Millions of women farmers who are innovating climate-smart agriculture experience multilayer oppression when they challenge traditional agriculture practices and paradigms.
Over 37% of the rural agricultural workforce in the world comprises women. In low-income countries, this ratio rises to 48%. According to the Food and Agriculture Organization, about half of the world's small-scale livestock managers and fishery workers are women.
Yet women in agriculture find very little space in news media coverage: only 2% of the stories on development issues and sustainability have women as a central focus. In stories about rural economy, agriculture, farming practices, agricultural policy, and land rights, women are centered in only 3% of stories. Only 1% of stories on sustainable development goals and 0% of stories on climate change raise gender issues.
In the process of socialization, the image of farmers is portrayed as men with women as helpers – this is reinforced by mainstream media. Prejudice, privilege, power, and authority combine to manifest oppression through exploitation, violence, marginalization, deprivation, and subjugation. And media stereotyping makes women farmers’ struggle against oppression more challenging.
When writing stories about these women farmers, we need to look beyond success/development stories. The process of empowerment must be the central theme of stories covering women farmers in climate-smart agriculture.
In 2023, the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism at the University of Oxford offered me a fellowship to study climate change and farmer suicides. During the fellowship, I developed the model of empowerment journalism defining the concept of empowerment based on the experiences of women farmers in 13 countries. I proposed an empowerment journalism model to highlight women farmers’ constructive struggle against the oppressive structures within which they operate while practicing climate-smart agriculture.

(Link of my paper - https://reutersinstitute.politics.ox.ac.uk/people/radheshyam-jadhav)

The model reflects on how women farmers build their self-belief system and keep themselves in a self-assertive mind frame in the struggle to gain the power to control their lives and resources while giving meaning to their lives. It provides the framework to report the psychological, economic, social, cultural, and political empowerment process.
Today, climate change has posed three major challenges in agriculture – to increase productivity sustainably, adapt to the impacts of climate change and reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Giving women the same opportunities as men could raise agricultural production up to 4 per cent in the poorest regions. But women innovating climate-smart agriculture experience multi-layer oppression as they question patriarchal agriculture practices and paradigms.
At the Reuters Institute, my project was more than just developing an empowerment journalism model. I proposed creating a vibrant network comprising farmers, communicators, researchers and reporters. Together, we would build a rich qualitative and quantitative database and craft compelling stories, with a focus on women in agriculture. Additionally, I proposed the development of a dynamic digital platform to showcase our collaborative efforts and amplify the voices of women in agriculture and also provide a platform for them to narrate their own stories. The value of the news is compromised if we don’t tell our own stories in our own words.
Women in Agriculture is the outcome of my research project at the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism, at the University of Oxford.
Dr. Radheshyam Jadhav
14 April 2024

References:
1. Food and Agriculture.
2. Who makes the news? 6th Global Media Monitoring Project.
3. UN women.