Sex Stories Girl Point Of View

Prepare to experience sex stories that seem like they were written just for you! We specialize in interactive erotica that can be personalized to fit your own sexual fantasies. You supply the name and characteristics of your dream partner, and we make them the subject of an erotic story. Most of our sex stories use second-person point-of-view and present-tense to make you the main character, and the multiple-choice interactive stories allow you to guide the plot in the direction that most appeals to you (like a Choose Your Own Adventure book) so you choose the path to the climax!

The use of second-person point-of-view in interactive fiction places you right in the action, possibly with a partner who would be unwilling in real life, doing things that may be illegal or dangerous. You should not read these stories if you have difficulty distinguishing fantasy from reality.

sex stories girl point of view

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At about the 45 minute mark, a clip came on that was shot from the point of view of a man receiving a blow job. A beautiful girl, with huge brown eyes and a devilish smile was slowly sucking the man's cock, her eyes looking directly into the camera. After a few seconds of sucking, she would let his cock fall out of her mouth, but would continue slowly stroking it with her hand while looking directly into the camera. She would smile and occasionally say something dirty. There was something so intimate about it. She was teasing him, taking him right up to the edge of climax but not past it. There was nothing hurried. She was drawing the pleasure out. I was so turned on that I threw my gown to the floor and stood naked.

The stories of these women represent the stories of many more victims, dead and alive. Sex trafficking and exploitation is a denial of human rights and civil liberties. The Comfort Women are an important case study because they represent as an institutionalized government-sponsored sex trafficking operation during wartime, and also as an ongoing issue. As Margaret Stetz points out, teaching about the comfort women will encourage solidarity with these victims, who deserve support, and help a new generation understand their experiences of sexual violence. 16

While women and girls today are less likely to be subjected to FGM compared to decades ago, UNFPA estimates an additional 2 million girls are at risk of this practice because COVID-19 disrupted preventive programs and child protection systems. FGM is often directly linked to child marriage, which many parents view as the most viable option for their daughters, especially during economic uncertainties like those related to the pandemic or the current global hunger crisis.

Traditionally, feminist literary criticism has sought to examine old texts within literary canon through a new lens. Specific goals of feminist criticism include both the development and discovery of female tradition of writing, and rediscovering of old texts, while also interpreting symbolism of women's writing so that it will not be lost or ignored by the male point of view and resisting sexism inherent in the majority of mainstream literature. These goals, along with the intent to analyze women writers and their writings from a female perspective, and increase awareness of the sexual politics of language and style[3] were developed by Lisa Tuttle in the 1980s, and have since been adopted by a majority of feminist critics.

According to data from 30 countries, only 1 percent of adolescent girls who have experienced forced sex reached out for professional help. In the U.S., only one in five female student victims between the ages of 18 and 24 reports the crime to law enforcement, according to the Department of Justice. Shame, denial and fear of repercussions all contribute to the reluctance of young women to share their stories.

Violence against Women and Girls: Lessons from South Asia is the first report of its kind to gather all available data and information on GBV in the region. In partnership with research institutions and other development organizations, the World Bank has also compiled a comprehensive review of the global evidence for effective interventions to prevent or reduce violence against women and girls. These lessons are now informing our work in several sectors, and are captured in sector-specific resources in the VAWG Resource Guide: www.vawgresourceguide.org.

The study analyzed the life and healthcare stories of women living in the Northwest Zone of the city of Santos, São Paulo State, Brazil, who had experienced neonatal deaths between January 2015 and July 2016. The study used triangulation of data from documents from the surveillance division, field diaries from visits to services, and interviews with the women. The interviews provided the main body of empirical data, based on narratives of the women's sexual and reproductive history, prenatal care, childbirth, and the experience of neonatal death. Of the 15 eligible cases, 8 women were interviewed, 6 of whom over 30 years of age and 2 under 30 years, all African-Brazilians, natives of Santos, and working in unskilled occupations. The data yielded the following results: (1) histories of unplanned pregnancies with various gestational risk factors; (2) the women's acknowledgment that they had experienced good access to health services; (3) questions concerning the need for tests and test results, understanding of complications, explanation of treatment approaches, and referrals; (4) prematurity, present in all the cases; (5) pain during labor, abandonment, and transfer to other services due to lack of beds in the neonatal ICU; (6) lack of integration between levels of care; and (7) after the infant's death, limited approaches and little orientation on comprehensive care related to the neonatal death. In conclusion, although the prenatal care was positively rated by the women, there was no comprehensive care for them in relation to the experience of neonatal death, with dialogue and an offer of more adequate contraceptive methods given their health history, as well as counseling on the emotional distress resulting from these experiences.

