Document Type: Reports

Strengthening The Capacity of Traditional Leaders to Champion Gender Equality in Zambia Lessons Learned Piloting Gender Guidelines for Natural Resource Management

December 19, 2023
Reports

Introduction

Between 2019 to 2023, the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) funded Integrated Land and Resource Governance (ILRG) program provided technical and financial support to the House of Chiefs (HoC) in Zambia to increase the capacity of traditional leaders in championing gender equality and promoting inclusive development in chiefdom administration. The intervention aimed to enhance the capacity of traditional leaders to play an effective role in shifting harmful gender norms related to women’s land rights, and participation in land governance and natural resource management. Zambia’s customary chiefs play a central role in establishing the customary rules that govern natural resource management and, in the allocation and administration of over 75 percent of Zambia’s land area. They are also key guardians of local culture and social relationships, particularly gender norms, for the majority of Zambia’s population and as such are important champions to shift norms that restrict women’s land rights.

The development of the Gender Guidelines for Traditional Leaders in Management of Natural Resources in the Chiefdoms (from hereon, referred to as the Gender Guidelines) was an initiative of a selection of the Chiefs/Chieftainess in the HoC who desired to find a solution to the pressing gender equality issues in their chiefdom administration. The initiative was led by a team of six traditional leaders that formed the Gender Committee at the HoC in 2020 with the aim of developing a resource to aid gender integration in natural resource management and chiefdom administration. A consultative process identified various entry points, including sectors, themes, and cross-cutting issues:

The Gender Guidelines provide general direction for integrating gender equality into resource management and a set of practical measures that can be adapted and contextualized based on customs and traditional systems in each chiefdom. Once implemented, the Gender Guidelines were expected to increase the contributions of traditional leaders to the promotion of gender equality and inclusive development in Zambia. The Guidelines were launched in 2021 and subsequently disseminated to all 288 chiefs across the country. ILRG piloted and monitored the implementation of the Gender Guidelines in two Chiefdoms. This report documents the implementation processes in the two Chiefdoms, reflecting on the successes, challenges, and lessons learned in their use as a tool to strengthen the capacity of traditional leaders to shift harmful gender norms and increase the participation of women in land and natural resource governance. The report identifies opportunities and recommendations for stakeholders on how to further support traditional leaders to lead gender equality in local governance.

Supporting Deforestation-Free Cocoa in Ghana, 2018-2022

December 19, 2023
Reports

Background

Cocoa trees thrive in a thin ecological band of countries along the equator, where the climate is warm and humid. Just two countries – Côte d’Ivoire and Ghana – produce two thirds of the world’s cocoa. Cocoa plays a critically important role in the local and national economies, providing jobs, improved livelihoods and social welfare, an expanded tax base, family and corporate income, and foreign exchange earnings. However, long term viability of cocoa farming is at risk in many parts of Ghana and Côte d’Ivoire due to climate change, and for many years smallholder cocoa has been the leading cause of agricultural commodity driven deforestation in both countries. This deforestation has a negative impact on biodiversity, soil fertility, water quality and quantity, affects local rainfall and threatens farmer livelihoods. In response, the governments of both countries and commodity buyers have made specific commitments to reduce and eliminate deforestation from their supply chains through the creation of initiatives such as the Cocoa and Forests Initiative (CFI) and the Ghana Cocoa Forest Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation (REDD+) Program that will sell carbon credits to the Forest Carbon Partnership Facility.

Companies like Hershey’s rely on thousands of West African farmers, each of whom farms a tiny plot, often one to two hectares (2.5 – 5 acres). In Ghana, up to 40 percent of cocoa farms suffer from low productivity due to aging trees and blight. In the past, when cocoa farmers faced diminishing crop yields, they could clear new forests and plant new trees. But today with fewer remaining primary forests this approach to expanding or even maintaining yield is environmentally and socially unacceptable. The most sustainable solution is to replant or rehabilitate old cocoa farms with disease-free new trees. Yet several challenges confront small farmers who want to replant. Many farmers have insecure land tenure that prevents or discourages them from replanting old farms. Tenure challenges also limit incentives to plant and intercrop cocoa seedlings with shade trees that can increase survival and productivity, as well as help cocoa companies meet their sustainability commitments. Farmers have low incomes and limited access to credit to borrow money to invest in their farms. In addition, they often lack information and training on best practices to rehabilitate old cocoa farms to increase yields and resiliency.

