Highlights
From the ‘four powers’ to five lenses
Highlights of CIFOR’s research on gender and inclusiveness
It’s about more than just men and women
In the forestry sector, the concept of gender has evolved from an awareness of the need to consider women in forest management to the growing recognition that gender equality is a goal in its own right. But ‘gender’ is still interpreted in a simplistic way that rarely goes beyond traditional notions of women’s vs. men’s roles.
CIFOR researchers have been untangling the concept of gender, studying how it combines with age and marital status, class, ethnicity and other forms of social differentiation. This ‘intersectionality’ is the focus of a new manual that proposes a five-lens approach to identifying who is marginalized and why. CIFOR and partners also held a webinar to help make sense of it all.
Another article assessed how much attention recent forestry research paid to gender issues (spoiler alert: not much).
Restoration risks and opportunities
As countries gear up to meet their commitments to the Bonn Challenge, CIFOR is exploring how forest landscape restoration strategies can help – or hinder – gender equality.
Gender was a major focus of the Global Landscapes Forum on “Prospects and Opportunities for Restoration in Africa”, held in Nairobi in August 2018. Experts from across Africa shared examples of successful gender-responsive approaches at a gender plenary, and CIFOR scientists conducted a study and published a joint set of briefs with partners, summing up research on gender-responsive restoration in Africa.
What does power have to do with it?
A digital summit hosted by the Global Landscapes Forum and moderated by CIFOR scientist Bimbika Sijapati Basnett explored the power structures at play in global landscapes. Focusing on research in Southeast Asia, the panelists outlined a framework for analyzing how different actors are able to control land and transform landscapes, and what happens when agendas conflict.
At the CGIAR collaborative platform on gender webinar, CIFOR presented findings on strengthening women’s tenure and rights to forests and trees through the Adaptive Collaborative Management approach, which aims to level the playing field, resolve conflict, foster collaboration and negotiation, and build skills and capacities.
When moving away isn’t an option
As climate change starts to threaten livelihoods, men tend to migrate to find work. This means women – who must stay to raise children and produce food – are often confronting the worst aspects of land degradation. Gender and intersectionality are key themes in CIFOR’s migration work, including research that’s drawing the links between migration, forests and gender in Burkina Faso.
The gender dynamics of informal logging
Extracting timber, hewing logs and burning wood for charcoal have often been portrayed as men’s work. But CIFOR and partners are examining how these traditionally male-dominated industries are shaping – and being shaped by – gender roles.
‘Cubic women’ get their own share of logging profits in the Solomon Islands
In the Solomon Islands, women are responsible for collecting fresh water and gardening staple foods like yam, taro, sweet potato and banana, as well as fishing and collecting shells and crabs to sell, if there are markets nearby. But when logging companies move next door, water can become laden with sediment or oil, forcing women to hike or paddle farther for fresh water. Worse, domestic violence and sexual abuse are a common side-effect of nearby logging camps.
But some entrepreneurial women have found a way to profit from the infrastructure put in place by foreign companies to extract their own timber with portable sawmills to sell by the cubic meter. Although negotiating with the companies can sometimes put these so-called ‘cubic women’ at risk of exploitation, the substantial money they earn from the timber is earning the respect of their husbands, leading to a shift in gender dynamics.
With the timber production rate now at 11 times the sustainable yield, the Solomon Islands is reviewing its forestry law, and CIFOR and partners are working on a gender-sensitivity manual for forestry practitioners to address the changes triggered by the industry.
More women take up charcoal production in Zambia
An increased demand for charcoal in Zambia has drawn women into this traditionally male-dominated industry, doing everything from packaging charcoal to molding kilns, and even felling and cutting trees. Although they consider themselves to be primarily farmers, making charcoal can provide income security when crops fail.
Poverty and a lack of other livelihood options has pushed mainly unmarried, widowed or divorced women into the charcoal trade, but some married women say producing charcoal has helped them gain more control over their household income. Yet researchers caution against taking this as a sign of changed gender norms and women’s empowerment, saying more intersectional approaches are needed to untangle gender from other social factors, such as age and marital status.
CIFOR and partners are also looking at the gender dynamics of woodfuel value chains in Zambia, Kenya, DRC and Cameroon as part of an European Commission-funded project on governing multifunctional landscapes.
Focusing on gender … over the years
Since its earliest days, CIFOR has designed research projects to inform gender-equitable policies and works to ensure gender is firmly rooted in all of CIFOR’s research and engagement activities.
Research timeline
1996
Researchers used social criteria and indicators to assess women’s participation in forest management in West Kalimantan, Indonesia and Cameroon’s humid forest zone
1998
Gender and Diversity Program initiated to help ensure that research activities incorporate diverse perspectives and are accessible to all groups
2001
Adaptive Collaborative Management (ACM) approach in Nepal boosted participation of women and members of ethnic and caste groups in community forestry
2003
CIFOR helped the Bolivian Sustainable Forestry Project establish a gender action plan to involve women in community forestry decisions
2004
The Equitable Forest, a collection of 14 case studies on ACM, stressed the need to recognise different groups within communities, especially women and other disadvantaged
2010
CIFOR trained researchers and managers in gender analysis and on ways to incorporate gender into proposals, activity plans and budgets
2012
Gender ratio among CIFOR staff at 50:50
2013
Research on gender dimensions of the shea, charcoal and furniture-making value chains aims to raise awareness of how trade and investment patterns affect women
2014
Field guide to Adaptive Collaborative Management and improving women’s participation shares practical findings from ACM research in Uganda and Nicaragua
2015
Findings on forest land restoration through enclosures in Burkina Faso reveals shifting gender dynamics as women speak up to ensure food security
2015
Series of briefs on gender research by CIFOR and partners launched at Paris climate conference (some were included in 2016 UN Global Sustainable Development Report)
2016
After six years of ACM approach in Uganda, women in leadership positions increased from 11% to 54%, and 9X more women ran for political office
2017
Earthscan Reader on Gender and Forests summarized 30 years of findings by CIFOR and partners
2018
Green Climate Fund’s gender and social inclusion policy 2018–2020 includes key messages that align with CIFOR recommendations