Women empowerment and gender equality is one of the critical ingredients in fighting extreme poverty, hunger and malnutrition, said FAO Director-General Jose Graziano da Silva at Step It Up Together with Rural Women to End Hunger and Poverty at FAO Rome, Italy on 16 December 2016.
Below are the Key Facts pointed out in the event:
- In developing countries, women make up 45% of the agricultural labour force, ranging from 20% in Latin America to up to 60% in parts of Africa and Asia.
- In developing countries in Africa and Asia and the Pacific, women typically work 12-13 hours more than men per week.
- Across all regions women are less likely than men to own or control land, and their plots often are of poorer quality. Less than 20% of the world’s landholders are women.
- If women farmers had the same access to resources as men, the number of hungry people in the world could be reduced by up to 150 million due to productivity gains.
- Women reinvest up to 90% of their earning back into their households – that’s money spent on nutrition, food, healthcare, school, and income-generating activities – helping to break the cycle of intergenerational poverty.
To know more about this event, click here.