CHAPTER II. THE GENDERPERSPECTIVE 2.1 THE CONCEPT OFGENDER 2.2 GENDER ON THE INTERNATIONALAGENDA 2.3 GENDER ANDDEVELOPMENT 2.4 CONSTRAINTS IN DEVELOPMENTPOLICIES 2.5 GENDER IN AGRICULTURE AND RURAL DEVELOPMENT: FAO PLAN OF ACTION FOR WOMEN IN DEVELOPMENT 2.1 THE CONCEPT OFGENDERThe gender perspective looks at the impact of gender onpeople's opportunities, social roles and interactions. Successful implementationof the policy, programme and project goals of international and nationalorganizations is directly affected by the impact of gender and, in turn,influences the process of social development. Gender is an integral component ofevery aspect of the economic, social, daily and private lives of individuals andsocieties, and of the different roles ascribed by society to men andwomen.Social scientists and development experts use two separateterms to designate biologically determined differences between men and women,which are called "sex differences", and those constructed socially, which arecalled "gender differences". Both define the differences between men and women,but they have very different connotations.Sex refers to the permanent and immutable biologicalcharacteristics common to individuals in all societies and cultures, whilegender defines traits forged throughout the history of social relations. Gender,although it originates in objective biological divergencies, goes far beyond thephysiological and biological specifics of the two sexes in terms of the roleseach is expected to play. Gender differences are social constructs, inculcatedon the basis of a specific society's particular perceptions of the physicaldifferences and the assumed tastes, tendencies and capabilities of men andwomen. Gender differences, unlike the immutable characteristics of sex, areuniversally conceded in historical and comparative social analyses to bevariants that are transformed over time and from one culture to the next, associeties change and evolve.Gender relations are accordingly defined as the specificmechanisms whereby different cultures determine the functions andresponsibilities of each sex. They also determine access to material resources,such as land, credit and training, and more ephemeral resources, such as power.The implications for everyday life are many, and include the division of labour,the responsibilities of family members inside and outside the home, educationand opportunities for professional advancement and a voice inpolicy-making. 2.2 GENDER ON THE INTERNATIONALAGENDAFor several years now, governments and development agencieshave given top priority to gender issues in development planning and policies.Gender equity, concerning resource access and allocation as well asopportunities for social and economic advancement, has been a prominent item onthe agendas of all recent international meetings, which have also investigatedthe basic link between gender equity and sustainable development, definingspecific mechanisms and objectives for international cooperation.The 1992 UN Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED)in Rio de Janeiro (known as the "Earth Summit") explicitly included genderissues in Agenda 21, its platform statement. The World Conference on HumanRights, held in Vienna in 1993, also made significant progress in recognizingthe rights of women and girl-children as an inalienable, integral andindivisible part of universal human rights. This principle was taken up again bythe International Conference on Population and Development, held in Cairo in1994. Discussions focused on gender issues, stressing the empowerment of womenfor equitable development: "...the objective is to promote gender equality inall spheres of life, including family and community life, and to encourage andenable men to take responsibility for their sexual and reproductive behaviourand their social and family roles." The World Summit for Social Development,held in Copenhagen in 1995, took gender equity as the core strategy for socialand economic development and environmental protection. The 1995 Fourth WorldConference on Women, held in Beijing, reiterated the importance of these newoptions, drawing up an agenda to strengthen the status of women and adopting adeclaration and platform for action aimed at overcoming the barriers to genderequity and guaranteeing women's active participation in all spheres of life.Governments, the international community and civil society, including NGOs andthe private sector, were called upon to take strategic action in the followingcritical areas of concern:3 The persistent andincreasing burden of poverty on women; Inequalities and inadequaciesin, and unequal access to, education and training; Inequalities and inadequaciesin, and unequal access to, health care and related services; Violence againstwomen; The effects of armed or otherkinds of conflict on women, including those living under foreignoccupation; Inequality in economicstructures and policies, in all forms of productive activities and in access toresources; Inequality between men andwomen in the sharing of power and decision-making, at all levels; Insufficient mechanisms, atall levels, to promote the advancement of women; Lack of respect for, andinadequate promotion and protection of, the human rights of women; Stereotyping of women andinequality in women's access to, and participation in, all communicationsystems, especially the media; Gender inequalities in themanagement of natural resources and the safeguarding of theenvironment; Persistent discriminationagainst, and violation of the rights of, the girl-child.3 UN. 1995. Critical areas of concern.In Report of the Fourth World Conference on Women, Beijing, 4-15 September 1995,Chapter III, Item 44, p. 23, United Nations A7CONF.177/20.Governments and international organizations were urged topromote the search for, and the dissemination of, information on the mainaspects of gender issues, and to encourage the production and dissemination ofgender-specific statistics for programme planning and evaluation.Specific recommendations concerning statistics wereformulated. Strategic objective H.34 of the Platform for Action inAnnex 1 states that all statistics concerning individuals should be gathered,compiled, analysed and presented as gender-disaggregated data, mirroring theconcerns and issues of women in society. Data should, therefore:4 Ibid, p. 106, Strategic Objective H3:Generate and disseminate gender-disaggregated data and information for planningand evaluation. Measure the full contributionsof women and men to the economy; Measure unpaid work inagriculture, particularly subsistence agriculture, and other types of non-marketproduction activities included in the UN System of National Accounts; Develop methods for thequantitative measurement of unremunerated work that is outside the UN System ofNational Accounts, such as caring for dependents and preparing food, forpossible inclusion in satellite or other official accounts that may be producedseparately from the National Accounts; Develop an internationalclassification of unremunerated work activities for measurement in time-usestudies; Measure underemployment of menand women; Define concepts and methods tomeasure poverty and access to resources; Strengthen systems forgathering essential statistics and incorporate gender analysis; Develop data on morbidity andaccess to health services; Develop improved data on allforms of violence against women; Develop data collection onwomen and men with disabilities, including data on their access toresources.The Platform also formulated specific recommendationsconcerning national statistics. Governments were urged to review theirstatistics systems' coverage of gender considerations, disseminate statisticsperiodically in appropriate published forms for a wide range of users andutilize gender-specific data in the formulation of sustainable developmentpolicies and programmes. 