According to Ghana’s Lands Commission, less than two percent of the country’s 800,000 cocoa farmers have documented title to the land they cultivate. Instead, farmers access property through customary tenure arrangements made with a chief or a landowner. Traditionally, these oral agreements have allowed farmers to clear forests and begin farming. Customary tenure comes in several forms that can range from rights analogous to common law freehold (asidae and usufruct) or tenancy (abunu). Under abunu tenure, the farmer’s tenure is tied to keeping the land under cultivation as cocoa. If the farm is abandoned or no longer used for cocoa it reverts to the landowner. Once cocoa tree yields drop after 25 years or so – or sooner if disease strikes – abunu farmers often need to obtain permission from the original landowner to replant. At a time of historically high demand for land, chiefs and landowners are increasingly refusing farmers’ requests to replant. That leaves abunu farmers with two options: clear virgin forests and start again or get out of the business entirely. The exact number of abunu farmers across Ghana is unknown, but previous United States Agency for International Development (USAID) work in Nyame Nnae community in Asankgranwa found 46 percent of farms were under abunu tenure agreements.

Most cocoa farmers are subsistence farmers with little financial capacity to invest in their farms. Cocoa takes four to five years to mature and produce cocoa pods and most farmers cannot afford to cut and replant large portions of their farm at one time due to the time it takes for a tree to produce cocoa. If a farm is diseased, however, the only way to remove the disease in some cases is to clear and leave the land fallow before it can be replanted with cocoa.

Finally, traditionally cocoa farms retain large shade trees. This practice has preserved many economically and environmentally important trees within the landscape. However, a combination of government and Ghana Cocoa Board (COCOBOD) policies has led to the widespread removal of shade trees from farms; in 2007 it was estimated that 72 percent of cocoa farms across Ghana had “no to light” levels of shade. The government of Ghana also claims ownership of all naturally occurring trees, which creates a disincentive to maintain or restore shade tree cover across cocoa farms.

Securing Insecurity: Semi-Industrial Gold Mining and Violence in Mwenga, South Kivu, Democratic Republic of Congo (in English and French)

December 19, 2023
Reports

Summary

This study examines the impact of semi-industrial gold mining on local conflict and security dynamics in the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). It provides an in-depth analysis of the context in which semi-industrial gold mining companies have been established in Mwenga territory (South Kivu province) since 2017, and of their impact on the fragile security situation (Map 1).

The intersection between conflict and gold mining in Mwenga began as early as 1997 when the gold mines of the Société Minière et Industrielle du Kivu (SOMINKI, a former state mining company) were overrun by artisanal miners and rebel movements. Two decades later, conflicts still persist in the area, causing Banro Corporation, the multinational company that acquired the majority of SOMINKI’s shares, to cease its mining activities in 2019 due to violence against its employees. While Banro’s industrial operations were paralyzed, gold mining by semi-industrial companies – often Chinese-owned – increased significantly. Between 2017 and 2019, six semi-industrial companies established themselves in the territory, including Congo Blueant Minerals SARL and Société Orientale Ressources Congo SARL (ORC) (Map 2). Since their arrival, local populations, civil society and state authorities have complained about these companies’ behavior.

This report discusses how these semi-industrial companies have established themselves in Mwenga, as well as the impact of their practices on the security situation. The study uses the notion of ‘practical norms’ to explain the companies’ strategies to set up and secure their operations. ‘Practical norms’ refer to the gap between actual informal practices and the legal provisions that regulate the mining sector. It is a set of informal norms that underpin the practices of actors who deviate from official norms, notably the mining laws in this case. First, the practices of these companies do not abide by or adhere to the mining law and formal regulations governing the mining sector. Second, in order to acquire access to gold deposits, they sign partnership agreements with mining cooperatives, which serve as fronts for the companies. Consequently, the cooperatives do not act in the best interests of the artisanal miners whom they supposedly represent. To date, the details of these agreements remain opaque. Third, the mining companies continue to operate with the support of a vast predatory network involving state, customary, and military authorities at various levels.

In order to illustrate the complexity of these networks, this study presents the different actors, the challenges they face, as well as the strategies they have developed to navigate the gold mining sector.

