Proceedings of the Kansas State University 1985 Farming Systems Research Symposium.
No. 8 (in press)
USING MALE RESEARCH AND EXTENSION PERSONNEL TO TARGET WOMEN FARMERS
Anita Spring
University of Florida
A group of people en route to the FSR Conference met a child with a wagon load of puppies. One of them asked
where the child was taking the puppies and the child
answered that the puppies were going to be given to the commodity researchers (this was a sophisticated child).
The next day, after the conference had started, the
participants were en route to lunch and they came across
the same child again. One of the participants introduced
the child to some people who hadn't been there the day
before and asked the same question about the fate of the
puppies. This time the child said the puppies were
being taken to the farming systems researchers. The
participants pointed out that only yesterday the child
said the puppies were going to commodity researchers.
"But," the child replied, "yesterday, the puppies didn't
have their eyes open."
INTRODUCTION
To many FSR proponents, commodity-oriented scientists do not focus on the
whole farming system and therefore do not have their eyes open. They cannot
appreciate the complexities of small farm management and smallholder needs and
problems. This is analagous to the way those involved in farming systems
research and extension (FSR/E) feel about the lack of appreciation and
consideration of gender issues and intrahousehold dynamics amongst FSR&E
practictioners. Those who ignore these issues do not have their eyes open.
Farming systems researchers did not invent the fact that farmers have to deal
with a multitude of environmental, familial, infrastructural, and other
factors, so that a focus on a single commodity might not remedy the problems
of the farming system. So too, researchers who consider women's role in
agriculture did not invent the sexual division of labor, the semiautonomous nature of different family members, the differential access to land, labor,
and capital, or the fact that women are becoming more involved in the
smallholder sector in some developing countries because of extensive male
migration (Chaney and Lewis, 1980; Gladwin et al.; Dixon, 1982).
Evidence is accumulating that technology transfer is frequently hindered when
intrahousehold dynamics are not taken into account (see for example Rogers,
1979; McKee, 1984). Often, technologies are ill-suited or only partially
adopted because the resource base in terms of personnel, capital, land, and
equipment is inappropriate or inadequately understood. A consideration of
intrahousehold labor allocations and decision-making shows that in many places
female family members will have to provide the labor and will either make or
be involved in the decision as to whether or not to adopt the technology. In
addition, labor, access to resources, and remuneration are not consolidated in
one neat family unit everywhere in the world, but often are dispersed among