1,721,087 research outputs found
Round I: Gender-disaggregated household survey data on rural women empowerment and technological change in wheat, Madhya Pradesh
No full textGender equality is an indicator of sustainable development and also a means toward it. One of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) set by United Nations is to achieve gender equality and empowerment of women and girls by 2030 (United Nations 2017). Empowerment of rural women is considered also as a necessary pre-requisite to attain food security and alleviate poverty in developing countries. While a
number of studies address women empowerment as a developmental outcome, the deterministic role of rural women empowerment on agrarian development has not
received sufficient research focus. On one hand, the quantitative empirical studies addressing technological change often limit the gender dimension to a binary variable on sex of the household head. The key roles and responsibilities of women members of the farm household, who are directly or indirectly involved in crop and livestock production, are overlooked by doing so. One the other hand, the in-depth qualitative case studies are not sufficiently broad (small sample size) to allow for generalization. Against this backdrop, the proposed study attempts to develop a mixed research methodology taking variables from quantitative household surveys and qualitative case studies for quickly and effectively capturing rural women involvement and empowerment and their ramifications on technological change and farmer livelihoods.
The empirical analysis will be based on Focus Group Discussions (FGDs) and household survey data, conducted in the second half of 2018 in Madhya Pradesh (India), where wheat is one of the main crops. The study frame was built in close collaboration with the CGIAR Gender and Agriculture Research Network, and also be a ‘pilot’ study for identifying and integrating gender variables in the adoption-impact studies in CRP WHEAT and MAIZE Programmes.
The overall objective of the project is to better understand the importance of women involvement in agriculture and women empowerment on technological change and rural livelihoods in India, focusing on impact heterogeneity and the role of different social institutions. There are two sets of research questions – first specific to the study area, and second more generic to the developing countries. The research questions specific to the study area are shown below.
1. Which of the individual / household / community characteristics are the key determinants of women empowerment in agriculture?
2. What role do gender plays on diffusion of varietal technologies and sustainable
intensification practices in wheat?
3. What are the impacts of women empowerment and gender roles on household food
insecurity?
The more generic research questions are concerning (a) better technology targeting and (b) development of a variable set on gender to be used for quantitative data collection. The research questions framed in this connection are shown below.
4. How should the technology dissemination and targeting strategies change when the role, responsibilities, and preferences of women farmers are addressed?
5. Which are the easy to observe household attributes that could stand proxy for woman empowerment in quantitative studies on technological change?
The empirical part of this study will be based on data collected from three districts of Madhya Pradesh, India – Jabalpur, Mandla and Damoh. Madhya Pradesh is one of the states with largest wheat growing area (19% of wheat area in India) but with lower wheat productivity (2.85 tons) compared to other major producers (4.29 tons in Punjab and 3.98 tons in Haryana in 2014-15 season). While Mandla and Damoh are lower productive districts within the state, Jabalpur farmers experience moderately high wheat productivity. Mandla and Damoh are also categorized as the disadvantaged districts by Government of India. The selected districts contain the three GENNOVATE case-study communities
Round II: Gender-disaggregated household survey data on rural women empowerment and technological change in wheat, Madhya Pradesh
No full textThis dataset was generated as part of a research project that aimed to identify relevant gender considerations associated with wheat varietal development and the modifications required in wheat seed value chains in order to ensure inclusive diffusion of varieties and faster varietal turnover. Understanding the role that women play in agricultural production decisions is now widely considered as a pre-requisite to attain food security and alleviate poverty. There have been studies conducted on gender-sensitive breeding on a number of crops, however there are no evidence with respect to wheat in India. The role of gender-sensitive seed and information networks, which could facilitate the spread of varietal technologies ensuring social inclusiveness, is also rarely examined. The lack of control of women over the benefits from participation in value chains and gender discrimination in access to complementary inputs such as credit could be the reasons for not carrying out such analysis. However, when technology interventions do not capture gender-specific preferences for traits of varieties and dissemination networks, intra-household disparities in workloads and incomes persist or even worsen over time. This could also result in a lower rate of adoption by farm households. The study was conducted in the wheat growing tracts of Madhya Pradesh, with the the following research outputs expected.
1. Gender-specific farmer preferences for (a) wheat varietal traits and (b) attributes of seed and information networks are elicited.
2. Solutions to meet heterogeneous demand through inclusive delivery of improved wheat varieties among men and women farmers are identified and the associated transaction costs are estimated.
