Measuring Women’s Empowerment in Social Protection

The Case of Rwanda’s VUPPart I: Mixed Methods for Decision-Making Indicators

Ana Paula de la O Campos

Social Protection Division of the FAOA4NH Gender-Nutrition Methods Workshop II

December 2-4, 2014

Does social protection empower women?

A classic approach to gender in social protection:

• women often targets of social protection because of vulnerabilities related to gender (e.g. FHHs)

• women often transfer receivers because of providers of care and their reproductive roles (e.g. pregnancy, feeding the family) (Molineux, 2006; Holmes & Jones, 2013)

Beyond “mothers and caretakers” - relevance for FAO’s work:

• how does social protection close the gender gap in agriculture and rural development? Recognition of women’s economic roles.

• Link between women’s economic advancement, power and agency and poverty reduction

Economic empowerment: what does it mean?

• access to health services

• access to education

• access to productive assets

• access to social insurance and financial services

• access to technology and extension services

• access to more productive and beneficial labor status

• access to better community infrastructure

Economic Advancement

• membership in rural institutions and access to social networks

• knowledge of rights and legal empowerment

• positive social change of gender roles

• increased intra-household bargaining power, decision-making and control over key household assets and earned income

Power and Agency

Case Studies on Women’s Empowerment and Social Protection: Three areas of Inquiry

schemes: cash transfers & public works

• economic advancement: – increase women’s income and asset base, skills and employment opportunities

– enable their access to credit

– reduce inequalities between men and women in agriculture

• power and agency: – increase women’s bargaining power within the household and wider community

– increase women’s physical mobility

– Increase social networks and entitlements of association

• design and implementation: – gender-sensitive design and implementation promotes gender equality in access

to social protection

– direct benefits and program features

Case study on Rwanda’s Flagship SP scheme

The Vision 2020 Umurenge Program (VUP)

• The program– targeted to the abject and very poor

– community-based targeting using the local Ubudehe household wealth categories

– four pillars: DS, PW, FS and Sensitization

• Public Works:– offers cash payments in exchange for temporary labour

– started in 2008, operational in 150 sectors out of 416 sectors of Rwanda

– in 2012/13 it reached 89,000 households, average of 40 days of work

• Geographical focus of study: Southern Province– Selection based on poverty levels, agro-ecological zone and availability of

public works projects and jobs

Mixed Methods

The Vision 2020 Umurenge Program (VUP)

• qualitative:– overall, 1 week of qualitative training and 2 weeks of fieldwork

– implementation of KII, FGD, case studies in 4 VUP villages and 2 comparison villages

– about 80 people participated

– 5 different qualitative tools

• quantitative: – household survey - about 600 households

– individual survey, administered to primary men and women in the household - about 1,200 individuals

• integration and communication throughout the process

Integration of mixed-methodsdevelopment of

quantitative methods

development of

qualitative methods

Development of mixed-methods in

3 areas of inquiry

qualitative fieldwork

qualitative synthesis report

quantitative fieldwork

quantitative syntheisis report

mixed-methods workshop

3 areas of inquiry

case study report

(mixed-methods)

First half

of 2014

Oct/Nov

2014

Jan/Feb

2015

now

Qual: Decision-making MatrixTypes of decisions Women Men

At household level

Household expenditure 6 4

Use of cash transfer/asset

transfer

6 4

Purchasing of farm inputs 2 8

Household tasks 5 5

At group level

In producer organizations 5 5

In women’s groups 10 0

In savings and credit groups 5 5

At community level

To elect leaders 5 5

To voice concerns to

authorities/leaders

2 8

To help decide on infrastructure 4 6

To help decide on other

community matters

4 6

Quant: Decision-making modulesENUMERATOR: Ask G01 for all categories of activities

before asking G02.

If household does not engage in that particular activity,

enter code for “Decision not made” and proceed to next

activity.

When decisions are made regarding the

following aspects of household life, who is

it that normally takes the decision?

If 1 and respondent is male OR

If 2 and respondent is female

(>> next domain)

Otherwise >> other code of CODE 1

CODE 7↓

To what extent do you feel you can make your own

personal decisions regarding these aspects of household

life if you want(ed) to?

CODE 9↓

G01 G02

A Agricultural production?

B What inputs to buy for agricultural production?

C What types of crops to grow for agricultural production?

D When or who would take crops to the market?

E Livestock raising and selling?

FStarting up and management of non-farm business activity?

G Your own (singular) wage or salary employment?

HOnly for VUP beneficiaries: Income from VUP programme

obtained through public works?

IMajor household expenditures? (such as a large appliance

for the house like refrigerator)

JWhether or not to use family planning to space or limit

births?