2.3 GENDER ANDDEVELOPMENT 2.3.1 Work 2.3.2 Poverty 2.3.3 Family life 2.3.4 Health andnutrition 2.3.5 Education 2.3.6 The environment 2.3.7 The public and policy-makingspheresPlanners and policy-makers must be mindful of the majoraspects of socially ascribed gender functions and the specific needs of men andwomen. If development policies are to be sustainable, they must considerexisting gender disparities in employment, poverty, family life, health,education, the environment, public life and decision-making bodies. 2.3.1 WorkHouseholds in all societies differentiate various householdactivities and responsibilities by gender. For women, production andreproduction are two interlinked activities, and much of the work women do,although productive, is unpaid. Men have always played a minor role in domesticwork; societies tending to assume that they have paid work outside thehome.Gender disparities in access to economic resources, includingcredit, land and economic power-sharing, directly affect women's potential forachieving the kind of economic autonomy they need to provide a better quality oflife for themselves and their dependants.5 Limited access toagricultural inputs, especially for food crops, severely curtails women'spotential productivity.5 Sections A and B of the BeijingPlatform for Action recognize women's lack of access to productive resources andlimited access to economic power-sharing as being major causes of poverty. The1995 FAO Plan of Action for Women in Development identifies women's lack ofaccess to land and other agricultural inputs as one of the major obstacles toproductivity.Discrimination against women in employment is also frequentoutside the agricultural sector, and has an impact on the kinds of work, careersand career advancement that women can expect. Over the past 20 years or so,women all over the world have increased their participation in the labourmarket, but they continue to work in less prestigious jobs, are paid less andhave fewer opportunities for advancement.66 UN. 1995. The world's women 1995:trends and statistics. Sales No. E.95.XVII.2. New York.Women face a number of disadvantages in the labour market. Aswell as coping with sexist prejudices, they must reconcile the twin roles ofhomemaker and money-maker. This often affects their work status, the length andstructure of their workday and their salary level. In addition, the employmentsector offers less scope and potential for women than for men, as well as lowerpay for the same work. 2.3.2 PovertyPoverty can be defined as the combination of uncertain ornon-existent income and a lack of access to the resources needed to ensuresustainable living conditions. It often goes hand-in-hand with hunger,malnourishment, poor health, high mortality and morbidity rates, insufficienteducation and precarious and unhealthy housing.Studies have revealed an increasing feminization of poverty.Compared with men, the number of women living below the poverty line increasedbetween 1970 and 1980. By 1988, an estimated 60 percent of poor people werewomen.7 As well as sexism in the employment sector, contributingfactors included the economic restructuring imposed on many countries,government budget cuts and the adoption of neo-liberal economic models. Womenhave borne the brunt of cutbacks in civil service jobs, social services andbenefits. Their workload has increased as welfare structures have broken down,leaving them in sole charge of children and of elderly, ill and disabled peoplewho were previously looked after, at least partially, by the social servicessector. While trying to cope with the impact of the crisis of the welfare state,women are also desperately trying to juggle their meager resources. Thefeminization of poverty is much more visible among female-headed households. Ina male-headed household, both the man and the woman contribute to the family'swelfare; the man brings in income and the woman, in addition to the goods andservices she provides the family, may also seek paid work outside thehome.87 ILO. 1995. Gender, poverty andemployment: turning capabilities into entitlements. Turin, Italy.8 The indices of even limited studies show that thestatus of female heads of household with dependent children is comparable tothat of older widows living alone - both tend to be poorer than men.In rural areas, where services and job opportunities are evenfewer than in urban areas, poverty is also more acute. The situation is worsefor women, who are less likely to have access to production factors, servicesand resources such as credit, land, inheritance, education, information,extension services, technology and farm inputs, as well as a say indecision-making.Another reason for the persistence of female poverty is gendervulnerability within the home. When poor families cannot afford to send all oftheir children to school, parents favour investing in the boy-children, keepingthe girls at home to help with domestic work or some income-generatingactivity. 2.3.3 Family lifeIn all societies women are the prime carers of children, theelderly and the ill, and do most of the domestic tasks.9 Women'slives are greatly affected by reproduction, which has an incisive and directimpact on their health and on their educational, employment and earningopportunities. In societies where women marry very young and much earlier thanmen, wives defer more to husbands, and this has a substantial bearing on women'schances of finding paid work and receiving an education.9 Op. cit., footnote 6, p. 6.Growing male migration in search of work has combined withunstable conjugal arrangements to increase the number of female-headedhouseholds. There are also more widows then widowers because women tend to livelonger and men are more likely to remarry or seek alternative livingarrangements. The 1990 censuses showed that 21 percent of Latin Americanhouseholds were headed by women while, in the Caribbean, the figure was 35percent - the highest of any region worldwide.1010 Women in developing countries areestimated to do between two-thirds and three-quarters of the domestic work (op.cit., footnote 6, p. 106). A study of three cities in Mexico showed that womenspent an average of 56 hours per week on household tasks, while men spent sevenhours. The sexes also did different tasks; men mostly shopped and took thechildren to school and women did the remainder of the work in the home (Pedrero,M. 1996. "Organización familiar"; familias con futuro. Mexico,GEM.The differences between female- and male-headed householdsusually have a bearing on all aspects of family life: the size and compositionof the family and how it is run; nutrition; raising children; and availableincome.11 A single female head of household has a doubleresponsibility - she must earn a living and, at the same time, run ahome.11 Whoever bears the family name isusually listed as the head of household. Stereotypically, an adult male is oftenautomatically considered to be the head of the family even when a woman iseconomically and otherwise responsible for that family. Most female-headedhouseholds are, therefore, also one-parent households. M. Pedrero's study (op.cit., footnote 10) showed that only 1.4 percent of female heads of householdlived with a partner. 