This document provides an overview and summary of a workshop on exploring social and gender dynamics of migration in rice-based systems in South Asia. It discusses several key topics: - Women's large role in Bangladeshi agriculture, constituting over 75% of the farming population. They perform many agricultural tasks but face discrimination. - A framework for analyzing gender and resource ownership at the household, community, market, and state levels. - The impacts of migration on agriculture, including labor shortages and the "feminization of agriculture" as more women take on agricultural work. - The costs and benefits of migration for individuals and communities in Bangladesh. While it provides income, it also breaks social ties and kin

1. WELCOME
TO
WORKSHOP
ON
EXPLORING SOCIAL AND GENDER DYNAMICS OF
MIGRATION IN RICE-BASED SYSTEMS IN SOUTH ASIA
Md. Sahed Khan
17-20 June 2019
ISARC, Varanasi

2. Presentation and discussion
■ Perspectives from Bangladesh

3. Women in Bangladesh Agriculture
■ Almost 13 million farm families of the country grow rice [Bangladesh Rice Knowledge Bank]
■ Agriculture provides employment to largest share of rural population (54.1%), women
– Constitute 76.7% of farming population (43.9% men) [Quarterly labour force Survey (2015-16) of
BBS]
– Women’s participation has increased & are dominating the sector
■ Doing harvesting, tilling, irrigation and others works outside their homes
■ Besides caring for crop fields, crop sorting and processing, storing, irrigation, harvesting and some other related
works, women are also participating in core cultivation with males
– [https://www.daily-sun.com/printversion/details/277579/Women-make-a-change-in-agri-sector]
– Contribute considerably to household income through farm and homestead production and wage labor
■ A highly patriarchal society with high gender discrimination at all levels
■ Women struggled a lot and mostly failed in demanding and controlling their
deserved rights in family, society and in the state
– due to the domination of their male counterparts in this patriarchal society

4. Political Ecology Framework
Dimensions Resource Ownership Capacity Building Research & Development
Household •Nature of accessibility by people of
different layers within household i.e.,
oHusband and wife
oYoung and Old-age group
oWidowed member
oOther family interactions
•Increased knowledge and enhanced self-
confidence
•Consciousness orientation
•Able to identify and articulate information and
technology needs
•Enhanced access to services provided by GOs
and NGOs
•Membership (GO & NGO)
•Development of a range of affordable and
appropriate technologies that meet women’s
needs in agricultural production, post-
harvesting & household tasks, reduce
drudgery & save time
Community •Availability, adequacy &
accessibility by people of different
layers like
oMen and women
oRich and poor
oModerate and Extreme poor
oFarmers and Non-farmers
oOther interactions
•Educate community leaders, government officials
and local leaders regarding the importance of
gender responsive and participatory approaches
•Train government and other officials involved in
rural development in gender analysis and gender
mainstreaming
•Development of a gender and sex-
disaggregated database (using inputs from
GOs, NGOs and communities)
•Support to decision-makers by assisting
identification, planning and targeting of
gender-sensitive interventions, including
technology development and delivery
Market •Create and regularly update
organizational directories to improve
knowledge about the roles of actors
in technology development and
delivery
•Agricultural value chain involvement
•Gender-responsive consciousness orientation
•[Gender based] Farmers’ cooperative
•Mechanisms to bring stability on
information accessibility
oPricing policy
oCredit policy
oTrading policy
State •Policies and strategies for attaining
gender equality
•Gender based equal accessibility to
resources
•Equality in resource ownership
•Inter-sectoral partnership
•Policies and strategies for promoting awareness
•Self-worth and self-reliance
•Provide support to stakeholders to develop
appropriate gender-responsive technologies
for agricultural production, processing and
household tasks
•Entrepreneurship for all
4

5. Agriculture-gender-livelihood nexus
■ Impacts of the Green Revolution package have boomeranged negatively
– a vast majority (more than 60%) as capital-deficit, poor and marginal farmers with
fragmented land holdings
■ For decades, September-October has persisted as the dreaded “Monga”
period (also known as ‘Dead October’)
– a severe food insecurity; distress-sale of livestock, land and household assets.
■ Initiatives slightly facilitated coping during high-stress periods
■ Increased agricultural productivity gains didn’t proceeded to the majorities (65-70%) – the
Landless
■ Gendered dimensions of land ownership are even more debilitating
– Very few women were able to or wanted to exercise this right in their socio-cultural
context
– Owning land implies breaking social ties & bonds - often critical support networks
women

