Category Archives: Kenya

Yemaya: gender equality in small-scale fisheries is a struggle at two levels

Posted on March 14, 2017 | Leave a comment
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Sally Barnes runs an artisanal fi sh smoking business. Through the smoking business, she added value to her husband’s catches and increased the family income. Source: Yemaya and WWW.WOODCOCKSMOKERY.COM

The first 2017 issue of Yemaya, the gender and fisheries newsletter of the International Collective in Support of Fishworkers (ICSF), recognizes that implementing the gender equality provisions of the Voluntary Guidelines on Small Scale Fisheries is a struggle at two levels. The first struggle is in the household and community, and the second is the level of the state and other stakeholders. Many of articles in this issue of Yemaya amplify on this theme.

  •  World Fisheries Day: Africa – Sustainability through unity by Béatrice Gorez
  • What’s New Webby? By Ramya Rajagopalan
  • Ireland: Independent and happy by Sally Barnes (see photo)
  • Milestones:  UNESCO inscribes haenyeo culture on Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity by Ramya Rajagopalan
  • Network –  An uphill task by Marja Bekendam de Boer and Katia Frangoudes
  • Tanzania – Study time by Ali Thani and Lorna Slade
  • Profile – Gilda Olivia Rojas Bermudez: In defence of rights and culture by Vivienne Solis
  • India – Anjali: Woman of the waters by Sujoy Jana and Santanu Chacraverti
  • Asia – Round table of women in fisheries (Goa) by Mariette Correa
  • Q & A – Interview with Mercy Wasai Mghanga, fish trader and Chairperson, Bamburi Beach Management Unit (BMU) and Vice-Chairperson, Mombasa County BMU network by Hadley B. Becha
  • Yemaya Mama – Cartoon – “Gender equality begins at home”
  • Yemaya Recommends – Review: Promoting gender equality and women’s empowerment in fisheries and aquaculture (FAO) by Ramya Rajagopalan

Download the whole issue of articles at this link.

 

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Posted in Africa, Aktea, Asia, Europe, Fish post-harvest, Fisheries, Gender, Goa, ICSF, Ireland, Kenya, Korea, Men, South Korea, Tanzania, West Bengal, Women

Lake Victoria Fishermen’s Spouses Who Travel More at Risk of HIV/AIDS

Posted on January 22, 2013 | Leave a comment
Fish market, Kisimu County, Kenya. Photo source: guide2kenya.com

Fish market, Kisimu County, Kenya. Photo source: guide2kenya.com

The new study by Zachary A. Kwena, Carol S. Camlin, Chris A. Shisanya, Isaac Mwanzo, Elizabeth A. Bukusi, carried out in Kisimu County, near Lake Victoria, Kenya, delves into social patterns of mobility and the risks it brings for contracting HIV/AIDS.

Short-Term Mobility and the Risk of HIV Infection among Married Couples in the Fishing Communities along Lake Victoria, Kenya

PLOS ONE: download paper here 

Also check out links below for other recent papers on HIV/AIDS in Uganda Lake Victoria fishing communities.

Abstract

Objective: Mobility has long been associated with high HIV prevalence. We sought to assess sex differences in the relationship between mobility and risk for HIV infection among married couples in the fishing communities.

Methods: We conducted 1090 gender-matched interviews and rapid HIV testing with 545 couples proportionally representing all the different sizes of the fish-landing beaches in Kisumu County. We contacted a random sample of fishermen as our index participants and asked them to enrol in the study together with their spouses. The consenting couples were separated into different private rooms for concurrent interviews and thereafter reunited for couple rapid HIV counselling and testing. In addition to socio-economic and behavioural data, we collected information on overnight travels and divided couples in 4 groups as follows both partners not mobile, both partners mobile, only woman mobile, and only man mobile. Other than descriptive statistics, we used X2 and U tests to compare groups of variables and multivariate logistic regression to measure association between mobility and HIV infection.