The empirical part of this study was conducted in three districts of Madhya Pradesh, India – Jabalpur, Mandla and Damoh – where one round of farm household survey and focus group discussions had been already completed one year ago.
In 2018, a first-round of farm household survey was conducted among 400 households in Madhya Pradesh (Dataset Persistent ID: hdl:11529/10548897). We interviewed both male and female heads (i.e., a total of 800 interviews). Questions were asked on women’s role in decision making and their involvement in farm-household activities. In addition to farm household surveys, 60 sex-specific focus group discussions were conducted with male and female farmers. The results revealed that the varietal turnover rate in wheat is significantly low in this region, with most farmers cultivating age-old varieties such as Lok 1.
The same farm households were interviewed in 2018, to form the current dataset. The aim was to better understand their preferences for wheat varietal traits (e.g., early maturing; suitability for chapatti making, drought tolerance etc.). Choice experiments and contingent valuation approaches will be used to elicit farmer preference for varietal attributes. The elicited preferences will be explained using data from the 2018 survey
Plot-level datasets for groundtruthing and satellite detection of tillage operations, Punjab (India)
No full textThe intensive, irrigated rice-wheat systems of the northwestern Indo-Gangetic Plains (NW IGP) are associated with the widespread burning of excess rice residue that cannot be otherwise disposed-off within the limited turn-around time. The second-generation direct seeders (SGDS) for wheat sowing, such as Happy Seeder, facilitate sowing under heavy stubble conditions, and thereby avoid the need for residue burning. The objective of the study is to test the causal relationship between Happy Seeder diffusion and reduction in residue burning and, ultimately, reduction in air pollution in the NW IGP. We draw on data from remote sensing, a systematic review of literature, existing primary datasets, and new surveys among farm-households, service providers, and village elders. The estimated reduction in air pollution due to the technology diffusion will then be converted to savings in human health costs. As part of this study, we aim to study the village characteristics and do groundtruthing for remote sensing of plots where SGDS has adopted. The plot level datasets were constructed twice (for 2021 and 2022 Rabi seasons) for identifying tillage types and residue burning through remote sensing. These datasets were not from the same set of farmers, and the plot selection was not random
Survey among Happy Seeder Service Providers in Punjab
No full textThe Green Revolution has led to intensive, irrigated rice-wheat systems across the Indo-Gangetic Plains (IGP). The limited turn-around time between rice harvest and sowing of the next crop (wheat) and mechanized harvesting of rice pose a critical challenge for farmers to sustainably handle the surplus rice residues. Because only a few economically viable residue-management alternatives are readily available, a majority of the 2.5 million farmers burn an estimated 23 million metric tons of rice stubble in October and November. The rice residue burning and the resultant increase in air pollution have received significant media attention in the recent past. Residue
burning causes emission of short-lived climate pollutants, such as methane and black carbon. More importantly, the decrease in air quality due to rice stubble burning has a significant adverse effect on human pulmonary functions. A solution for residue burning is offered by the application of two fundamental principles of Conservation
Agriculture (CA) in wheat – minimal soil disturbance and crop residue retention for mulching. CA is heralded as more sustainable than the traditional tillage alternatives. The first-generation CA technology using conventional zero tillage seeder, although reduced the turn-around time for wheat, was not efficient in handling the surplus loose rice residues present on the soil surface. The second-generation direct-seeders (SGDS), such as Happy Seeder, alongside a superior straw management system (e.g., spreaders attached to the combined harvesters), were subsequently developed to facilitate wheat sowing even under heavy stubble and avoid the need for residue burning, making the farming system more sustainable through curtailing the negative environmental externalities.
To map the diffusion process of CA (particularly SGDS) and to identify the constraints faced in disseminating the technology among farmers, we conducted a face-to-face survey among the service providers of Happy Seeders in 2022. The survey was conducted in randomly selected villages (where village surveys were conducted) from 8 districts of Punjab.A total of 385 service providers were included (Barnala 12; Fatehgarh_Sahib 49; Jalandhar 37; Ludhiana 86; Moga 18; Nawanshar 20; Patiala 90; Sangrur 73)
Gender-segregated focus group discussion (FGD) data on women's role in wheat cultivation, Madhya Pradesh, India
No full textThe dataset is generated as part of an empirical study to develop a mixed research methodology, taking variables from both quantitative household surveys and qualitative case studies for quickly and effectively capturing rural women involvement and empowerment and their ramifications on technological change and farmer livelihoods. Focus Group Discussions (FGDs) were conducted in the second half of 2018 in Madhya Pradesh (India), where wheat is one of the main crops.