2.3.4 Health andnutritionBiologically, men and women have different health needs, butlifestyles and socially ascribed roles arising from prevailing social andcultural patterns also play a part in the health picture. Men are more likely tobe the victims of occupational diseases, accidents at work, smoking, alcohol andother forms of substance abuse. Men12 have a higher incidence ofcancer and of cardiovascular lesions and diseases (the principal cause of malemortality). Women's health risks, which are mainly linked to reproduction, makethem more vulnerable during pregnancy to anemia, malnutrition, hepatitis,malaria, diabetes and other illnesses.12 For a more detailed analysis ofcauses of mortality and morbidity, see: Murray, C.J.L. & López, A.D.1994. Global and regional cause-of-death patterns in 1990. WHO Bulletin,72 (3): 447-480.Women's life expectancy is greater than men's - women live forfive to 12 years longer than men in Europe, North America and some countries ofLatin America. There are a number of hypothetical explanations for thisphenomenon, ranging from genetics and biology to environmental and socialcauses, but no definitive consensus has yet emerged.13 Female lifeexpectancy does not conform to this pattern in some Asian countries, wherecultural norms and religious precepts restrict women's access to medical careand health services.13 Ibid, p. 65-66.Despite the generally poor provision of health services,particularly in rural areas, there has been a surge of interest in the familyplanning, maternal and child health care services offered by NGOs, which havebenefited mothers, children of both sexes and adult women in general.Custom, social constraints and lack of resources also giverise to gender disparities among children in terms of nutrition, morbidity andmortality. The two sexes do not receive equal attention and care; the tendencybeing to favour boy-children. Males are also fed more and better.The sharing of food among adult members of the family may alsobe unequal in some societies. Women often serve the family first and eatwhatever is left. They often do not get enough to eat, with grave consequencesfor their health, especially when they are pregnant or breastfeeding. Women arethe poorest of the poor, and even women heads of household are oftenundernourished, denying themselves in order to feed their children.Because food production in the rural zones of many countriesis largely carried out at home by women, their own and their families'nutritional status would benefit from women having greater access to theagricultural credit, technology and services necessary for increasedproductivity. 2.3.5Education1414 "Education" here is taken to mean"schooling", as the word has connotations far beyond mere formalinstruction.The increasingly competitive labour market demands ever-higherlevels of education. People without it are at a growing disadvantage.At the same time, there is broad consensus that education can,in times of change, move marginalized, excluded people into the mainstream.Despite this, socio-cultural barriers and prejudices that restrict women'saccess to education persist in a number of societies.More women than men are illiterate; and the lower a country'sliteracy rate, the wider the gap between the two sexes. The United NationsEducational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) estimates that 41percent of women in developing countries are illiterate, compared with 20percent of men. In some countries, the illiteracy rate of rural women betweenthe ages of 15 and 24 years is twice to three times that of women in urbanareas.15 Girls leave school earlier, especially in rural areas wherethey are needed to help with domestic and productive work. The lack of transportor of schools located near the home widens the literacy gap by directlyaffecting girls' school attendance, as parents tend to worry about the personalsafety of their daughters. In some societies, rigid cultural patterns and socialrules restrict women's movements outside the home.15 UNDP. 1995. Human DevelopmentReport. New York and London, Oxford University Press. See also op. cit.,footnote 6.In some parts of the world, such as the Caribbean and westernAsia, the number of women enrolling in institutes of higher learning isincreasing, sometimes even exceeding male enrolments. However, the chosen fieldsof study differ greatly. Cultural traditions, prejudices, stereotypes and familyreluctance frequently result in the exclusion of women from the scientific andtechnical fields, inducing many to opt for the more "feminine", but lessremunerative and less promising careers - a choice that aggravates segregationin the job market. 2.3.6 The environmentThe impact of environmental degradation isgender-differentiated in terms of workloads and the quality of life; women arethe first to be affected by the depletion of natural resources. In rural areasin most developing countries, women are responsible for the daily management anduse of natural resources, as well as providing for the family by raising foodcrops, gathering forest products and fetching wood and water. Widespread andgrowing deforestation and the drying-up of water sources force women to rangeever further afield, spending more time and energy in producing and findingessential commodities and making it even harder for them to engage in moreproductive, more lucrative activities.1616 A series of case studies by theUnited Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) to evaluate the impact on women ofenvironmental degradation revealed the increasing difficulty of finding fuel andwater. See UNFPA. 1995. State of World Population 1995. New York. Fordata on women with respect to water and fuel scarcity, see also op. cit.,footnote 6.Environmental degradation caused by poorly managed andutilized waste products and pollutants can have a disproportionate impact onwomen, who seem to be more susceptible to the toxic effects of certainchemicals. The health risk is even higher among the lower-income strata of thepopulation, who tend to live near industrial urban areas, or among rural peopleliving near fields that are sprayed from the air.Consumption patterns and industrial production in developedcountries are very detrimental to sustainable development, natural resources andpeople everywhere. Global warming, the shrinking ozone layer and reducedbiodiversity are some of the better-known effects of environmentaldegradation.In many countries the lives of rural people are whollydependent on the availability of natural resources. Both men and womenoverexploit natural resources in a struggle for survival in which soils aredepleted, wildlife, plant and marine resources destroyed, and the quality ofwater downgraded. Environmental degradation is most keenly felt by the mostvulnerable members of the community and those who rely heavily on nature'sbounty. For this reason, gender disparities in natural resource management andparticipation in policy-making must be clearly understood. 