Results: We found significant differences in the number of trips women travelled  in the preceding month (mean 4.6, SD 7.1) compared to men (mean 3.3, SD 4.9; p,0.01) and when the women did travel, they were more likely to spend more days away from home than their male partners (mean 5.2 [SD 7.2] versus 3.4 SD 5.6; p = 0.01). With an HIV prevalence of 22.7% in women compared to 20.9% among men, mobile women who had non-mobile spouses had 2.1 times the likelihood of HIV infection compared to individuals in couples where both partners were non-mobile.

Conclusion: The mobility of fishermen’s spouses is associated with HIV infection that is not evident among fishermen themselves. Therefore, interventions in this community could be a combination of sex-specific programming that targets women and combined programming for couples.

Also read about other studies regarding HIV/AIDS in fishing communities around Lake Victoria, from Uganda.

https://genderaquafish.org/2011/09/24/hiv-behavioural-survey-and-tests-in-uganda-fishing-communities/

https://genderaquafish.org/2011/08/18/uganda-fishing-communties-study-on-hivaids-rates-in-women-and-men/

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Posted in Africa, Country, Fish post-harvest, Fisheries, Gender, Geography, HIV/AIDS, Kenya, Men, Regional, Research, communication resources, Risk reduction, Uganda, Women

Overcoming Gender Inequalities in Fish Supply Chains

Posted on November 29, 2012 | 1 comment

Panelists in IIFET Gender and Value Chains Session, July 2012.

“Gender equality thinking should not focus just on the numbers of women and men in fish supply chains”, said Gifty Anane-Taabeah (Ghana), the final panelist on Overcoming Gender Equalities in Fish Supply Chains. The panel and two presentation sessions (Markets and Value Chains for Small Aquaculture Enterprises and Looking at Fish Supply Chains with a Gender Lens) were held on the first day of the 2012 conference of the International Institute of Fisheries Economics and Trade (IIFET) in Dar Es Salaam, Tanzania. Rather, Gifty contended, “the overall aim should be how to empower women and men in supply chains to boost overall productivity.”

In July 2012, the International Institute of Fisheries Economics and Trade (IIFET) held its biennial conference in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania.  On the agenda, thanks to IIFET and the Aquafish CRSP, were sessions that included or focused on gender in aquaculture and fisheries, especially on value chains for small scale aquaculture and fisheries. The reports from the sessions are now starting to appear on the conference  repository website (https://ir.library.oregonstate.edu/xmlui/handle/1957/32231).

Read these reports for a start (others to be posted on the site):

VALUE CHAINS SESSION INTRODUCTION by Dr Hillary Egna: download here

SUMMARY OF THE GENDER AND VALUE CHAINS  sessions and papers by Presenters and Meryl Williams: download here

The above reports  include summaries of papers of global reach and more specific regional and country studies from:

AFRICA: Lake Victoria, Ghana, Kenya, Mozambique, Nigeria, Tanzania (including Zanzibar), Uganda

ASIA: India (including Kerala), Sri Lanka

Visit the AquaFish CRSP gender page for more.

Papers that can be downloaded are:

  1. M.L. Adeleke and J.A. Afolabi. Appraisal of Fresh Fish Marketing in Ondo State, Nigeria.
  2. Salehe, Mwanahamis; Mlaponi, Enock; Onyango, Paul O.; Mrosso, Hilary D.J. Contribution of Lake Victoria Dagaa Fishery in East and Central African Fish Trade.
  3. Olufayo, Mosun. The Gender Roles of Women in Aquaculture and Food Security in Nigeria.
  4. De Silva, Achini; Bjorndal, Trond; Lem, Audun. Role of Gender in Global Fishery Value Chains: A feminist Perspective on Activity, Access and Control Profile.
  5. Masette, Margaret. Sun-dried Mukene (Rastrineobola argentea) Value-Chain Analysis in Uganda.
  6. Cheke, Abiodun. Women in Fish Value Chain in Nigeria.

