Empowering women farmers: A mechanization catalogue for practitioners

Rural women across the world work along agri-food value chains performing numerous agricultural operations. Their work is increasingly affected by land degradation, climate change impacts, and out-migration. It is often unrecognized, unqualified, and unpaid. Moreover, the traditional division of labor often relegates women to manual, time-consuming operations with high degrees of drudgery. The combination of family responsibilities and insufficient access to critical services, information, and technologies, affects women’s work burden and their potential for income generation. For example, fewer rights over land make it more difficult for women to access subsidies, finance, or mechanization. There are three ways in which sustainable mechanization can empower women and respond to their needs: as customers of mechanization service providers - reducing their drudgery, and freeing up time for resting or opting for other social or economic activities; as operators of machinery and equipment or staff of a mechanization hiring services business - offering their service to others to earn an income; as entrepreneurs managing their own mechanization hiring services agribusiness - providing a service for other farmers and generating revenue. The goal of this catalogue is to promote and support women’s access to sustainable agricultural mechanization as operators and/or managers. It lists and provides information on market-tested machinery and equipment for crop production and post-harvest operations. This catalogue highlights the potential for smallholder farmers, including women, to earn an income via mechanization hire service. The information for each machine or equipment includes: its function its main features what it is suitable for its technical specifications (key features only) where to buy its pictures. The target audience includes extensionists, gender experts, agricultural engineers, government officials, donors, micro-finance institutions, and implementing partners seeking to: promote inclusive agricultural mechanization interventions; reduce women’s drudgery and improve the efficiency of tasks they perform; address gender issues in agriculture; support economic opportunities for women as entrepreneurs.