2.3.7 The public and policy-makingspheresGender inequality is a persistent feature of the public andpolicy-making spheres. Women continue to be under-represented in governments,legislative bodies and many other crucial sectors affecting public opinion, suchas the mass media, the arts, religion and culture. Worldwide, there are only 16countries in which more than 15 percent of ministerial posts are held by women,and in 59 countries there are no women ministers at all.17 Althoughwomen have the right to vote in nearly every country in the world, there arevery few women in government; in 1994, only 10 percent of the world'sparliamentary deputies were women.1817 Op. cit., footnote 6.18 UNDP, op. cit., footnote 15.These inequalities have their roots in everyday family life;gender disparities in the division of household tasks and responsibilities crampwomen's horizons and hamper their full participation in other activities.Socio-cultural prejudices and stereotyping are still the main constraints towomen's participation in the spheres of political and economic power.Few women occupy key positions in large companies, and it isstill rare to find a woman heading one. Ministries of finance and budget and thecentral banks are mostly headed by men, with very few administrative ormanagement positions filled by women.1919 UNFPA, op. cit., footnote 16, p.25-26; and op. cit., footnote 6 2.4 CONSTRAINTS IN DEVELOPMENTPOLICIES 2.4.1 Land rights 2.4.2 Water distribution 2.4.3 Research 2.4.4 Extension 2.4.5 Modern technology 2.4.6 FinancialresourcesStudies by FAO and other institutions show that policiesadopted in various parts of the world to promote sustainable development andregulate access to productive resources and services, such as land, water,technology, research, training and financial resources, have not always beensuccessful in reducing rural poverty and increasing food supplies. Such policieshave, indeed, often had a negative impact. Two reasons for this have alreadybeen made clear: women agricultural producers have been left out of theequation; and many development policies and projects do not take gender issuesinto consideration.The lack of gender-disaggregated data has probably been themain constraint to serious consideration of women's real role in agriculture.Such data would help to enlist women's full participation in the formulation ofrural development and food security strategies. In addition,gender-disaggregated data would illuminate gender-differentiated impacts on foodand cash crop production, financial management and supervision, and the storageand sale of agricultural products. 2.4.1 Land rightsFAO studies have shown that insecure rights to landownershipand use are a crucial, gender-based barrier to enhancing women's agriculturalproductivity and income. Secure land rights encompass the rights to lease publicland and use community-owned property, and not just the right to own privateproperty. Women would certainly make better use of land to which they had somesort of guaranteed rights, as such rights would help and encourage them to makethe correct long-and short-term input and management decisions and achievehigher yields.Women have had limited access to land nearly everywherethroughout history. Even agrarian reform or resettlement programmes have failedto solve this problem - indeed they have aggravated it by allocating land to thehead of the family, who is presumed to be a man. Those responsible for thedesign and execution of such programmes have paid little attention to thequestion of who is really responsible for the household or productiveunit.In addition, the modernization of agriculture has often led towhole populations being moved off the best land to make room for cash crops,making once self-sufficient farmers dependent on getting food from othersources. In contrast, however, agrarian reform in some countries, such asThailand, China, Nicaragua, Malaysia and Cuba, has led to changes in systemsthat once relegated women to a subordinate position in family food production.Many women have also organized themselves to claim access to collectively ownedland.Limited access to land is still a major constraint to women'sfull participation in rural development. The Beijing Platform for Actionunderlined this aspect as a direct cause of female poverty. Among the optionsfor eradicating poverty, it urged governments to implement policies to promotewomen's access to and control over land, and to reform legislation that deprivedwomen of the right to own and inherit land.2020 The Beijing Declaration and Platformfor Action, paras 53, 58(n), 58(p) and 63(b). 2.4.2 Water distributionWater policies and programmes frequently restrict women'srights to the use and sustainable management of water, despite the importantrole they play in water management. In rural areas, where fetching water cantake all day, women are responsible for providing it to the family unit. Wateris needed for food preparation, drinking, personal hygiene and watering thegarden and livestock. Women cannot afford to waste a drop of it. They know thelocal sources of good drinking-water, which they have to fetch, store andmanage. They recycle it for washing and watering, maximizing water use andkeeping it as clean as possible. They have acquired real expertise in watermanagement, and consideration and recognition of this is crucial to the successof water conservation programmes and policies.Despite this, agricultural sector policies tend to favourmonocropping for cash over the crop diversification that is typical of (andessential to) rural food production. One feature of this approach is that littleattention is paid to small-scale irrigation and water supply systems that areappropriate to small farmers. The needs, as well as the water managementexpertise, of the men and women in this subsector are overlooked.In many cases, water is monopolized and channeled, and riversand streams are diverted for commercial irrigation, depriving many smallsettlements and farm plots. Drainage systems are built and cause water suppliesto become polluted with pesticides and other contaminants. Water is wasted, andno thought is given to recycling this resource, or even using it in a rationalway.Decisions regarding the scheduling of water in irrigated zonestend to be made without women's on-farm and home activities being taken intoaccount. The exclusion of women from water management and irrigation projects isa key factor in the frequent failure of both water and poverty alleviationprojects. 