The geographies where the semi-industrial miners work have become areas that operate outside of government control without mining taxation or traceability of mineral production. State mining services and local authorities do not dare to enter the mines because of heavy militarization in and around the mines through the deployment of large numbers of soldiers of the national army (Forces Armées de la République Démocratique du Congo, FARDC) and police, who are perceived as so-called ‘Chinese guards’. This excessive presence of security forces also lies at the root of illegal taxation and has led to arbitrary arrests.

Traditional chiefs can be considered key actors enabling installation of semi-industrial companies in Mwenga. They have organized social dialogues to convince local populations to accept these companies’ operations, dialogues often perceived as a way to silence, and even intimidate, the population.

At the heart of tensions surrounding semi-industrial gold mining in Mwenga are civil society actors who have been the main whistleblowers. The advance of semi-industrialization has however also led to the creation of multiple new civil society organizations and a climate of division between them. This does not happen by chance but is rather the intended consequence of a policy of ‘divide and rule’ developed by the mining companies and their supporters. The semi-industrial exploitation of gold has thus become one of the main drivers of insecurity, at times involving local militias. This insecurity manifests itself not only in terms of physical violence, but through the destruction of the means of subsistence of local populations.

In addition to the arrival of foreign-owned companies, the process of ‘semi-industrialization’ is characterized by the spread of quartz stone crushers in the artisanal gold supply chain of South Kivu. The introduction of hundreds of crushing mills at several ASM sites has changed labor relations and favored the emergence of local entrepreneurship with a direct impact on the production of gold. Unfortunately, these machines also cause accidents and a number of pollution-related illnesses. The spread of these crushing mills has also triggered conflicts with mining cooperatives. Even though these conflicts have not turned into violence, it does show that the mere process of semi-industrialization, in general, entails risks beyond the arrival of (foreign) mining companies.

Finally, the study highlights long-term security risks, as semi-industrial mining is a major source of predation, social destruction and conflict. First, semi-industrial gold mining actors operate in well-established, powerful networks that enable predatory behavior against local populations. Operating from the national capital of Kinshasa, the South Kivu capital of Bukavu, and at the mining sites, these networks involve state authorities, heads of the mining administration, the military and police, as well as customary authorities. It is thus hard to tackle this climate of predation. The second risk factor concerns the way in which semi-industrial gold mining affects mining governance, namely by creating areas where the State cannot control activities and production, by fostering suspicion over corruption by state and customary authorities, and by making the gold trade more opaque. Thirdly, a heavy price is paid in terms of social cohesion as semi-industrial gold mining creates deep divisions within local civil society and pits traditional chiefs against their own populations. Therefore, there is a risk of score-settling by dissatisfied populations in which local militias may become active. These risks urgently need to be addressed if the gold sector is to be beneficial to the DRC and its people.

The report concludes with recommendations that aim to address the negative impacts, conflicts and security risks associated with semi-industrial mining activities. They recommend a few actions that will encourage semi-industrial operators to comply with mining regulations and to promote peaceful coexistence between semi-industrial operators and local populations. Finally, they highlight the importance of raising local populations’ awareness of their rights with regard to companies’ mining operations.

Performance Evaluation of the USAID’s Property Rights and Artisanal Diamond Development project II in Cote d’Ivoire

November 13, 2023
Reports

Introduction

This report presents the findings from a performance evaluation of the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) Property Rights and Artisanal Diamonds Development (PRADD II) project in Côte d’Ivoire. To support the Government of Côte d’Ivoire’s objective of making the mining sector an engine of economic growth, the objective of PRADD II was to increase the number of alluvial diamonds entering the formal chain of custody, while improving the benefits accruing to diamond mining communities.

USAID and the European Union funded PRADD II and Tetra Tech implemented the project at the national level and in the localities of Séguéla and Tortiya from 2013 to 2018.

This study examines the performance, outcomes, and sustainability of PRADD II interventions five years after the end of the program. The research investigates output sustainability by examining whether the program investments still remain and/or if these have been scaled-up by different beneficiaries. The study also examines reasons for the expansion or decline of specific interventions in light of political, institutional, and economic changes in the national and local contexts of Séguéla and Tortiya.

The evaluation methodology is based on a variety of different sources: a document review; 16 individual interviews conducted with stakeholders at central and local levels; 33 focus group discussions organized with different categories of project stakeholders; surveys carried out with 188 beneficiaries, 13 village chiefs, and 9 mining officials; and direct observation of project sites. The primary data analysis methods include descriptive statistics of surveys combined with content analysis of the qualitative data sources.

