Index of female empowerment in agricultura

Abstract

Until now, little is known about the role of women in agriculture and their empowerment. The present investigation seeks to contribute to this field of knowledge, by calculating the women’s empowerment in agriculture index (WEAI) in the Malacatos parish in southern Ecua­dor for the year 2023. This work used the Pro-WEAI methodology developed by the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI), which consists of an instrument that analyzes 5 dimensions of empow­erment. The information was collected in 143 farmer households in the study area, during the period February-May 2023. The calculation of the index is based on two subindices: the Index of the three domains of empowerment (3DE) with 10 indicators and the gender parity index (IPG), weighted at 90% and 10% respectively. The results show that in most of the indicators, general conditions were acceptable for women farmers, except for labor balance and access to financial resources. The women’s empowerment index was 63 %, the same as the percent­age of empowered women farmers. One of the biggest challenges to improving the conditions of women in rural areas is that they require reconciliation between agricultural, community, and care activities, for both men and women.