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Are African high-value horticulture supply chains bearers of gender inequality?

Year of publication 2009

Pages 25 p.

Author Maertens, M.;Swinnen, J. F. M.

Publisher FAO ;

Product type Document

Edition 1

Synopsis (short abstract) Modern supply chains – comprising the production and trade of high-value produce, such as horticulture products, destined for high-income markets – are expanding rapidly across developing regions. While there is consensus that the emergence and spread of modern food supply chains is profoundly changing the way food is produced and traded in developing countries, there is still debate on the welfare implications. In this debate the gender effects of high-value agri-food trade and modernization of supply chains remain an almost unexplored issue. In this paper we examine the gender implications in modern horticulture supply chains with a main focus on Africa. We conceptualize the various mechanisms through which women are directly affected by the emergence of modern supply chains, we review existing empirical evidence and add new survey-based quantitative evidence from two studies of high-value horticulture supply chains in Senegal. Our results suggest that the growth of modern horticultu re supply chains has been associated with direct beneficial effects for rural women and reduced gender inequalities in rural areas. We find that that women benefit more and more directly from large-scale estate production and agro-industrial processing, and the creation of employment in these modern agro-industries than from high-value smallholder contract-farming. In addition, we identify several additional unresolved issues where conclusive empirical evidence is still lacking, or where complex causal links of direct and indirect effects are not completely understood yet.

Language English

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