ILRG Malawi Final Report: Reflections from Customary land Documentation Scaling Project

October 26, 2023
Reports

Approximately 1 billion people around the world are tenure insecure and fear losing access to their. land and property. A lack of documentation contributes to tenure insecurity, leaves people vulnerable to land grabs by neighbors or relatives and contributes to underinvestment for fear of losing access to land in the future. Many governments, especially those with colonial legacies of state-owned land and absence of registered rights for smallholder farmers, have attempted to carry out large-scale, systematic documentation of land rights in recent years, through legislation that facilitates first time registration of rights and subsequent rollout.

Developing a comprehensive land cadaster is a massive undertaking, particularly where there is a legacy of registered rights to consider, for example colonial land allocations or sporadic leaseholds issued within a broader community managed landscape. Reviewing and updating historical or latent rights alongside efforts to carry out first time registration for rural smallholders within the same landscape and integrating these in a land information system presents a series of challenges. This task is complicated by varying laws governing different types of land, such as public, private, customary, etc., and the conflicts and ambiguities that emerge from registering boundaries and rights. Despite these challenges in reconciling historical rights, in recent years, systematic customary land documentation has well-established processes that include community consultation, parcel boundary mapping, dispute resolution, and a public period for viewing maps and making corrections, which is designed to ensure communities collectively agree on current land rights. Donor funding often supports pilots to demonstrate proof of concept of documentation methodologies, while government leadership and ownership of the process is required to achieve broad coverage.

The ultimate goal of most systematic documentation processes is full jurisdictional coverage (and in many cases national coverage) in order to achieve appropriate economies of scale, gain anticipated economic benefits that come with secure land and property rights, and reduce the potential for conflict and grievances between those who were eligible and not eligible for the documentation scheme. Such efforts require coordination with national land information systems, early planning, and a cost-effective, digitized, replicable and coordinated process. The advancement of digital mapping and data collection tools has created opportunities for cost-effective, large-scale land documentation efforts. For example, the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) supported mapping approaches for securing tenure (MAST), an inclusive fit-for-purpose approach that has been used in five countries to document land rights for nearly one million people. While low-cost, digital tools create efficiencies in data collection, they also risk reinforcing existing power dynamics if not undertaken with an intentional gender equality and social inclusion (GESI) lens. These steps take time and can raise costs, yet if not undertaken, risk producing a land information system that does not reflect on-the-ground realities and exacerbates inter- and intra-community disputes.

Following the passage of the Customary Land Act of 2016, the Government of Malawi (GoM) piloted customary land documentation procedures across different areas of the country, including through the EU-supported pilot on: “Technical cooperation to strengthen national capacity in implementing land policies and laws efficiently and effectively” as well as through the World Bank-funded Shire Valley Transformation Project, and the Agricultural Commercialization Project. These pilots were facilitated through the Land Reform Implementation Unit (LRIU), which has been instrumental in advocating for a structured approach to scaling customary land documentation. In 2020, USAID partnered with the GoM on a gender-responsive customary land documentation project under the Integrated Land and Resource Governance (ILRG) program. This activity aimed to achieve scale by documenting customary land across an entire Traditional Land Management Area (TLMA) – TLMA Mwansambo in Nkhotakota District. Seventy percent of the population in Malawi lives on customary land, held by communities and administered by community leaders, most of whom are smallholder farmers, and less than 10 percent of whom have some form of land documentation. ILRG aimed to document 10,000 parcels in a year as a proof of concept to help inform the government’s national roll out of a customary land documentation process across other jurisdictions.

Malawi’s land laws provided a strong foundation for the work. In 2016, the government enacted a series of new land laws, including the Customary Land Act of 2016, which allowed customary land holders to formalize their ownership rights by registering their parcels (Kamoto et al., 2021). The law laid out a clear process for systematic documentation (see Figure 1), including the establishment of locally led, gender-balanced customary land committees to help facilitate the work. The government invested in a mobile technology platform developed through a contract with the Regional Center for Mapping Resources for Development (RCMRD) in Kenya to digitize parcel demarcation. It also began work to establish an updated land information management system (LIMS) to house land administration data. Building on the momentum from earlier pilots, the ILRG project had strong government buy-in from the beginning and a commitment to utilize lessons learned to inform scaling efforts.