2.4.3 ResearchIn the context of food security, sustainable development andpoverty eradication, research and extension objectives are to: increase foodsupplies, create employment opportunities, reduce environmental degradation andenhance resource management. Despite this, agricultural research has focusednearly exclusively on profitable cash crops and other basic commodities such asmaize, to the detriment of cereal, fruit, pulse and vegetable crops.To achieve sustainable agricultural production in developingcountries, research programmes need to target food crops and small livestock,making the most of the farming expertise of women who are responsible forgrowing food.FAO studies confirm that women constitute the backbone of thesmall farming sector, they produce 60 to 80 percent of the food in developingcountries (and 50 percent worldwide), do much of the work on the farm andprovide for their families. However, they have much less access than men to theinformation and farm support services that were established to boostproductivity. Micro-economic studies in Latin America and sub-Saharan Africahave shown that women also play a decisive role in specific cash cropoperations. In many countries they are responsible for coastal and inlandfisheries in rivers and lagoons; the production of secondary crops; gatheringforest products, fuelwood and water; processing and conserving food; andfetching the family's water supply.Women are extremely knowledgeable about the value and use ofwild and domestic varieties, and this has major implications for food, health,income and the conservation of plant genetic resources. If women are overlookedas food producers and resource managers, modern technology will lose the benefitof traditional practices. New approaches now being introduced will bring womeninto agricultural research, harnessing their special skills in production andbiodiversity for their own benefit and for that of society.There are pragmatic gender differences in men's and women'sknowledge about the environment, plants and animals, and their respective usesand products. This gender differentiated knowledge is crucial to in situgenetic resource conservation, management and improvement. Deciding whichspecies to conserve demands an intimate local understanding of the value of eachresource.In times of famine, drought and war, people often depend ontheir familiarity with wild plants and animals to feed themselves. Subsistencefarmers (the majority of whom are women in most parts of the world) are not in aposition to buy such inputs as fertilizers, pesticides and veterinary medicinesand have to fall back on their ability to adapt to the environment, which allowsthem to grow a wide range of crops and to buffer crop failure and livestockdisease or death by finding alternative food sources in the wild. Forsubsistence farmers, the natural ecosystem is a varied and permanent larder andan ally in the struggle against hunger and malnutrition.Research programmes have consistently undervalued the capacityof rural communities for varietal improvement and innovative crop practices.Modern techniques and attitudes have caused women to lose much of the influenceand control over production and the access to resources which they used toenjoy. This is the legacy of patriarchal practices that where introduced duringthe process of colonization (and which, unfortunately, persist today in someparts of the world) involving the introduction of crops and techniques for thebenefit of commercial interests, while totally ignoring environmental protectionand the needs of the local people.There is a body of highly sophisticated knowledge that ishanded down from one generation to the next. Sustainable practices for theprotection of soil, water, natural vegetation and biodiversity have beendeveloped over time. They should be preserved and extended, and priority givento enhancing and promoting them.FAO studies maintain that long-term strategies for theconservation, utilization and improvement of the full range of plant geneticresources for food and agriculture should: Acknowledge and consider thegender roles, responsibilities and contributions of various socio-economicgroups; Acknowledge and enhance thecapabilities, skills and practices, as well as the rights, of men and womenfarmers; Promote appropriate andequitable agricultural policy incentives for sustainable resource use, payingparticular attention to in situ and ex situ conservation andbetter linkage between the two; Define and adopt appropriatenational legislation to protect endangered productive and food geneticresources, so as to guarantee continuity in their use and management by localand indigenous communities and people, and ensure a fair and equitabledistribution of the benefits from their utilization; Reinforce rural women's accessto land and water, education, extension, credit and appropriatetechnology; Promote women's activeparticipation in decision-making processes, to ensure gender equity in thebenefits of agricultural development.A concomitant requirement would be to set up a database for aninitial analysis, followed by permanent monitoring and evaluation ofprogress. 2.4.4 ExtensionAlthough women are highly instrumental in food production andfood security, they have little access to production support services such asextension and training.FAO studies have identified several weak points that preventextension programmes from reaching rural women. The traditional focus of mostextension services is the farmer-landowner,21 who is in a position toclaim credit and invest in inputs and new technology. Few women have access toland and other resources, and encounter serious constraints to obtaining credit.Extension services tend to sideline them, focusing more on cash crops than onthe subsistence food crops that are a priority for women farmers and are vitalto the food security of millions.21 The World Bank's widely adoptedtraining-visit system, for example, frequently uses landownership as aprerequisite for identifying contact farmers, and few women own land.Deep-rooted, erroneous beliefs on the part of extensionworkers lead them to overlook women. They may claim that it is difficult toestablish dialogue with women (who are, in any case, of only minor importance inagricultural production), that women have little say in farm decisions or a poorgrasp of what extensionists are teaching, or that they are too shy or reluctantto accept new technology.Other factors hindering women's access to extension are theirlack of formal schooling, mobility and time for extension activities. However,women are good at finding ways of balancing domestic responsibilities with farmduties. Their inclusion in extension programmes would make their work moreproductive, helping to boost agricultural production. Extension programmes wouldbe more likely to succeed if they were tailored to women's specialcircumstances.The lack of extension service provision for women restrictstheir access to inputs such as improved seed, fertilizer and pesticides. Womenrarely belong to cooperatives, but cooperative membership is often a necessaryqualification for government-subsidized inputs for small farmers.Extension services are pivotal to increased productivity,agricultural development and poverty eradication. Both cash and food crops standto gain from gender equity in access to extension. A participatory, continuous,gender-differentiated database is imperative in identifying target groups forextension services, reorienting extension programmes, maximizing experience,ensuring feedback and monitoring and evaluating extension activities. 