CODE 7: (G01) Decision making CODE 9: (G02) Extent of participation in decision

making1=Main male or husband

2=Main female or wife

3=Husband and wife jointly

4=Someone else in the household

5=Jointly with someone else inside the household

6=Jointly with someone else outside the household

7=Someone outside the household/other

98= Decision not made

1=Not at all

2=Small extent

3=Medium extent

4=To a high extent

Integration of Mixed-methods

• Qualitative

– Individual level

– Asks different decision-making domains

– Men/Women

– Percentages

• Quantitative

– Community/average level

– Fixed different decision-making domains

– Men and women within the household or outside the household

– Four levels of “extent of participation”

Qual informs

quant (and

viceversa)

Some stories from the field (Rwanda)

Analysis

The Vision 2020 Umurenge Program (VUP)• Mixed-methods workshop (January 2015)

– Results will be “organized” along three areas of inquiry for quantitative and qualitative

– Focus on most compelling messages/findings and recommendations

– Interpreting decision-making indicators in the context of Rwanda (and empowerment): what matters the most in the context of social protection and Public works? (e.g. access/participation, time burden, economic decisions and control over income)

• Econometric analysis will explore:– the relationship between empowerment (decision making) and PWs participation

– relationship between empowerment (decision making) and different ways of using cash/income from PWs

– relationship between economic outcomes and decision-making

Measuring Women’s Empowerment in Social Protection

The Case of Rwanda’s VUPPart II: Adaptation of the WEAI

Ana Paula de la O Campos

Social Protection Division of the FAOA4NH Gender-Nutrition Methods Workshop II

December 2-4, 2014

Research programme on women’s empowerment and social protection

• focus on cash transfers and public works

• global research programme: Rwanda (pilot), Lesotho, Zimbabwe, Malawi, Zambia ... Guatemala, Kyrgyzstan ...

• aims to provide programme and policy recommendations to FAO Member States (design, complementarities with agricultural interventions)

• three areas of inquiry: economic advancement, power and agency, operational issues (gender-sensitive design)

• main question: integrating empowerment indicators into impact evaluation of social protection programmes

• challenge: economic outcomes vs. health/nutrition outcomes

Challenges: using WEAI in impact evaluation of social protection programmes...

Power and agency:

• empowerment in agiculture - 5 domains

• focus on questionnaire and derived indicators – not index: stateof the art/experiments of measurement of empowermentindicators

• WEAI is data intensive: difficulties mainstreaming in programme impact evaluation surveys … but WEAI data already available in several countries - useful for power calcuations and buidlingcomparison groups

Economic advancement:

• WEAI does not measure agricultural productivity

• or labour participation in “decent” employment (higher incomes/better work status)

What is indispensable? How we used the WEAI questionnaire and more...

Domain WEAI Indicator Additional questions

Production

Input in productive decisions (1) + inputs

in use of incomes (including that from SP

programme)

(**) Agricultural Productivity*

(2) Labour module (participation and

income in ag/non-ag wage employment)

Autonomy in production (RAI) – dropped

Resources

(3) Ownership of assets (owns-records

different IDs)

(**) Economic value of assets

Purchase, sale, or transfer of assets

Access to and decisions on credit (4) Credit value

Income Control over use of income (5) Income from SP programme + income

from wage employment

Leadership

Group member

(6) Speaking in public (Modified

questions)

Time

Leisure time ** Time use during participation in public

works

Workload (time poverty) ** Particularly when participating in public

works

Gender-based

violence?

Modification of WEAI (questions)

Ownership of assets

• Who owns most of [asset]? (WEAI)

• Who owns [asset]? Reported up to 3 HH IDs (FAO)

Speaking in Public

• Do you speak up and take part in decision-making in your community? For example, to help decide on small wells, roads, water supplies to be built in your community or problem-solving at community level?

• Do you speak up to ensure proper payment of wages or any form of remuneration from your own work?

• Do you speak up to convey needs and priorities to authorities or elected officials?

• Do you speak up to protest the misbehavior of authorities or elected officials?

Modification to input in Decision Making

FAO

• No input• Input into very few

decisions• Input into some decisions• Input into all decisions• No decision made

WEAI (v2)

• No input or input in few decisions

• Input into some decisions

• Input into most or all decisions

• No decision made

Lessons learned so far...

• Purpose: informing programme design, not statistics:

– should allow variability in questions and scores

– better if influence by qualitative data and analysis

• Impact Evaluation of social protection (programs):

– individual indicators of empowerment and empowerment outcomes (productivity)

– WEAI index can be used, but other variables too, for measuring empowerment

– data intensive for small budgets – targeted indicators

Thank you!

anapaula.delaocampos@fao.org