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Agriculture plays a pivotal role in the developing economies of the world. In most developing countries its contribution to the national GDP is found to be the highest of any economic sector and, most importantly, employs the major proportion of the labour force. Agriculture provides food for the growing population of the world, as well as the raw materials to the industrial sector, and also fulfills food requirements for the livestock sector.

With more than 70 per cent of the world’s poorest people living mostly in rural areas and depending on agriculture for subsistence, both for food and other requirements, it is imperative that the agricultural sector becomes a means by which the economic and social status of the marginalised and poor peoples may be uplifted. This fact has been recognized by development stakeholders, and various agricultural development plans have been conceived and implemented with the same objective. Varying degrees of success have been achieved by various projects during their implementation, and evaluation and follow-up studies indicate a number of reasons why many fail to achieve their designed objectives. One of the main reasons has been found to be the lack of equal gender participation and opportunity in rural development plans. There is an imperative need to introduce gender mainstreaming in developmental projects, as many studies have established.

Women’s contribution to each sphere of life is an agreed fact. It is also a fact that their contribution is concentrated in the agricultural sector. Although their participation in some stages of agricultural production is not equal to that of men, it is nevertheless well distributed along the entire chain of activities, from the initial stages of buying seed and fertiliser to the final stage of marketing. Their contribution to field work alongside their male counterparts depends on the particular activity under consideration; there are some activities where their participation is minimal; others where their contribution is far greater than that of men.

Women comprise half the population living in rural areas. It is not possible to achieve maximum productive results without ensuring effective female participation. This necessitates first acknowledging and documenting their current level of participation in relevant social aspects in general, and economic aspects in particular. Their contribution to family and community economic health is not only in the performance of household activities, but also in undertaking income-generating activities like agriculture and livestock raising; despite this double burden, recognition of their work is found to be very low.

Literature indicates the best remedy for undervaluing, underpaying, and under- recognising women’s contributions to be a phased, step-by-step transformative approach that will gradually enhance women’s integration in development processes. Women have always played a vital dual role in society, by accomplishing productive work in society and the workplace, and reproductive work in household. However, their contribution is rarely given due recognition in development policies, and until recently there has been serious oversight of the need to include women in developing policies and initiatives. This fact was observed by researchers as early as the early 1970s, at which time an approach was initiated and denoted as Women in Development (WID). This initiated to give women due acknowledgment of their contribution to development, and was based on the principle of involving women in development agendas and providing them with opportunities to expand their untapped potential. However this approach had drawbacks, as it did not deal with the reasons for women’s marginalisation. In order to address this concern a more comprehensive approach was initiated, known as Gender in Development (GAD).

The GAD approach was developed to integrate both men and women in the development discourse and bridge the gaps between them by reviewing the power relationships existing in societies. Transformatory strategies of gender mainstreaming were used to change the legal, social, cultural and institutional structures that hindered women’s empowerment. Gender mainstreaming was found to be an innovative strategy to overcome the obstacles faced by women in many different aspects of aspect of development; as well, it aimed to create capacities and opportunities for women, empowering them socially, politically, economically, and psychologically.

Women’s empowerment is found to be the concept which not only improves women’s status but also ensures their effective participation in development processes. Measuring women’s empowerment attained much prominence in development discourse, and various approaches were suggested by which to quantify this abstract concept.

Literature reveals two basic approaches to empowerment; liberal empowerment and liberating empowerment. Liberal empowerment refers to women’s integration in development agendas by providing them equal access to opportunities and welfare services, without concern for the reasons that unequal opportunities and power relations exist in the society. Liberating empowerment is transformatory in nature, not only incorporating women in the developmental process but also dealing with transforming power relationships and social, cultural and organizational structures, opening the way for women’s empowerment in a true sense by overcoming the reasons for their marginalisation. To encourage liberating empowerment, researchers and intellectuals have constructed a number of frameworks by which to enhance women’s social, educational, and occupational opportunities. Various factors indicated in these frameworks can positively impact women’s empowerment, in particular enhancing their potentials and capabilities, and enabling them to make decisions about their lives and act upon them.

Empowerment is a multidimensional, broad concept with economic, political, legal, cultural, social, familial, psychological and cognitive dimensions that must all be addressed for the accomplishment of empowerment. Although researchers have developed various measures to quantify women’s empowerment, the very breadth of

the concept brings with it limitations. In agriculture in particular, women’s empowerment has been a difficult task; and because of this, the International Food Policy Research Institute designed an empowerment model which comprehensively measures women’s empowerment in the agricultural sector, recognising both the substantial contribution they make to agricultural production and the disempowerment that they endure across social and economic dimensions. Because of this model’s comprehensiveness, relevance and effectiveness in measuring women’s empowerment in the agricultural sector, the approach was used in this particular study.

Literature identifies various factors which have a positive impact on women’s empowerment. Education is one of these: it has been found to have significant effect on empowerment, raising women’s consciousness and awareness of their rights. Paid employment is another: women’s involvement in paid labour has a significant impact on their empowerment, and a number of studies have found that women with earned incomes are more economically sound and independent in their decisions than women whose labour, in the home or the fields, goes unpaid. Women who have money in their control are able to uplift their social status and make improvements in household conditions. This understanding has led to the realization that access to credit is a basic tool, providing women with the necessary assets to initiate their own businesses, and so to generate income; access to credit is now recognized as having a highly significant effect on women’s empowerment.

Despite such specific findings that have clear and measurable outcomes, the essence of women’s empowerment lies in their participation in development process. Around the world, women are found to be most empowered in those situations where their participation, whether in agriculture, business or service activities, is strong. It can be inferred that participation is necessary for empowerment.

Women’s integration into development processes is largely affected by social, cultural, religious and organizational constraints. Gender mainstreaming strategies intended to incorporate women in developmental discourses and in the empowerment processes aimed at assisting them are strongly, and negatively, influenced by the customs and laws of patriarchal societies. Women’s inadequate education and lack of skilled training, forced upon them by cultural and social

constraints, limit their psychological and cognitive empowerment and affect their functional capacity. Lack of access to or ownership of resources, forced upon them by the practices of patriarchal communities and governments, have enforced women’s social and economic subordination. Their economic dependence on men is made greater by practices such as wage discrimination. Their immobility and lack of power to make choices about their lives, or to be able to engage fully with issues that concern them because of their deprived economic conditions, are factors that limit their empowerment, as has been found in the literature. These constraints are increased in almost all developing countries by the lack of recognition they receive at governmental level.

A society is a living entity where various factors continuously act to instigate changes within it. These changes impact on gender roles and the contribution any member of the society is permitted to make to the whole. Sometimes these changes are positive and lead to growth and development; others may work negatively. Any developmental strategy designed to uplift the social and economic status of an individual living in a particular society has to be carefully planned with regard to reliable and current data about that society. Literature currently suffers from a dearth of topical gender-sensitive data which can help policy makers develop effective and efficient developmental programs. It is the responsibility of researchers and academics to fill this gap and focus on those developmental issues which can help policy makers.

For these reasons this study was designed and conducted in Pakistan, where women’s empowerment status in agriculture has not previously been measured quantitatively. The study not only fills this gap but offers much-needed gender- sensitive data that will assist policy interventions in rural development.

This study examines the role of women in potato farming in Pakistan and looked at the following objectives:

 Determine gender roles in potato production in Hazara Division, Pakistan;  Assess the relationship of the participation of men and women on household

 Determine whether the participation of women in potato production has led to their empowerment; and

 Make recommendations for future planning and studies based on the research findings.