2.4.5 Modern technologyThe main thrust of the green revolution of the 1960s and 1970swas the introduction of an innovative technology package to disseminate improvedseed, new techniques in farming and irrigation, and the use of chemicalfertilizers. While the green revolution was successful, worldwide, in boostingyields and food supplies, it did not necessarily enhance food security, economicopportunities and general well-being among the poorest of the rural poor becauseits impact differed greatly by gender and social class. The rich benefited morethan the poor, and men more than women. The introduction of high-yielding wheatand rice varieties in Asia, for example, proved disadvantageous in terms of workand employment opportunities for rural women for the followingreasons: Households foundthat they needed more money to buy technological inputs, so women had to seekpaid work as farm labourers. Women's unpaid workloadincreased on small farms that were unable to hire outside labour as the largerfarms did. Paid workers had to call onfamily members to meet production quotas, and women's workloads increased asthey could no longer work the small plots that were the source of the family'sfood security. Mechanization reduced women'sopportunities for paid work; not only could the work be done by fewer people,but jobs once done manually by women were now done by men usingmachines. There was no automaticimprovement in living standards even when there were more jobs. Modernization increased theyields of the larger holdings, while day labourers' wages remainedstatic. Women were paid less than men,although they often did the harder work such as weeding, transplanting andharvesting.In addition to these points, it is worth mentioning the factthat farmers do not judge a crop solely on the grounds of higher yields, theyalso look at the potential for using a plant's biomass and harvest and otherresidues. To a small farmer, rice means more than just grain - it providesstraw for roofing and mats, fodder for animals, feed for acquaculture and hullsfor fuel. These products are essential items in the budget of poor ruralfamilies and crucial inputs for the money-generating activities that provide alivelihood to many of the rural poor, especially women.In general, the green revolution has mainly benefited thecapital accumulation of more affluent farmers, while more equitable andsustainable development requires technology that is designed to meet the realneeds of poor farmers in environmentally fragile areas where there is noirrigation.Technology offers unquestionable benefits, such aslabour-saving devices and increased productivity, but agricultural modernizationcan also have a dramatic, negative impact. It can reduce rural women'sopportunities for paid work by abolishing jobs (such as cottage industries) thatwere traditionally done by women and brought in extra income from value-added.With farm mechanization, consumers tend to buy unprocessed products, thus savingon even these small labour costs while, which results in lower income levels forrural households.Most of the negative impact of farm modernization can betraced to the introduction of technologies that were not designed to solve theproblems of small farmers (much less women farmers), but rather to meet theneeds of larger producers.Despite this, technological advances can be very beneficial.Farm households headed by single women who have no one to do the heavy jobs thatrequire great physical strength would benefit immensely from the introduction ofenergy-saving devices. Unfortunately, however, labour- and energy-saving devicesare usually designed with men in mind.New techniques for the collection of water and fuel and theeasing of post-harvest tasks such as processing and storage have also receivedscant attention from the research sector. Little value is attached to women'sactivities, and the volume of work they do tends to be overlooked. Women arerarely enlisted to help select topics for technological research,experimentation, production and dissemination. As it looks for ways to lightenworkloads, research would greatly benefit everyone's living conditions byseeking to ensure that women farmers continue to retain the few employmentopportunities they still possess. 2.4.6 FinancialresourcesIn general, gender prerogatives concerning local resources andthe benefits of national policies rarely match women's mounting responsibilitiesfor food production and natural resource management.Throughout much of the world, poor women farmers cannot affordto purchase even subsidized inputs such as fertilizers, pesticides andveterinary medicines, good, nourishing food, and fuel for cooking orheating.In most countries, rural women have difficulty getting creditbecause they are unable to put up the collateral that lending institutionsrequire, or because of the prevailing laws. Civil and/or farm legislation eitherdoes not grant women property rights on a par with those enjoyed by theirhusbands, or fails to acknowledge women as heads of household, even when theyplay that role. Not only does the lack of secure title limit women's access tocredit, it also bars them from joining farmers' associations, especially thoseconcerned with processing and marketing. If women had secure title to land theycould invest in it rather than merely working it, and this would encourage themto adopt sustainable farming practices.Lending institutions do not recognize women's capacity forloan repayment, so they often fail to target women who are then forced to resortto unofficial moneylenders charging exorbitant interest rates, thus exacerbatingfemale poverty. Alternatively, women may turn to family or informal lendingfacilities, which can, of course, only offer very small loans.The challenge for the future is to achieve full gender equityin access to resources and land, so that women can increase their buying powerand productivity, buy extra food and help to lay the foundations for foodsecurity. Credit machinery designed to reach small farmers and the landless mustalso be devised.Some countries have been experimenting successfully withcredit systems accompanied by technical advice on management and production.Outstanding examples of this include Bolivia's Banco Solidario and the famousGrameen Bank in Bangladesh, which have proposed alternatives to conventionalloan guarantees when lending to poor and landless rural women, who are theirmain customers. These banks report very high rates of repayment and note thatthe income generated by production increases is reinvested to enhance familynutrition, health and education. Such options work well only when they do notbecome welfare programmes; the initial support is intended to ensure femaleself-sufficiency. Detailed data on these successes should be collected, analysedand systematized for dissemination. 