Guidebook on Developing Womens Entrepreneurship among Agricultural Cooperatives in the ESCAP Region

1
Guidebook on Developing Womens Entrepreneurship
among Agricultural Cooperatives in the ESCAP
Region

• Marie Sicat
• Emerging Social Issues Division
• UN Economic Social Commission for Asia the
  Pacific
• International Workshop on Entrepreneurship and
• e-Business Development for Women APEC Womens
  e-Biz Training 2006
• Seoul, Korea (3-8 July 2006)

2
Visiting Pulmu Coop in Hongsong
3
Overview

• Description of project
• Background on regional situation of women in
  rural areas and key issues faced
• Cooperative entrepreneurship
• Women in green cooperatives
• Opportunities for entrepreneurship in green
  market
• Brief overview of publication structure and
  process finalizing publication.

4
ESCAP Green Coop Project

• Studies conducted as part of ESCAP project
  Establishment of Sustainable E-Business and
  Network for Green Coop Enterprises for Women in
  Rural Communities
• Two year project
• - First phase conduct two research studies to
  be made into publications (1) on womens
  entrepreneurship and agricultural cooperatives
  (2) green coops and e-business. Organization of
  workshop seminar where findings presented.
• - Second phase establish knowledge network of
  women green coops and pilot a womens green coop
  e-centre.

5
Objective of project

• The empowerment of women through building
  womens capacity in entrepreneurship and in the
  use of ICT as a tool for socio-economic
  development in agricultural cooperatives
  specialized in green or organic products in rural
  areas.

6
Regional situation with regard to rural women and
key gender issues
7
Situation of rural women in region

• Asia Pacific region is home to over 60 of the
  worlds population with approximately 3.8 billion
  people in the region. Majority live in rural
  areas.
• In most developing countries, rural population
  exceeds 50 of total population.
• Approximately 2/3 of all women work in some area
  of economic activity.
• Agricultural employment comprises primary source
  of income for women.

8
Share of rural and urban populations living
below the national poverty line ()Selected
ESCAP countries
9
Feminization of poverty

• Has become largely accepted that there is a type
  of feminization of poverty, in particular in
  rural areas.
• No consensus has been reach on definitions, and
  this needs to be clarified to be useful.
• Can mean one or a combination of the following
• - women compared to men have a higher incidence
  of poverty
• - womens poverty is more severe than mens
• - over time, the incidence of poverty among
  women is increasing compared to men.
• In order to apply this for useful policy
  formulation toward poverty-reduction strategies,
  the root causes and dynamics involved in this
  phenomenon must be determined.

10
Qualitative dimensions of living conditions of
rural women womens work

• Informalization of womens work
• Work opportunities may appear created, but in the
  informal sector.
• Insecure jobs.
• Wages are lower.
• Work conditions are bad.
• Women work time exceeds that of men, experience
  constant fatigue.
• Often subject to social subordination.

11
Empowerment of women

• Earning our own money allows us to do what we
  want with it. It also brings us izzat (honour
  or respect) because the money proves our
  contribution. Otherwise, we work like animals,
  we are never given credit for our contribution
  and even our own men say that we do not work.
  When we have our own money we are no longer
  mohtaj (dependent to the point of being at the
  other persons mercy. The word is often used for
  the physically disabled).
• Quote from a Pakistani entrepreneur in Nighat
  Said Khan, 1984

12
Cooperative Entrepreneurship
13
Cooperative Entrepreneurship

• What is a cooperative?
• An autonomous association of persons united
  voluntarily to meet their common economic, social
  and cultural needs and aspirations through a
  jointly-owned and democratically controlled
  enterprise.
• International Cooperative Alliance

14
Benefits Coops Offer to Small-Scale Entrepreneur

• Enables small-scale entrepreneurs with limited
  individual resources to pool their resources and
  make equipment purchases and investments normally
  impossible on their own.
• Can acquire economies of scale usually only
  attainable by more financed entrepreneurs.
• Enable small farmers to become competitive
  players in the market and to enter higher-return
  areas of business such as the organic/green
  products market.

15
Cooperatives contribution to economic and social
development

• Economic model based on collaboration rather
  than on competition
• Stresses self-help and mutual aid.
• Collaborative nature fosters trust and helps
  develop social capital within communities.
• Driven by balance between profit motive and
  interest of membership and community
• Concern for community work for sustainable
  development of their communities

16
Some Characteristics of Cooperative Governing
Structures

• Member owned
• Democratic member control members have equal
  voting rights
• Member economic participation members
  contribute equitably to, and democratically
  control, the capital of their cooperative
• Co-operation among cooperatives working
  together through local, national, regional and
  international structures

17
Types of coops and activities

• Farmers and agricultural producers coops
• Agro and food processing coops
• Marketing coops
• Agricultural cooperative banks, credit union and
  microfinance coops
• Consumer coops

18
Dynamics of Cooperative Collaboration Key
strength

• Tend to operate through mutually supporting
  networks in local, national, regional and
  international structures among different
  cooperative types and functional areas.
• Example of strong effectiveness of cooperative
  system for empowering small-scale entrepreneurs
• dynamic between producer cooperatives and
  consumer cooperatives.
• Formation of comprehensive consumer cooperatives
  has provided the vital marketing channel for the
  small-scale farmers in the producer cooperatives
  to sell their products and enter higher-return
  areas of business.
• Without these consumer cooperatives, many of the
  small-scale farmers would not be able to find a
  market for their goods and survive or make a
  profit.

