Rural women: at the front of food safety and climate control

… Every time I go to the village she takes my hand and say “let me show you.” In the shade of the big apricot tree, there are large bowl with colored dried fruits.  Colors are becoming more and more beautiful, fried fruits – more and more, and no more place in the refrigerator. She does not leave the place for drinking water,” Hripsime’s son is joking and promising to buy  freezing for his mother.

October 15 is the day of rural women. According to the UN Food and Agriculture Organization’s Food Safety Status Report, published today, rural women constitute a quarter of the world’s population. In developing countries, they account for 43% of the agricultural labor force. In the UN, they consider them the main source of natural resources.

“Their primary responsibility is to protect their food security because they develop process and prepare most of the products,” the report says.

Despite the decline in extreme poverty in the world, one billion people continue to live in unacceptable conditions. Many of them are mainly concentrated in rural areas. Here, poverty is at a higher level than in urban areas.

About 80 percent of food is produced by smaller farmers in Asia and Sahara Africa, the main source of income for about 2.5 billion people.

According to some estimates, the reduction of gender gap and land use in women in Africa will result in an increase in food production by 20 percent. In reality, this can bring about threefold benefit: gender equality, food security and climate management, which can be cost-effective in achieving Sustainable Development goals.

Full text in Armenian