Gender and ICTs - Mainstreaming Gender in the Use of Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) for Agriculture and Rural Development

"This publication looks at the benefits of Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) when placed in the hands of men and women working in agriculture and in rural areas. It examines the challenges to be overcome and makes recommendations so that rural communities can take full and equal advantage of the technologies."

This Food and Agriculture Organization analysis of ICTs in agriculture and rural areas was amassed through "desk study, online fora on gender held in the framework of the e-agriculture Community of Practice (www.e-agriculture.org), and a review of projects and programmes conducted in regions of the world."  It was used to update the "World Bank Sourcebook on ICT in Agriculture: Connecting Smallholders to Knowledge, Networks, and Institutions."

The document reviews FAO milestones in ICT development and use related to gender, including gender mainstreaming, with particular attention to divisions in digital access, rural barriers due to poor infrastructure, and gender divisions in access. It defines e-agriculture in terms of designing, developing, and applying ICT innovation to boost agricultural and rural development, especially through encouraging national e-agriculture strategies.

The seven critical factors in ICT success in agriculture, including examples of some of the challenges and recommendations from chapter 2 of the document, include: 

1. Content - Adaptation of content to local needs, languages, and contexts in forms that are easily accessed and exchanged by the resource poor of both genders, with  innovations coming directly from the rural communities themselves.
2. Capacity development - There is a need to strengthen individuals' capacity, organisational capacity, and the enabling environment through internet access that is universal, affordable, safe and open nd designed to reinforce "the resilience capacity of states, communities and individuals to adapt to shocks and natural disasters, food chain emergencies, transboundary threats, socio-economic crises, violent conflicts and protracted crises."
3. Gender and diversity - "Gender, youth and diversity should be systematically addressed in the planning phase of project design and during the whole project cycle..." including gender disaggregated data to show gaps.
4. Access and participation - Inclusion policies with gender perspectives should include collaboration and knowledge sharing.
5. Partnerships - Public-private partnerships for sustainable business models need not be through large corporations. "Small, local private companies, local producer organizations and community-based non-governmental organizations (NGOs) often have the social capital to provide trusted information and good quality services."
6. Technologies - "Combination of radio and telephone, and locally relevant technologies selected on the basis of in-depth analysis of local needs and existing information systems" can be adopted along with mobile information and voice-based services.
7. Sustainability - "Access to mobile telephony, Internet and information in general should be possible, and within the price range of the poor..." using identified sustainable financial models and environmentally friendly technology.

Cultural and social limitations can form gender barriers, as can time and mobility constraints. Costs and ownership barriers need to be overcome, for example, the use of the colour pink for phones and bicycles in Cambodia has helped to determine woman-owned goods. Literacy and education for women and girls can be aided by ICT access. Talking books, for example, have helped deliver information to 175,000 families in Ghana (2015), up from 1,00o in 2008.

Integrating gender in ICT in agriculture initiatives includes: content (such as women farmer-made videos in India), capacity development (such as women controlled telecentres in Burkina Faso), improved monitoring and evaluation (using the Gender Evaluation Methodology for Internet and ICTs (GEM) method, adaptation to gender needs of both genders, partners at a community and country level who analyse gender issues within their initiatives (for example, a gender balance in call centre representatives), choice of mixed technologies accessible by both genders (for example, Her Farm radio from Farm Radio International (FRI)) , and sustainability (such as FAO-Dimitra clubs, a participatory information and communication project implemented in several countries of sub-Saharan Africa). Projects to close gender gaps include mobile finance and mobile learning and e-learning.

The document cites the Sustainable Development Goals which mention new technologies in their targets and indicators and concludes that through obtaining and using gender data in development, national ICT in agriculture strategies can contribute to bridging the digital, rural, and gender divides.