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Posted in Africa, Aquaculture, Asia, Bangladesh, Events, awards, grants, employment, Fish post-harvest, Fisheries, Gender, Geography, Global, IIFET, India, Kenya, Kerala, Men, Mozambique, Regional, Sri Lanka, Tanzania, Uganda, Women, Zanzibar

New global beach seine fishing review

Posted on November 21, 2011 | Leave a comment

This new FAO Technical Paper gives a global overview of beach seine fisheries, studies the operations in several countries in depth and identifies key issues in the responsible use of beach seines and the sustainable livelihoods of beach seine fishers including women and children.

It examines women’s roles in 9 country case studies – Benin, Ghana, Togo, The Gambia, India (Andra Pradesh and Orissa), Kenya, Mozambique, Peru and Sri Lanka. Women’s roles include financing and managing the operations (Ghana), owning shares of the beach seine (Sri Lanka), helping with hauling the net (several countries), sorting the catch (several countries) and processing and marketing the catch (most countries).

http://www.fao.org/docrep/014/i2117e/i2117e.pdf

Tietze, U.; Lee, R.; Siar, S.; Moth-Poulsen, T.; Båge, H.E., eds. Fishing with beach seines. FAO Fisheries and Aquaculture Technical Paper. No. 562. Rome, FAO. 2011. 149p.

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Posted in Benin, Country, FAO, UN Women, World Bank, IFAD, UNIDO and other multilateral, Fisheries, Gender, Geography, Global, India, Kenya, Men, Mozambique, Peru, Sri Lanka, The Gambia, Togo, Women

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Influencing change, gender mainstreaming

Posted on July 31, 2011 | Leave a comment

Recommended reading!

Guinea pig farmer, DR Congo. Photo: CIAT

“Influencing Change: Mainstreaming Gender Perspectives in Agricultural Research and Development in Eastern and Central Africa.”

Edited by: Barun Gurung, Elizabeth Ssendiwala, Michael Waithaka

Link to download publication

Part of the CGIAR Particiaptory Research and Gender Analysis Program, the project from which this very useful report came sought to influence the policies of agricultural research and development systems, while improving implementation and delivery of services directly benefitting vulnerable groups, such as poor women, through improved targeting. It wanted to develop mechanisms in national agricultural R&D institutions for making gender an explicit criterion for programming and effectiveness, and to enable the organizations to think more deeply about gender relations, away from the earlier “add women and stir approach”.

The researchers identified four challenges:

1. the limitations of the R&D institutions to effect real changes in social relations of their constituency groups, the small scale farmers

2. the tendency within the R&D institutions to define gender mainstreaming only in instrumental terms (investment in women has high pay-offs) and subsequently focus narrowly on emphasizing women’s visibility and their capacities and needs. This instrumental approach to mainstreaming emphasizes reliance on ‘tool kits’ and ‘checklists.’

3. the ‘logic of bureaucracies’ or how bureaucracies react to new challenges. When a new challenge is posed, the bureaucracy’s response will be determined by the level of threat or opportunity. When it comes to gender equality or women’s rights, both the opportunity and threat are low.

4. the culture of organizations is influenced by the larger society in which they are situated.

The project developed and trialed approaches to gender mainstreaming for meeting these challenges in agricultural R&D institutes of the following East African countries: DR Congo, Ethiopia, Kenya, Madagascar, Rwanda, Sudan, Tanzania and Uganda.

For fisheries and aquaculture specialists, the Introduction and Project Evaluation chapters will be of most interest, unless you work in one of the project countries, in which case you will find your country chapter also of interest.

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Posted in Africa, Climate Change, Country, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Ethiopia, FAO, UN Women, World Bank, IFAD, UNIDO and other multilateral, Gender, Gender in the workplace, Geography, Kenya, Madagascar, Regional, Research, communication resources, Rwanda, Sudan, Tanzania, Theme, Uganda, Women

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