6. Agriculture and policy distance: A
paradox
■ Steady continued agrarian growth and productivity in Bangladesh is
commendable – but it masks many broken stories and experiences
 Landlessness
 Land fragmentation
 Distress sale of land
 Gendered disparities in land ownership
 Agriculture decision-making and
 Distress pull-out from agriculture of the most vulnerable
■ The “policy distance” persists
– Most peripheral regions presents a paradox of being too far away from
capital city [Dhaka], (nerve centre of policy, decision-making and
politics)

7. Northern
More frequent & permanent
Age: 15 – 34 years;
Destination: mostly Dhaka
Rapid agricultural transition
Less profitability in rice farming
Inadequacy of non-farm & year round employment
opportunity
High waged industrial employment in urban regions
Western
Less frequent & mostly seasonal
Age: 15 – 32 years;
Destination: mostly Neighboring regions & few
India
Rapid agricultural transition
Inadequacy of non-farm & year round employment
opportunity
Less profitability in rice farming
Eastern
More frequent and both permanent & seasonal
Age: 20 – 36 years;
Destination: few Dhaka and mostly International
Rapid agricultural transition
Less profitability in rice farming
Inadequacy of non-farm employment opportunity
High waged employment in urban as well as foreign nations
Southern
More frequent and both permanent & seasonal
Age: 18 – 35 years;
Destination: mostly Dhaka and few International
Climate change and frequent natural disasters
Less profitability in rice farming
Inadequacy of non-farm employment opportunity
High waged employment in urban as well as foreign nations
Migration in
Bangladesh:
Nature & causes

8. Profile of migrants to Capital
■ Around 50% migrants in Dhaka city
– Had only one year of schooling
– Were engaged as agricultural workers and landless
– Were extreme poor and destitute
– Settled in slums
– Every three of five got their jobs within one week (Afsar, 1999)

9. Afsar; Kamala Gurung; Humnath Bhandari; Thelma Paris (2016)
Migration: Myths & assumptions
• Prevalence of poverty
• Rapid agricultural transition
• Swift urbanization and industrialization
• Environmental – climate change, natural
disaster, famine
• Economic – better employment
opportunity, higher wage, better exposure
to outside world
• Cultural – religious freedom, education
Consequences of high men out-
migration
• Reduction in national poverty rate
• Lack of farm labor
• Reduction in farm productivity
• Feminization of agriculture
• Vulnerability of left behind – mostly women
• Reluctance of youth in agriculture
• Varying risk coping strategy

10. Social
costs
Kinship Breaking
Physical insecurity
More health problems
faced in urban slums
Skewed access to basic
amenities for life
Social
benefits
Relatively more
income (reduced
national poverty)
Individual satisfaction
from earnings and
spending
Pleasure of having urban
citizenship
Better exposure to outside
world
Costs and benefits of Migration

11. In-depth study on consequences
■ More equitable land ownership, production and consumption pattern - prior to Green
Revolution
– It required and facilitated a consolidation of land, capital and a switch to mono-
cropping.
– Explains the wide-spread landlessness of cultivable land - the vicious poverty cycle.
■ Vulnerability of left behind
“All my sons are living happily with their wives and children in Dhaka city. After their departure,
initially they continued some sort of communication with me but now-a-days they do not even
think of caring about me, or sending any money from there. They do not even care about
whether I am dead or alive.”
■ Facilitation of a mass-out migration from the North provided little respite from poverty and
we reported heard comments like,
“... it is very expensive to survive in the city; if we could have some land and we would
get proper output price, we would like to be in the village”
■ This perhaps also explains why a significant number (more than 60%) of the rural poor in
Western regions, who opt to remain poor, battle hunger and distress, choosing not to
migrate.

12. Agriculture-migration-development
nexus■ High men out-migration from northern Bangladesh have acted as engine oil to the expansion of
‘inter-generational prolonged poverty’ situation
– has revolved into a status quo that can be termed as a ‘vicious circle of
underdevelopment’
■ Northern people were late in making the out-migration decision than the people of other region
– Southern people - first one who migrated to Dhaka city after independence of Bangladesh
– They mostly grasped the benefits generated through overall development in Bangladesh
– after 1990s, northern people started to migrate to Dhaka city and mostly got employed in
laborers positions there
– the decision to migrate didn’t bring that much of well-being which ultimately couldn’t bring
desired improvements in their livelihood (Inter-generational prolonged poverty)
– leaving their children under the supervision of others (Grandparents, Sisters, brothers etc.)
– their children’s inner development (ethical issues) got troubled a lot
– children couldn’t turn out to be as skilled manpower and as youth, they followed similar
pathways that their ancestors used –
■ either get employed in the farming business (- land fragmentations made them laborers)
■ or get migrated to Dhaka city for being employed (repetition of ‘vicious circle of

