Presentation by Catherine Mungai from the Climate Change, Agriculture and Food Security (CCAFS) at the workshop on Gender and Climate-Smart Agriculture in Eastern and Southern Africa Region: Case studies and lessons from 02 to 04 November 2016, Nairobi, Kenya

1. Catherine Mungai (CCAFS)
Gender & Social Inclusion in
Climate-Smart Agriculture:
Experiences from Nyando CSVs
Workshop on Gender-Sensitive Climate Smart Agriculture in Eastern & Southern Africa 2 - 4 November 2016, Nairobi, Kenya

2. CCAFS Gender and Social Inclusion
• Goal: ensure that rural women and youth benefit from CCAFS’
contribution to poverty reduction, enhanced environmental
resilience, improved food security, human health and nutrition.
• Strategy: undertake research to:
 Increase the control of women and youth over productive assets and
resources, and
 Promote their participation in decision making
 Inform, catalyze and target CSA solutions to women, youth and
vulnerable groups that do not increase their workloads
Women are central to agriculture in developing countries within a
broader social context ;
other categories or characteristics also affect opportunities: caste,
socioeconomic class, age, ability

3. GSI Strategic Research
1. Analysis and update of data collected to date in the Gender
Household Survey, to provide a baseline in relation to the gender
and youth sub-IDOs;
2. Analysis of household decision-making in adaptation and
mitigation.
3. Enabling mechanisms, tools and frameworks for gender in CSA,
along with strategies for scaling up and measurement frameworks
4. The potential for climate finance instruments to support women’s
adaptation and mitigation-based enterprises
5. Global and national climate policy research will investigate the
extent to which women and gender are integrated; work with
national and global policy makers.

4. • High poverty incidence (46%) and high population
density (>400 per Km2)
• More than 40% of landscape degraded
• Annual rainfall 900-1200mm
Study site - Nyando
• Food insecurity, 81%
of families
experience 1-2
hunger months a yr
• Another 17%
experience 3-4
hunger months a yr

5. Climate-smart interventions
• Drought and disease tolerant cereals
(maize and sorghum) and root crops
(sweet potatoes, cassava)
• Improved land management
practices, incorporating fruit trees to
improve nutrition and enhance soil
carbon content
• Water harvesting to increase access
to water during drought
• Improved beekeeping - building skills
and knowledge of farmer groups
(including women)

6. 6
• Improving local breeds of small
ruminants - heat tolerant, parasite
resistant, faster maturing Gala goats
and Red Maasai sheep
• Aquaculture – stocking tilapia fish in
the water pan fitted with liner
• Poultry – confined ranges for local
indigenous chicken and upgrading
with improved breeds
• Agro-forestry and tree nursery
management groups
Climate-smart interventions

7. CSA technologies and practices %HH aware of and using CSA practices and technologies
Male Female Total n (51)
Improved high yielding varieties (HYVs) 53.1 46.9 96.1
Scientific weather forecasting 52.2 47.8 92
Efficient fertilizer use 52.3 47.7 86.3
Cover cropping 50 50 82.4
Improved stress tolerant varieties (STVs) 54.8 45.2 82.4
Manure management 43.9 56.1 80.4
Terraces/bunds 51.3 48.7 78
Agroforestry 56.8 43.2 72.5
Integrated pest management 45.9 54.1 72.5
Destocking 61.1 38.9 70.6
Crop residue mulching 51.5 48.5 64.7
Water harvesting 51.6 48.4 62
Composting 55.2 44.8 58
Improved feed management 61.5 38.5 51
Adoption of resilient livestock breeds 60.9 39.1 46
Traditional weather forecasts 38.1 61.9 41.2
Tree nurseries 63.2 36.8 37.3
No/minimum tillage 41.2 58.8 34
Green house production 40 60 19.6
Both female and male
are aware and using
CSA interventions
Women are just as likely,
or more likely to adopt
CSA practices as men –
when aware
Uptake of CSA

8. Uptake of CSA – Crops
Changes in cropping strategies
• Preferred adaptation strategy is introduction of new crop
varieties (cowpeas, Sorghum and beans) that are high
yielding, shorter cycle, drought and flood tolerant.
• New crops introduced are Pigeon pea and Finger millet that
are heat and drought tolerant. Maize and groundnuts are
two main crops that some households have stopped
growing due to decreased rainfall and poor soil fertility.
• Soil improvement changes include use of
manure/composting, mulching and rotations.
The membership of all farmers groups in the CSVs
consists of about 60% women.