The empirical part of this study is based on data collected from three districts of Madhya Pradesh, India – Jabalpur, Mandla and Damoh. Madhya Pradesh is one of the states with largest wheat growing area (19% of wheat area in India) but with lower wheat productivity (2.85 tons) compared to other major producers (4.29 tons in Punjab and 3.98 tons in Haryana in 2014-15 season).
From each of the three districts, 5 villages were selected for data collection. We restricted our study to those villages where wheat is one of the main crops. Of the total 15 villages, three included the GENNOVATE case study communities (non-random selection). The other 12 will be selected based on the remoteness to the state road highways (6 close, 6 remote). From each village, two wards (sub-units of village) will be selected based on the income poverty (one where most of the poor households reside, and other with the non-poor). Two FGDs were conducted (one for men, one for women) in the selected wards
Key informant interview data to identify soil characteristics of the study villages, Punjab
No full textThis survey was done in 122 villages of Punjab, as part of the SPIA-funded project on the impact of Conservation Agriculture (CA), particularly the impact of Happy Seeder technology, on yield and residue burning. During the exploratory surveys, we found that the adoption of CA depends on the soil structure. To identify the soil characteristics, our team of enumerators interviewed 2-3 knowledgeable people per sample village. The participants were asked to draw the map of village and mark the regions with clayey / loamy / sandy soils and with saline / sodic soils within the village boundaries using an A3-size graph sheet. From this graph sheet the percentage of cultivated area under different soil types and salinity / sodicity were calculated
Household Survey, “Wheat Seed Information Networks and Seed Acquisition Practices in Bihar”
No full textThis dataset is built from a survey among wheat farming households in Bihar state. The survey was conducted by the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT) between August and September 2021. In total, the questionnaire was administered to 1,008 wheat-growing households. The survey elicited information on various topics, for example, socio-demographic characteristics, wheat cultivation, varietal use, access to seed sources, and asset ownership. We collected gender-disaggregated data asking men and women in the same household a predefined set of questions, such as influence in intra-household decision-making
Round III: Household Survey Data, Punjab
No full textThe Green Revolution has led to intensive, irrigated rice-wheat systems across the Indo-Gangetic Plains (IGP). The limited turn-around time between rice harvest and sowing of the next crop (wheat) and mechanized harvesting of rice pose a critical challenge for farmers to sustainably handle the surplus rice residues. Because only a few economically viable residue-management alternatives are readily available, a majority of the 2.5 million farmers burn an estimated 23 million metric tons of rice stubble in October and November. The rice residue burning and the resultant increase in air pollution have received significant media attention in the recent past. Residue
burning causes the emission of short-lived climate pollutants, such as methane and black carbon. A solution for residue burning is offered by the application of two fundamental principles of Conservation Agriculture (CA) in wheat – minimal soil disturbance and crop residue retention for mulching. CA is heralded as more sustainable than traditional tillage alternatives. The technology diffusion has so far been only marginal in eastern IGP due to multiple institutional and economic constraints. The present survey was conducted in four districts of Punjab to (a) identify the adoption pattern of CA and alternative tillage practices among farmers (b) elicit farmer perceptions regarding different tillage options in different dimensions such as cost of cultivation, yield, input requirement, pest infestation, etc. Most of the sample farmers were visited by CIMMYT researchers in 2018 and 2021
Midterm Evaluation of CRA Project, Bihar: Household Survey Data
No full textClimate-resilient agriculture (CRA) includes the sustainable use of the available natural resources to enhance the longer-term productivity of the crop and livestock production systems and to achieve higher farm incomes under climate variabilities. This practice will reduce hunger and poverty in the face of climate change for future generations. Several CRA technologies are being developed and disseminated by CIMMYT and partners, such as zero tillage in wheat, direct seeded rice, crop rotations with legume crops, etc. The objective of the study is to examine farmers' awareness and attitudes towards CRA technologies and the possibility of reaping the positive externalities through direct payment to farmers. This dataset was collected from intervention farmers of the CRA project in Bihar. In selected 75 villages of Bihar State of India, 1000 short farmer interviews (mostly closed-ended questions) are to be conducted among the early adopters of CRA technologies. The farmer lists were provided by the participating Krishi Vigyan Kendras (KVKs). The farmers' opinions on the performance of the technology, constraints faced during adoption, and the effect of resource use and livelihoods will be examined
Impact of oil palm expansion on the provision of private and community goods in rural Indonesia
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