This report reflects on experiences from the scaling project. It focuses on overall process lessons and recommendations. Section two highlights key project results. Section three outlines key elements needed to achieve scale (low-cost, digital tools, clarity of steps, efficient oversight structures), including successes and challenges implementing each element under the ILRG project. Section four lays out conclusions and recommendations for the full government rollout of the land documentation process.

Lessons Learned: Private Sector Engagement on Land and Gender

October 17, 2023
Reports, Lessons Learned

Introduction

Private sector engagement (PSE) is a key strategy for the United States Agency for International Development (USAID). Under this approach USAID “consults, strategizes, aligns, collaborates, and implements” with the private sector to leverage US government investments for greater scale, sustainability, and effectiveness, while also strengthening market-based systems in developing countries and contributing to economic growth and employment (USAID, 2022). Working with the private sector, USAID can demonstrate that investing in local development can be good for both a company’s bottom line and the wellbeing of communities. This brief explores USAID experiences partnering with the private sector to advance land tenure security and gender equality and women’s empowerment across five countries under the Integrated Land and Resource Governance (ILRG) activity (2018-2023).

Public-private partnerships (PPPs) are just one element of private sector engagement. USAID defines public-private partnerships as an arrangement between public and private sector entities to “share risks, and rewards in the delivery of services and infrastructure. Characterized by joint planning, joint contributions, and shared risk, PPPs are an opportunity to leverage resources, mobilize industry expertise and networks, and bring fresh ideas to projects” (USAID, 2022). The catalytic role of the private sector is well recognized in agricultural production because it contributes significantly to input delivery, storage and processing, transport, transfer of technical competencies to producers, and sale of commodities to national and international markets. Yet partnerships with the private sector on broader development goals, such as land tenure security or women’s empowerment, that have positive but diffuse downstream impacts on company profits, require significant effort to align visions, interventions, and outcomes. For example, some broad public-private partnerships have promoted policy and legal reforms around land governance to improve the business enabling environment, the enforceability of commercial land rights,1 and land markets. However, companies working in the agriculture sector may be wary of getting involved in policy issues around land tenure reform, which they see as outside of their core business interest. While women’s empowerment is oftentimes an easier entry point, many private sector efforts are confined to corporate social responsibility (CSR) initiatives, rather than fully integrated into commercial supply chain operations. Many private sector entities may not have considered how proactively resolving land disputes and gender-responsive sourcing approaches can positively impact their bottom line. This is where public-private partnerships can help. USAID has done much work in this area and can help the private sector effectively engage on land rights to de-risk investments and improve community relations2, as well as empower women through increased land literacy, land registration work and by providing linkages to expanded access to finance

Through private sector partnerships under ILRG, USAID has generated a series of lessons on approaches to proactively work with companies to strengthen land security for rural populations, while also empowering women and expanding their access to agricultural supply chains. This brief documents approaches employed, focusing on private sector engagement in sectors and supply chains linked to land-based investments. This includes partnerships to clarify land rights and access issues, as well as those that combine engagement on land with efforts to increase women’s access to productive resources, agricultural inputs, and global supply chains. It is designed for USAID program staff and implementers who are attempting to facilitate private sector partnerships on these issues and sectors.

The brief opens by framing the rationale for private sector engagement on land tenure, gender equality, and women’s empowerment and shares best practices and promising approaches. Next, it describes the varying structural design elements of public-private partnerships within the USAID ILRG activity and what impact each of these design choices had on partnership implementation. Third, it outlines both the successes experienced in the nine private sector partnerships under the USAID ILRG program as well as the lessons learned. Finally, it concludes with recommendations for other donors looking to engage with the private sector around land, gender equality, and women’s economic empowerment (WEE).

Land Tenure Situation in the Sambirano Valley, Ambanja District: Issues, Opportunities, and Challenges

October 17, 2023
Reports

Summary

The Climate Resilient Cocoa Landscapes (CRCL) project utilizes a landscape analytical framework to assess the interface between the cocoa cash crop sector and the dynamics of deforestation in the Sambirano Valley of Madagascar. The CRCL project is financed by the Swiss State Secretariat for Economic Affairs (SECO) and implemented by Helvetas Swiss Intercooperation, an independent development organization working in thirty countries in Africa, Asia, Latin America, and Eastern Europe. CRCL subcontractors are Earthworm Foundation and the Centre for Development and Environment of the University of Bern, and local commercial partners Ramanandraibe Exportation (Rama Ex) and the Société Commerciale et Industrielle de Madagascar (SCIM). Beginning in 2019, the USAID funded Integrated Landscapes and Resource Governance (USAID ILRG) began a partnership with CRCL at the request of Lindt & Sprüngli AG to support the consideration of land tenure and property rights issue into design and implementation of the CRCL project.

