In South Africa, women often depend on subsistence farming as a means of providing for their families and ensuring growing children have access to adequate nutrition. Now, with climate change and global warming impacting the agriculture sector, women in farming are more vulnerable than ever.
Due to the impact of global warming, parts of South Africa are beginning to experience abnormal weather patterns. This has resulted in lengthening droughts, the warming of specific areas, and floods in other parts.
According to research conducted by Georgetown University in Washington D.C, United States, and overseen by Ndivile Mokoena, project officer for the Gender into Urban Climate Change Initiative, a Johannesburg-based non-governmental organisation, women are often the group that are most often subject to bearing the burdens of climate change, especially within smallholder or subsistence farming.
“The disproportionate impact of climate change on women magnifies gender inequities, including political disenfranchisement and economic marginalisation,” says Mokoena to Food For Mzansi.
“The problems of climate change compound the additional challenges faced by women farmers in gaining equal footing in the agricultural market, and these challenges are well documented. While they dominate labour contributions, women do not have the same access to markets and credit,” she adds.
This has been attributed to the fact that women are largely involved in the informal agricultural sector, and because of this, it is often difficult for researchers to ascertain the official contribution of women within South African farming. Most informal work women partake in are involvement in community gardens and school agricultural projects. This gives rise to other social problems women have to contend with.
“These gardens are vulnerable to exploitation – when it is harvest time, people who wish to benefit from the gardens steal crops and equipment. Clearly, there are no safeguards or security for women in agriculture, even at this small scale, and the lack of such safeguards poses a huge limitation to women’s ability to sustain their livelihoods and grow their businesses.
“However, when trying to advocate for support systems and financial connections, women often face corruption and political interference, and are taken from pillar to post when seeking assistance from the government,” Mokoena explains.
Staying abreast of sustainable practices
There are things women can do to empower themselves and to minimise the effects of climate change on their farming activities or operation.
According to aquaponic farmer Gugulethu Mahlangu, it is important for her to stay abreast of developments within the world of climate change because it helps her guide her farming practice. She is the proud farmer of House Harvest, an aquaponic farm that operates in Boksburg, Gauteng.
“I started paying attention to the impacts of climate when I started working on an aquaponic farm, and I realised the amount of water waste in traditional agriculture is something we are not counting as contributing to climate change. Conventional agriculture is very water-intensive,” Mahlangu says.
“In aquaponics, about 90% of the water we use is recycled. You don’t need to add in water because aquaponics is symbiotic. You have fish in the water eating the waste, and cleaning the water, so this is where symbiosis comes in. That was when I really started paying attention to climate change, and saw the impact of minimising climate change when I was introduced to the world of aquaponics.”
Aquaponics is just one example of sustainable agriculture, which is widely known, but still fairly underutilised.
What can be done to help women in agriculture?
According to Mokoena, policies that break down inequalities can assist women in greater access to credit and other financing resources. South African female farmers who have access to education on land, technology, climate change, and finance are able to engage in more adaptive practises. This information will aide in making more informed decisions, such as choosing more drought-resilient crops.
“They will be empowered to discuss and analyse threats and opportunities, use innovative, farmer-led, community-based, and gender-sensitive approaches, including traditional and indigenous knowledge for capacity-building and growing more food. If given enhanced access to tools, resources, and opportunities to take part in decision making, local women farmers could play a vital role in the promotion of climate-resilient practices in agriculture,” she adds.
Also read: All hail, queen Gugu: ‘I am a black woman and I farm’
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