Designing for empowerment impact in agricultural development projects: Experimental evidence from the Agriculture, Nutrition, and Gender Linkages (ANGeL) project in Bangladesh

The importance of women’s roles for nutrition-sensitive agricultural projects is increasingly recognized, yet little is known about whether such projects improve women’s empowerment and gender equality. We study the Agriculture, Nutrition, and Gender Linkages (ANGeL) pilot project, which was impleme...

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Main Authors: Quisumbing, Agnes R., Ahmed, Akhter, Hoddinott, John F., Pereira, Audrey, Roy, Shalini
Format: Artículo preliminar
Language:Inglés
Published: International Food Policy Research Institute 2020
Subjects:
Online Access:https://hdl.handle.net/10568/143540
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author Quisumbing, Agnes R.
Ahmed, Akhter
Hoddinott, John F.
Pereira, Audrey
Roy, Shalini
author_browse Ahmed, Akhter
Hoddinott, John F.
Pereira, Audrey
Quisumbing, Agnes R.
Roy, Shalini
author_facet Quisumbing, Agnes R.
Ahmed, Akhter
Hoddinott, John F.
Pereira, Audrey
Roy, Shalini
author_sort Quisumbing, Agnes R.
collection Repository of Agricultural Research Outputs (CGSpace)
description The importance of women’s roles for nutrition-sensitive agricultural projects is increasingly recognized, yet little is known about whether such projects improve women’s empowerment and gender equality. We study the Agriculture, Nutrition, and Gender Linkages (ANGeL) pilot project, which was implemented as a cluster-randomized controlled trial by the Government of Bangladesh. The project’s treatment arms included agricultural training, nutrition behavior change communication (BCC), and gender sensitization trainings to husbands and wives together – with these components combined additively, such that the impact of gender sensitization could be distinguished from that of agriculture and nutrition trainings. Empowerment was measured using the internationally-validated project-level Women’s Empowerment in Agriculture Index (pro-WEAI), and attitudes regarding gender roles were elicited from both men and women, to explore potentially gender-transformative impacts. Our study finds that ANGeL increased both women’s and men’s empowerment, raised the prevalence of households achieving gender parity, and led to small improvements in the gender attitudes of both women and men. We find significant increases in women’s empowerment scores and empowerment status from all treatment arms but with no significant differences across these. We find no evidence of unintended impacts on workloads and we note inconclusive evidence of possible increases in intimate partner violence (IPV). Our results also suggest some potential benefits of bundling nutrition and gender components with an agricultural development intervention; however, many of these benefits seem to be driven by bundling nutrition with agriculture. While we cannot assess the extent to which including men and women within the same treatment arms contributed to our results, it is plausible that the positive impacts of all treatment arms on women’s empowerment outcomes may have arisen from implementation modalities that provided information to both husbands and wives when they were together. The role of engaging men and women jointly in interventions is a promising area for future research.
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spelling CGSpace1435402025-12-02T21:02:41Z Designing for empowerment impact in agricultural development projects: Experimental evidence from the Agriculture, Nutrition, and Gender Linkages (ANGeL) project in Bangladesh Quisumbing, Agnes R. Ahmed, Akhter Hoddinott, John F. Pereira, Audrey Roy, Shalini gender norms gender women's empowerment nutrition-sensitive agriculture randomized controlled trials empowerment agriculture nutrition agricultural development women The importance of women’s roles for nutrition-sensitive agricultural projects is increasingly recognized, yet little is known about whether such projects improve women’s empowerment and gender equality. We study the Agriculture, Nutrition, and Gender Linkages (ANGeL) pilot project, which was implemented as a cluster-randomized controlled trial by the Government of Bangladesh. The project’s treatment arms included agricultural training, nutrition behavior change communication (BCC), and gender sensitization trainings to husbands and wives together – with these components combined additively, such that the impact of gender sensitization could be distinguished from that of agriculture and nutrition trainings. Empowerment was measured using the internationally-validated project-level Women’s Empowerment in Agriculture Index (pro-WEAI), and attitudes regarding gender roles were elicited from both men and women, to explore potentially gender-transformative impacts. Our study finds that ANGeL increased both women’s and men’s empowerment, raised the prevalence of households achieving gender parity, and led to small improvements in the gender attitudes of both women and men. We find significant increases in women’s empowerment scores and empowerment status from all treatment arms but with no significant differences across these. We find no evidence of unintended impacts on workloads and we note inconclusive evidence of possible increases in intimate partner violence (IPV). Our results also suggest some potential benefits of bundling nutrition and gender components with an agricultural development intervention; however, many of these benefits seem to be driven by bundling nutrition with agriculture. While we cannot assess the extent to which including men and women within the same treatment arms contributed to our results, it is plausible that the positive impacts of all treatment arms on women’s empowerment outcomes may have arisen from implementation modalities that provided information to both husbands and wives when they were together. The role of engaging men and women jointly in interventions is a promising area for future research. 2020-07-01 2024-05-22T12:14:57Z 2024-05-22T12:14:57Z Working Paper https://hdl.handle.net/10568/143540 en https://doi.org/10.2499/p15738coll2.133061 https://hdl.handle.net/10568/148376 https://hdl.handle.net/10568/154140 https://doi.org/10.1016/j.foodpol.2018.09.001 https://doi.org/10.1111/dpr.12374 Open Access application/pdf International Food Policy Research Institute Quisumbing, Agnes R.; Ahmed, Akhter; Hoddinott, John F.; Pereira, Audrey; and Roy, Shalini. 2020. Designing for empowerment impact in agricultural development projects: Experimental evidence from the Agriculture, Nutrition, and Gender Linkages (ANGeL) project in Bangladesh. IFPRI Discussion Paper 1957. Washington, DC: International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI). https://doi.org/10.2499/p15738coll2.133872.
spellingShingle gender norms
gender
women's empowerment
nutrition-sensitive agriculture
randomized controlled trials
empowerment
agriculture
nutrition
agricultural development
women
Quisumbing, Agnes R.
Ahmed, Akhter
Hoddinott, John F.
Pereira, Audrey
Roy, Shalini
Designing for empowerment impact in agricultural development projects: Experimental evidence from the Agriculture, Nutrition, and Gender Linkages (ANGeL) project in Bangladesh
title Designing for empowerment impact in agricultural development projects: Experimental evidence from the Agriculture, Nutrition, and Gender Linkages (ANGeL) project in Bangladesh
title_full Designing for empowerment impact in agricultural development projects: Experimental evidence from the Agriculture, Nutrition, and Gender Linkages (ANGeL) project in Bangladesh
title_fullStr Designing for empowerment impact in agricultural development projects: Experimental evidence from the Agriculture, Nutrition, and Gender Linkages (ANGeL) project in Bangladesh
title_full_unstemmed Designing for empowerment impact in agricultural development projects: Experimental evidence from the Agriculture, Nutrition, and Gender Linkages (ANGeL) project in Bangladesh
title_short Designing for empowerment impact in agricultural development projects: Experimental evidence from the Agriculture, Nutrition, and Gender Linkages (ANGeL) project in Bangladesh
title_sort designing for empowerment impact in agricultural development projects experimental evidence from the agriculture nutrition and gender linkages angel project in bangladesh
topic gender norms
gender
women's empowerment
nutrition-sensitive agriculture
randomized controlled trials
empowerment
agriculture
nutrition
agricultural development
women
url https://hdl.handle.net/10568/143540
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