Each year USAID ILRG activity in Madagascar summarizes the state of knowledge about the resource tenure situation in the Sambirano Valley of the District of Ambanja. This FINAL report highlights the patchwork of land tenure issues in the valley and the rapidly evolving initiatives carried out by government and donor-funded programs to increase the levels of tenure security of different land ownership categories. Significant progress has been achieved over the past year to address the long-festering insecurity around ex-indigenous land reserves, a tenurial category set up during the colonial
period to provide labor to plantations of cacao and other cash crops.

Download the full report in English or French below

The Business Case for Women’s Empowerment in the PepsiCo Potato Supply Chain in West Bengal, India – Final Report

October 2, 2023
Reports

Between 2019 and 2023, USAID and PepsiCo partnered to test the business case for women’s empowerment in the PepsiCo potato supply chain in West Bengal, India. Women are heavily involved in potato farming in West Bengal but often in overlooked areas of work such as seed cutting and seed treatment, which are typically done at home. As a result, most PepsiCo registered farmers are men. The partnership hypothesized that increasing women’s visibility and participation in PepsiCo’s supply chain would positively contribute to important tangible and intangible business metrics for the company, including increased productivity and profitability for farming families, adoption of sustainable farming practices, increased supplier base size and retention, and improved brand loyalty. The four-year partnership, implemented through the Integrated Land and Resource Governance (ILRG) program, worked with women and men farmers in 11 target communities, as well as with PepsiCo employees to increase gender equality awareness and women’s access to productive resources. Activities with men
and women farmers included:

  • Agronomy training for 1,888 women farmers;
  • Deployment of 17 women Community Agronomists (CAs) to increase outreach to women;
  • Support to seven women’s land leasing groups (LLGs);
  • Land literacy training for 838 farmers (542 women and 296 men);
  • Support to 11 women-led demonstration farms that showcased proper PepsiCo practices, visited by 305 people (225 women and 80 men);
  • Entrepreneurship training for 26 people (21 women and 5 men); and
  • Gender norms training for 289 farmers (174 women and 115 men).

In addition, ILRG also strengthened the gender capacity of all PepsiCo staff in West Bengal through in-person training on gender equality, women’s empowerment, and gender-based violence (GBV), asynchronous microlearning via WhatsApp, the development of written resources, and ongoing mentoring and support.

ILRG collected quantitative and qualitative data to measure impacts related to women’s empowerment and business results. The project-level Women’s Empowerment in Agriculture Index (Pro-WEAI) assessment found that overall women’s empowerment decreased for all women in the region from baseline to endline, which could be attributed to the economic and social repercussions of the COVID-19 pandemic. Although the Pro-WEAI empowerment score worsened for both women in the treatment and control groups, the decline was less pronounced for women in the treatment group, suggesting ILRG interventions could have provided some protection for women’s empowerment in a challenging environment. The broader body of quantitative and qualitative data collected shows progress in specific domains of women’s economic empowerment (WEE), including self-efficacy and confidence, access to knowledge, control of resources, control of income, decision-making power, acceptance by family and community members, and collective agency. There was a notable shift in women being recognized as farmers, instead of “farmers’ wives.” Women reported greater decision-making power over decisions related to the use of land, agriculture production, and use of income. Influential male champions were crucial to shifting harmful gender norms at the community level through positive role modeling and helping project staff overcome initial resistance of some men to the activities.

The data shows positive business results. Over 97 percent of women applied skills gained through agronomy training, positively impacting potato productivity and profitability. Families with trained women had better gross and net yields. In Year 4, 84 percent of women farmers reported an increase in their farm yield compared to the previous year, 76 percent reported a decrease in rejection rates, and 77 percent reported experiencing a positive change in their household income since associating with PepsiCo. The overall Sustainable Farming Program (SFP) score improved by 170 percent in the target communities but remained low compared to other areas (overall sustainability score of 74 percent versus 77 percent in Year 4). There is emerging evidence that reaching and empowering women can lead to greater stability and growth of the PepsiCo supply base in West Bengal, with women joining the supply chain at a higher rate than men. Additionally, women have been responsible for recommending PepsiCo potato cultivation to others. Finally, the data shows a marked shift in PepsiCo’s staff attitudes, knowledge, and behaviors toward gender equality. At the end of the project, 76 percent of PepsiCo staff agreed that women’s participation adds value to the business and 84 percent said they observed positive changes in farming communities or PepsiCo’s business metrics that they attribute to women’s empowerment activities.

