Reducing Drudgery and Improving the Lives of Women

Women smallholder farmers are responsible for the majority of the postharvest processing, yet ineffective tools reduce their abilities to efficiently manage their tasks, leaving minimal time for tending to their domestic responsibilities of caring for their families or for themselves. By using grueling, outdated, postharvest methods, women spend an unnecessary amount of time and intensive physical labor on food processing that prevents them from focusing on anything beyond the immediate survival of their families. Women also lack access to beneficial income-generating resources that are more often available for men, including business education, technical support, financial capital, land ownership and decision-making authority. This limits their opportunities to grow as entrepreneurs, keeping them trapped within the poverty cycle.

The Power of Investing In Women

Achieving global gender parity in access to agricultural resources can result in 150 million fewer people living with hunger every year.

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Equal access to resources means a 30% increase in farm yields as farms become more productive.

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Increased yields will result in a $300 billion yearly economic impact across sub-Saharan Africa by 2025.

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Women reinvest more in their family. A $10 income increase for women is as effective as a $110 increase for men in improving the quality of life for children living in poverty.

Our Multifaceted Approach to Empower Rural African Women

  1. Partnering with women to increase their access to a variety of postharvest resources
  2. Introducing more efficient tools, reducing the time needed for processing of crops
  3. Offering technical support and training for long-term maintenance of tools
  4. Providing food science education to help reduce food loss and improve the nutritional quality of food products
  5. Developing market linkages with the African private sector and increasing access to markets and distribution channels