19
Republic of Korea Hongdong Village in Hongsong

• Typical rice farming village where there are not
  many opportunities to increase farm income.
• Organic agriculture provided the opportunity for
  a new income source.
• 1995 19 farms of the total 81 farms organize a
  duck-rice organic farming group and start to
  produce organic rice.
• They utilize use of ducks for weed and insect
  control.
• Successful sales of organic rice through one
  consumer cooperative in Seoul area.
• Initial success of first group spurs many more
  farmers in neighbouring villages to enter organic
  rice farming.

20
Women in Green Cooperatives
21
Promotion of Womens Entrepreneurship in Green
Cooperatives Policy rationales

• Eco-friendly agricultural development and green
  business provides an enabling environment for
  womens entrepreneurship.
• It is a strong, growing niche market for women
  entrepreneurs which appears will accelerate with
  growing urgency for sustainable development.
• Can help counter extreme poverty particularly
  prevalent among rural women.

22
Percentage of women membership in cooperative
23
Womens participation in cooperative
decisionmaking

• Cooperatives in the region still characterized by
  strong gender inequality with regard to womens
  participation.
• Women in cooperative decision-making positions
• National Apex
  Primary cooperatives
• Leader 11.19 14.16
• Manager 2.3 7.0
• Source International Cooperative Alliance 2006

24
Potential womens cooperative model

• Agricultural consumer cooperative cooperatives
  comprised of members who are regular consumers of
  agricultural products.
• While producers cooperatives tend to be male
  dominated, consumer cooperatives tend to have a
  predominantly women membership and are run by
  women.
• May be useful to examine more in-depthly the
  governing process in consumer cooperatives and
  how it has been conducive to womens
  participation in the decisionmaking process, and
  if any of these lessons learned can be
  transferred to the agricultural producers
  cooperatives sector.

25
Increasing womens participation in cooperative
decisionmaking

• Male dominated cooperative governing structures.
  Womens not included in decisionmaking process.
• Male dominated cooperative governing structure,
  but increasing gender sensitization and
  consideration of womens needs and concerns in
  decisionmaking process.
• Equitable participation of women in
  decisionmaking process of cooperative governing
  structure.

26
Trends in green cooperatives

• Green coops, in particular, consumer cooperatives
  tend to be dominated and run by women.
• Reflects womens interest and priority on
  healthy, quality foods and products for family.
• These women networks are well familiarized with
  needs of consumer market.
• Opportunity exists for stronger liaison between
  women entrepreneurs in producer green
  cooperatives and women-run consumer cooperatives
  in green products.

27
Factors conducive to womens entrepreneurship in
green cooperatives

• Women have a vested interest in the healthiness
  and quality of foods which the family and
  children eat ie. Organic products
• Proliferation of women in poverty and role of
  women as caretakers of the family and children
  can often propel women towards a particular
  urgency to find new and more innovative ways of
  supplementing livelihood and providing better
  life for the family such as green
  entrepreneurship.
• Self-help and community support nature of
  cooperative forms of enterprise conducive to
  womens entrepreneurship.
• Many women-run coops tend to put more emphasis on
  social caring.

28
Example of womens traditional role in
agriculture Marketing of products
29
Entrepreneurship Opportunities in Green Business
30
Total area under organic management share for
each continent
31
Organic farming in Asian countries
32
Organic Product Market in Asia

• While Asias holding of the worlds organic
  agricultural area is still small relative to
  other regions of the world, there has been
  growing receptivity and acceptance of organic
  agriculture.
• Environmentally friendly agricultural practices
  gaining more urgency in region with environmental
  deterioration in many countries of region. Green
  coops conducive to sustainable development.
• Expanding local markets for organic products and
  government involvement in organic agriculture.
• Japan and Republic of Korea are currently main
  markets in region.
• China shows highest growth potential in the
  region in near future. Experiencing large rise
  in sales or organic foods.

33
Agricultural Products of Selected Asian Countries
34
Some of the policy recommendationsto promote
womens entrepreneurship in green coops

• Gender mainstreaming of rural policy on
  entrepreneurship
• Start-up with women ngo-initiated consumer
  cooperatives
• Public campaigns for the life of health and
  sustainability (LOHAS)
• Establishment of intra-regional e-business
  womens green cooperative networks.

35
Structure of Guidebook Report
36
Structure of report

• Ch.1 Introduction
• Ch.2 Green Cooperatives in Development Context
• Ch.3 Women and Green Cooperatives
• Ch.4 Gender Dynamics in Rural Labour and Womens
  Traditional Roles in Agriculture and Rural
  Entrepreneurship
• Ch.5 Guidelines on Womens Entrepreneurship in
  Green Cooperatives
• Ch.6 Good Practices of Womens Green Cooperative
  Enterprises
• Ch.7 Policy Recommendations
• Ch.8 Conclusions
• Annex Country-specific overviews on status of
  womens green cooperative entrepreneurship.

37
Other publication contents

• Publication will be policy oriented as well as
  practical application oriented.
• Includes a set of policy recommendations for
  promoting womens entrepreneurship in green
  cooperatives.
• Applications guidelines
• How to initiate creation of a cooperative
• Strategies for marketing rural products
• Womens network building for entrepreneurship.

38
Publication details

• Publication scheduled to be finalized by end of
  July.
• Policy recommendations and country-specific
  overviews Feedback and info from country
  delegations.
• Feedback and comments very welcomed from
  participants.

39
Thank you
40
The Guidebook is being developed by the UN
Economic Social Commission for Asia the
Pacific with researchers Dr. Soon-Young Jung
Ms. Hae-Young Pang of the Asia Pacific Womens
Information Network Center, Sookmyung University
For further information, www.unescap.org/icstd
or contactUN Economic and Social Commission
for Asia and the PacificEmerging Social Issues
DivisionMarie Sicat sicat_at_un.orgAPWINCMs.
Hae-Young Pang or Dr. Soon-Young Jung
apwinc_at_sookmyung.ac.kr