Participación de la mujer en las decisiones sobre el uso y la intensidad de siembra de variedades de arroz en ecuador

Abstract

Women’s contribution in agriculture is often not recognized, and this limits the
design of policies for targeting gender equality. The most recent body of literature
has provided lessons about the role of women and its importance to improve
agricultural productivity. However, these studies show that women’s contribution
in agriculture is heterogeneous and context specific. Furthermore, there is a lack
of evidence in Latin America about women’s roles and even less for specific crops
like rice in Ecuador, which is considered to be a male-dominated crop. Our study
confirms previous qualitative study results that demonstrate the importance of
women in rice production. Households, where women participate in the decision
process to select rice varieties, are more likely to adopt modern varieties. In addition,
in households that adopt improved varieties, women’s participation in the decision
about which variety to plant, is correlated with a larger land area sown in those
varieties than in households without female participation. These conclusions can
support the dialogue and design of policies that aim to improve the rice sector and
increase gender equality