9. • Women are leading some
of the crop demonstrations
where they teach the local
community about improved
agronomic practices and
new resilient crop varieties
like pigeon peas.
9
• 6 women groups in Nyando namely; Obinju Self Help Women Groups
(SWHG), Achego Border SWHG, Odeyo Nyalo SWHG, Cham Luchi
SHWG, Ng’onglo SHWG and Agoro Utaweza SHWG to coordinate a
program that involves use of demonstration plots by women farmers for
knowledge sharing and seed multiplication in local communities
Uptake of CSA

10. Uptake of CSA – Change to Farm
animals
• These include new breeds (diseases
and heat resistant, fast growing, short
gestation period, rapid weight gain,
twining rate) of chicken, sheep and
goats.
• Livestock management practices
include herd reduction and zero-
grazing units.

11. Uptake of CSA
Diversifying livelihood strategies
• Women in all the household types are spending more time on off-
farm activities than men such as making and selling baskets and
ropes, working in sugarcane plantation and factory, food for work
program, small business, selling farm produce and charcoal.
Access to and use of weather information
• Households’ access weather information (start of the rainy season
and drought), through radio and orally from traditional forecasters,
family and neighbors. Women households (without influence of
men) access seasonal and short term weather information. More
men accessed information on livestock production than women.

12. Access and use of resources for climate change
adaptation
• Women access & use of assets are bound by complex
property rights & cultural rituals
• Ownership & access to assets (e.g., land, livestock) is
highly correlated to economic status, gender, education,
wealth and position in the household, e.g., unmarried
women with children & unmarried youth have limited
access to assets.
• Women in all household categories have to seek for
consent from men
Uptake of CSA

13. Training and learning events
• A total of 280 Nyando CSVs women
farmers were trained on climate-smart
agriculture at the Kisumu Agricultural
Society of Kenya Fair.
• Farmer learning events, 2,500 out of
the 3,500 participants were women.
• Their understanding of resilient
agricultural practices and tools that
they can use on their farms increased,
and they were also linked to a women
micro-finance scheme.
Uptake of CSA

14. Youth involvement in CSA
• Kamula Youth Group are piloting the smart farm concept. This
involves extensive water conservation and management, adoption
of greenhouse farming, integration of aquaculture and seed bulking
of fodder for livestock and horticultural crops.
• The farm measuring half hectare is jointly managed by 10 group
members.
• The group has a goal of empowering each member to own a similar
farm within four years in their homes
• On average, the smart farm set-up costs about US$ 3,000 as initial
investment and yields at least twice that amount in a year through
farm produce sales.
Estimated yearly earnings from fish are US$ 2,000 per earth dam. The
horticultural produce is expected to yield about US$4,000. The March 2016
harvest yielded 867 fish each selling at Kshs. 150 making on average kshs.
130,000/= or 1300 USD.

15. Success Factors
• Active engagement and willingness to
participate by target women and youth in
the CSVs
• Strong partnership established with
women and youth groups and linked to
local government and other NGOs,
research institutions and also private
sector
• Capacity building through learning events
and participation in trade fairs and also
farmer-to-farmer exchange visits
• Identification and targeting of technologies
and practices building on local knowledge,
needs and priorities of the target
communities

16. Challenges and barriers
The sustainability of CSA interventions depend on the extent to which they
are suited to the local context and whether they address existing social
dynamics and power relations
• Social and cultural factors that hinder adoption of CSA e.g. hierarchical
planting/ harvesting patterns – early maturing plants
• Available CSA technology and practices not gender sensitive e.g.
irrigation
• Labour intensive CSA practices and technologies
• Lack of skills of knowledge to apply technologies and practices e.g.
weather related apps – education
• Insufficient financing and investments for CSA especially by women and
youth.
A researcher perspective – lack of gender indicators to monitor, lack of
capacity among M&E staff to gather gender and social inclusion
information

17. THANK YOU FOR YOUR KIND
ATTENTION