13. Trends in growth rate of GDP and
agriculture sector in Bangladesh
13
0
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
2006-07 2007-08 2008-09 2009-10 2010-11 2011-12 2012-13 2013-14 2014-15 2015-16
InPercent
Fiscal Year
GDP Growth (%) Target
GDP Growth (%) Achievement
Growth in Agriculture Sector (%)

14. Types of contract held in rural
Bangladesh based on gender
14
0
10
20
30
40
50
60
70
80
90
2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013
Percentage
Years
Male (%) Full-time
Male (%) Part-time
Female (%) Full-time
Female (%) Part-time

15. Wage level and gender based
participation in agriculture sector of
rural Bangladesh
15
0
10
20
30
40
50
60
70
80
90
100
2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013
Percentage
Year
Male (%) Low
Male (%) Medium
Male (%) High
Female (%) Low
Female (%) Medium
Female (%) High

16. Women farmers in Bangladesh: Myths and assumptions
Assumption 1: Women are more involved in home-based agricultural activities
Assumption 2: Women are more in charge of small-scale vegetable, poultry and livestock
production
Assumption 3: Women are more engaged in production of perishable, but often nutrition dense
foods
Assumption 4: Women are more involved in production for own consumption rather than for
the market.
Assumption 5: Women are usually not involved at all in marketing of agricultural products
Assumption 6: Women are not supposed to own productive assets like land, seed or pond
Assumption 7: Women’s involvement in field agriculture is still linked to loss of man honor
(man shomman)

17. Feminization of Agriculture
■ Nature
– Mostly agricultural day-laborers, few small and marginal farmers
■ Extent
– In case of rice, all works except land ploughing and harvesting
– In case of vegetables, all works except land ploughing
■ Process
Debt burden of NGO
credit and labour
intensiveness of crop
diversification
Swift male out-
migration from
rural to urban
Urge need for
lower waged
labour like
females, young
aged boys and
girls
Emergence of
the so called
spectacle
‘Feminization of
Agriculture’

18. Feminization of Agriculture: Women’s
insights■ The climax into the life of the disadvantaged women in Northern Bangladesh
■ Based on the trajectory analysis; during 1990s –
– The concurrent happening of rapid industrialization and urbanization; better
communication with capital (establishment of Jamuna Bridge) and less profitability of
farming business – both pushed and pulled the men through process of migration
– Through NGO membership, women got access to credits but the credited money was
mostly utilized by their male counterparts in unproductive means
■ Put the women in a trap of burdensome weekly installment repayment
■ Opted to migrate and work as RMG workers in Dhaka
■ In the next 15-25 years; their social injustices and insecurity experience was forwarded to
rural regions – daughters were advised not to migrate to Dhaka to work in RMG factories
– Lastly, changing cropping pattern introduced by the policy on the commercialization of
vegetable production – more cheap (female) labor emerged in the fields
■ “Feminization of Agriculture” started happening & the extent is escalating

19. Consequences of feminization of
agriculture
Positive
■ Making more visible monetary
contribution to family
■ Getting social recognition as
economically active participants in
agriculture
■ Able to have savings
■ Better gender relations within household
as well as community members
Negative
■ Burdensome workload of women –
different group has different extent of
burden
– Class
– Family type
– Ethnicity – Santal women in BD
■ School drop-out of girls in HHs: As
substitute for mother’s role in HHs

20. Leanings and ways forward
■ Gender analysis at institution
■ Need to address poverty, gender and inequality together
■ Implementation of land & agrarian reforms and promotion of decentralized industrialization
(as a source of non-farm employment) is needed
■ Women-women cooperation between institutional and field level
■ Training is less capable in generating awareness among women, only skill orientation
■ Land right issues
– Lack of access to ownership
■ Some feminist academics have argued that women’s land rights do not deserve policy
attention, since they aren’t demanding this. Why?
■ May be the deprived (women)
– Have incomplete information about all options
– Have adapted their preferences to what they see as attainable

21. Scope for further research
■ Literature also affirmed that ‘Feminization of Agriculture’ is happening - the extent is
escalating
– Allowed women to contribute to family in more productive ways and attain better
agency
■ High time to question,
– What impact it had on women’s life?
– What happens to other family members?
– How the experience differ among different agro-ecologies?
– Was that beneficial or burdensome to women?
– After all these, have the women been empowered – as they deserve?
■ If yes, then to what extent?
■ If no, then why not?
■ Need to conduct more in-depth research on
– Understanding the social and gender dynamics of migration in Bangladesh
■ Rice based farming being labour intensive will have slightly different implications when it
comes to migration within state, country or internationally
– Exploring impacts of feminization of agriculture on women’s lives and agency

22. THANK
YOU
ALL