Despite challenges related to the COVID-19 pandemic and untimely rains that led to significant losses in Year 3, the results demonstrate that there is a business case for promoting women’s empowerment in PepsiCo’s potato supply chain in West Bengal and potentially in other markets with a similar supplier model. However, some elements of the project proved difficult to pursue, such as the land component. There is room for improvement and a need for better data points for future and continued assessment. These areas include early alignment on business case elements and sustainability of interventions; strengthening women’s ownership, access to, and control over land; promoting equitable work sharing at the household level; increasing women’s representation in the entire supply chain (as suppliers, aggregators, and PepsiCo staff); and setting up efficient data monitoring and governance processes.

 

Women’s Land Rights and Economic Empowerment in Cocoa Communities in Ghana

October 2, 2023
Reports

Introduction

Ghana is the second-largest cocoa producer in the world, with cocoa representing a vital part of the country’s economy. Gender inequality is pervasive within the cocoa sector due to a combination of unequal access to productive resources and harmful gender norms at the household, community, and institutional levels. Although women are involved in nearly all the steps of cocoa production in Ghana, cocoa is largely considered a man’s crop, and women’s roles and contributions remain unrecognized, undervalued, and often unpaid. Land ownership is a key barrier; because women typically do not own or lease land on their own, they are not perceived as farmers by themselves, their families, communities, or other stakeholders in the supply chain. Commodity trading companies are responsible for procuring cocoa from smallholder farmers for major international chocolate brands. These companies not only interact with farmers on the technical aspects of cocoa production but also play a critical role in cocoa communities, often implementing social development initiatives in partnership with chocolate brands and international development funders and organizations.

In this context, the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) partnered with Ecom Agroindustrial Corp. (ECOM), a global commodity trading and processing company, to promote gender equality and empower women in the cocoa value chain in Ghana. The goal was to increase gender-responsiveness in ECOM’s internal policies and practices and pilot targeted women’s empowerment activities in cocoa communities where the company operates. Working directly with a cocoa commodity trader provides opportunities for greater sustainability and scalability of USAID investments, as the company can replicate successful gender-responsive approaches in multiple cocoa-sourcing communities in Ghana and West Africa, particularly in future partnerships with chocolate brands. The partnership was implemented between 2020 and 2023 under the USAID Integrated Land and Resource Governance (ILRG) activity, a global mechanism managed by Tetra Tech. Preparatory work, including an initial gender analysis and project design, started in 2020 and was delayed due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Implementation of activities with ECOM staff and in cocoa communities began in mid-2022 and concluded in mid-2023.

The project was informed by an initial gender analysis that provided a better understanding of ECOM’s gender equality practices and capacity, as well as the barriers and opportunities for women’s empowerment, particularly related to access to productive resources and income diversification opportunities. The gender analysis found that although ECOM promoted gender equality within the company and in its work with cocoa farmers, it lacked clear policies, strategies, and expertise to guide and institutionalize such efforts. Women’s representation in field positions was very low, and ECOM signed contracts with individual farmers based on their status as landowners, which meant most contracts were signed with men. Despite the company’s attempts to provide men and women equal opportunity and access to resources, in practice, women’s lack of land ownership led to less access to inputs, training and extension, technology, and financial services. Harmful gender norms affected the division of labor on the farm and in the household and limited women’s benefit-sharing and decision-making power over income derived from cocoa.

Armed conflict, insecurity, and mining in eastern DRC: Reflections on the nexus between natural resources and armed conflict

September 29, 2023
Reports

The concepts of ‘mining’ and ‘conflict financing’ have been closely linked in conflict analyses in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) over the past 20 years. The conflict, as well as conflict financing, has however changed considerably in eastern DRC over the past twenty years. It is therefore necessary to reconsider the concept of ‘conflict minerals’, as new types of conflict linked to mining have occurred, and more different types of actors are involved than before.