NEW DELHI: President Droupadi Murmu on Monday said the agriculture sector has a lot to do with regard to gender justice. She said women are making every effort to make grain reach from farm to plate but they do not get proper recognition.
Inaugurating a four-day global conference on ‘From research to impact: Towards Just and Resilient Agri-Food Systems’ in New Delhi, jointly organised by the Consortium of International Agricultural Research Centres (CGIAR) and Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR) President Murmu emphasised on removal of discriminatory social norms in order to attain just and resilient agri-food systems.
She said, “Women sow, grow, harvest, process and market our food. They are indispensable in making every grain reach from farm to plate. But still, across the world, they are held back and stopped by discriminatory social norms and barriers to knowledge, ownership, assets, resources and social networks. Their contribution is not recognised, their role is marginalised and their agency is denied in the whole chain of the agri-food systems. This story needs to change.”
According to the 2011 census, there were 55 per cent of women engaged in agricultural labour and 24 per cent were cultivators. However, only 12.8 per cent of the operational holdings were owned by women, which reflects the gender disparity in ownership of landholdings in agriculture.
Despite women's huge presence in agriculture, their recognition is too little. The government policy recognizes a person as a farmer engaged in livelihood activity of growing crops and producing other primary raw materials and earning at least half of their household income from agriculture. However, in practice, all the government's schemes are connected to the ownership of land instead of recognizing farmers as per its definition.
President Murmu, in an indirect reference to the recently passed Women Reservation Bill, said that India has been witnessing some changes as women get more empowered through legislative and governmental interventions.