Rural Women: Innovators, Guardians, Storytellers, and a Driving Force for Food Systems Transformation
October 15 is a day to honor and celebrate rural women worldwide. Rural Women’s Day, deservedly so, is meant to bring attention to women who have so long served as the backbone of their communities.
We cannot talk about food system transformation without acknowledging the significant role played by rural women. Due to their contributions to agriculture and food and nutrition security at household, local, and national levels., they should be at the forefront of the conversation.
In her book Staying Alive: Women, Ecology, and Development, Vananda Shiva opens with a reminder of the role women play when it comes to food and farming around the world, since the earliest days of human history,
"Agriculture has been evolved by women. Most food producers, farmers, in the world are women, and most girls are future farmers; they learn the skills and knowledge of farming in fields and farms,” writes Shiva. “Women also produce more than half the world’s food and provide more than 80 percent of the food needs in food insecure households and regions.“
Women, despite their contributions over eons, are often not adequately represented in data sets when it comes to measuring their contribution to agriculture. Why? Because they do too much work, and statisticians fail to account for work done both inside and outside the house, farming inherently is both. Because so much of the work done by women contributes to the sustainability of families and communities, work is measured as “household chores” as opposed to what it really is, contributions to the market.
Over the years, women have been continuously written out of the stories we tell about agriculture. In return, rural women also now bear the greatest burden of the failures of our food systems. That said, to this day, rural women play some of the most active roles in the entire food system, from production to processing, distribution, and preparation, as well as securing household nutrition. According to The Food and Agriculture Organization ( FAO), women make up about 48 percent of the agricultural labor force globally. However, they are disproportionately affected by food insecurity and hunger.
The theme of this year’s International Day of Rural Women attempts to shift the narrative. “Rural Women Cultivating Good Food for All” highlights the role that rural women and girls play in the food systems of the world. Today we acknowledge that in addition to their indispensable involvement in food systems processes, rural women serve as preservationists, storytellers, and educators, sharing traditional food knowledge and guardians of natural resources.
It is high time for us as a global collective to invite more rural women to the table, support projects they lead, and transform our food system so that everyone can access healthy and nutritious food, especially those on the front lines.