1. Gender, Agriculture, Nutrition
Lynn Brown
World Bank, GenRD, SecureNutrition, GDPRD
GFAR/GAP Side Event
CFS Oct 10th 2013

2. Upstream What governs agricultural research?
Whose needs?
Agriculture Production – food or commodity?
Cars and food!!!
Who does produce food?
Food Industry – developed versus developing
How is research structured – is it gendered?
Car industry produces a consumer good…how do we talk about R and D?
Fuel economy, flex fuel, speed, 0-60, saloon, hatchback, head room, rear seat?
But how do we talk about agriculture – drought tolerance, salinity resistance, striga resistance, roundup ready! We talk about input traits not the output characteristics of the product!
Developing looks just the same even tho people in the developing world would probably recognize their crops in the field, the developed world largely wouldn’t.

3. Focus of Agricultural Research
Focus of agricultural research – commodity based
Staple grains
Input or Output Characteristics?
Focus of Agricultural Research
Again input focused, commodity focused for people who sell immediately but what do women care about –output traits as well, starkly illustrated by an example in Zambia

4. Gender Preferences Zambia – men and women grow maize
No need for gender analysis – assumed a new hybrid maize would be good for everyone!
Evaluation of hybrid maize
Men still growing
Women reverted to traditional maize
Why?
Roles of maize for men and women
Men – cash crop
Women – food crop, labor input –yield, milling, storage,

5. Focus of Agricultural Research
Staple Grains
Input or Output Characteristics?
Sale or storage?
Large Livestock
Cash crops – public/private
Focus of Agricultural Research
Commoditization
Fruits?
Vegetables?
Small livestock?
Storage?
Processing?

6. Environmental Enteropathy EE
Gut permeability
Allows nutrients to leak from the gut
Gambian infants 3-15 mths – 75% of time
Accountable for 43% of long term growth faltering?
Nutrition interventions led to 0.7 Z score increase in height for age
Environment – s***!
Reversible – immigrants, Peace Corps
Women’s issue or responsibility?

7. Mycotoxins
Evidence they cause EE type issues
Aspergillus fungus/mold
Aflatoxins – mostly maize and groundnuts
Fusarium fungus/mold – 100% of maize
FUM
DON
Infected during growth
Worsened during storage, particularly is poor drying

8. Aflatoxin-Albumin and stunting / underweight (Gong et al., 2002 BMJ)
Af--Alb pg/mg

9. Why doesn’t agricultural research take into account gender issues?
Why is there so little focus on environmental health issues from small livestock,
Why don’t we understand the pathways with respect to nutrition for any mycotoxin?
We do know aflatoxins is one reason deaths from liver cancer are highest in the developing world
Questions
IT’S A WOMEN’S ISSUE