2.5 GENDER IN AGRICULTURE AND RURALDEVELOPMENT: FAO PLAN OF ACTION FOR WOMEN INDEVELOPMENT22 2.5.1 The context 2.5.2 The plan22 FAO. 1995. Plan of Action for Womenin Development. Twenty-eighth Session of the FAO Conference, 20 October-2November 1995. C95/14-Sup.1-Rev. 1. Rome. 2.5.1 The contextRural women, food security andnutritionA large and growing body of research shows that directresponsibility for household food provision falls largely on women. Despitethis, women farmers are disadvantaged. When they lack access to land (which isvery common), they are not eligible for credit, membership in farmers'organizations and training and extension services. Women's heavy workloads andlack of the inputs they need to become more productive are the main constraints,and these aggravate food insecurity and malnutrition in millions of households,especially female-headed ones.More than 780 million people in the developing world sufferfrom hunger and malnutrition. Many of these are women of child-bearing age,especially those who are pregnant or breastfeeding.23 Studies haveshown that, in the poorest female-headed households, household resources areused mainly to feed and educate the children, which is not necessarily true ofequally poor male-headed households. This emphasizes the need forgender-disaggregated data on the use of scant resources.23 Ibid.It is important to highlight the direct link between women'saccess to household resources and income management, and the improvement offamily food security and nutritional well-being. This linkage, along with theimportance of increasing women's productivity and, hence, their contribution tofood systems, should be a core consideration of policies and programmes aimed atenhancing food security and nutrition. There is, therefore, a crucial need for agender-disaggregated database on the control and management of resources andproduction factors.Rural women and the environmentWomen's relationship to the environment revolves around theircentral concern with household food security. Environmental degradation has adirect impact on women's workloads, and yet restricted access to inputs,resources, capital and employment often force women to overexploit the naturalresources base. Despite this, rural women are both the best-equipped and theworst-equipped to manage the environment; the best because they have thenecessary expertise, and the worst because they lack the power to intervene. Theexpertise in the conservation and preservation of wild plant and animal speciesthat women have developed over time must be explored, and these skills must betaken into account in policy formulation.Rural women and populationDespite the ongoing campaigns to limit world populationgrowth, poor families, especially in rural areas, continue to produce largefamilies with many children because of the labour value that children represent.A gender-disaggregated database would contribute to a deeper understanding ofpopulation trends and to the adoption of policies designed to improve the livingconditions of all rural people.Rural women and povertyNot only do women in the countryside do work that is directlyrelated to production and food security, they also do all of the domesticchores, working up to 16 hours a day in some developing countries. However, mostwomen are not remunerated for their work and their economic contribution isundercounted in official statistics - development programmes and policies rarelyconsider their contribution. According to a United Nations Development Programme(UNDP) report on human development, over 70 percent of the 1.3 billion peopleliving in absolute poverty are women. Economic crises, structural adjustmentprogrammes, armed conflicts and drought have led to the "feminization ofpoverty". Male outmigration, divorce and unstable living arrangements havedramatically increased the number of households headed by women who findthemselves wholly responsible for running the farm and feeding the family. Insome regions, these factors have all contributed to the greater presence ofwomen in agriculture. Development programmes and policies have rarely focused onthese new phenomena, however, and there is a lack of reliable statistics onthese social changes. 2.5.2 The planThe principal causes of the growing concentration of povertyand food insecurity among rural women and their families are: Limited access toinputs and to social, agricultural and commercial services; Unemployment orunderemployment and unequal pay and work opportunities; Exclusion from or restrictedparticipation in decision-making processes aimed at enhancing agriculturalproductivity and natural resource management; Unfavourable or discriminatorylegislation.The Plan formulated three stragetic objectives designedto solve these problems, improve living standards, achieve a satisfactory levelof food security, eradicate poverty among rural women and their families andsecure sustainable development.Strategic objective 1: To promote gender-based equityin the access to and control of productive resources. FAO action to achieve these objectives is centred on: promoting policies, programmesand projects that improve rural women's access to and control over productiveresources, inputs and services; undertaking research andaction programmes to identify the legislative and policy changes needed toachieve gender equity in all sectors; providing guidance andtechnical assistance to countries that are reorienting their agriculturalpolicies, and reducing institutional barriers to women's access to land,capital, credit, extension, research, training, markets and producers'organizations.Strategic objective 2: To increase women'sparticipation in decision- and policy-making at all levels. FAO action to achieve this objective is centred on: fostering awareness of theneed to promote the participation and leadership of women in local, regional andnational decision-making bodies; promoting the establishment ofdata exchange networks and ensuring that rural women's interests are representedin international and national policy-making; supporting research,consultation and communication to ensure that women are considered as agents ofchange and not the passive beneficiaries of plans, projects andprogrammes.Strategic objective 3: To promote a reduction in ruralwomen's workloads and enhance their opportunities for remunerated employment andincome. FAO action to achieve this objective is centred on: improving the production anddissemination of gender-responsive statistics so as to recognize and enhance theunpaid work of rural women, gain a better understanding of the situation ofrural men and women, and supply appropriate data for policy-making, planning andproject formulation; supporting initiatives toaddress policies and practices that reinforce rural women's employment in foodproduction, agriculture, forestry and fisheries; facilitating the utilizationof productive and domestic labour-saving technologies; enhancing rural women'sincome-generating opportunities and access to agricultural education and morelucrative agricultural occupations. 2ff7e9595c