institutes for Research
Sudhanshu Handa, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
Bpniface Kiteme, CETRAD

Despite agriculture’s significant contribution to livelihood, the sector is facing a decline due to natural resource depletion and soil erosion. Similar challenges are facing Kenya’s Great Rift valley region, which is the focus of this study. There is a growing interest by public-private water funds to implement nature-based solutions for sustainable soil and water conservation approaches for agricultural sustainability. Yet, gender-based constraints hinder the uptake of these approaches. Using the Pro- Women’s Empowerment in Agriculture Index (Pro-WEAI), this paper assesses disempowerment by gender how and why the sources of disempowerment differ, and implications for interventions. Overall, men had a slightly higher disempowerment score than women. Group membership and membership in influential groups (collective agency), had the highest contribution to disempowerment for both men and women. Other large contributors to disempowerment were respect among household members, intimate partner violence, vising important locations, and control over the use of income.