2011-2013
What have we learnt?
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What is Nuevas Trenzas?
Nuevas Trenzas – 21st Century Young Rural Women is a research initiative developed in Latin American countries under the coordination of the Instituto de Estudios Peruanos (IEP), with the financial support of the Latin American and the Caribbean Division of the International Fund for the Agricultural Development (IFAD). Nuevas Trenzas’ objective is getting to know and documenting changes that young rural women in our continent have experienced over the last two decades. We are interested in knowing what rural women in Latin America are like today, what are their expectations, their potentialities, and their desires; how are they different from and, at the same time, similar to their mothers and grandmothers, their male peers, and women who live in cities. In order to do so, Nuevas Trenzas works with national teams in Colombia, Ecuador, El Salvador, Nicaragua, Guatemala and Peru. These teams comprise renowned and experienced professionals in the field of rural studies. For assuring our research’s accuracy and relevance, Nuevas Trenzas also works with national advisory boards comprising specialists with different trajectories linked to transversal topics such as gender, youth, and rural studies. The result is over twenty specialized studies about a wide range of topics that include national assessments, census and statistical analyses, life stories, specialized research in aspects crucial to the new profile of young rural women, such as education, telecommunications, cultural assets, access to natural resources, politics of the body, reproductive health, and financial inclusion, among many others. These studies are available for free in the program’s website: www.nuevastrenzas.org
Why Young Rural Women?
Nuevas Trenzas assumes that young rural women in Latin America live in a situation of disadvantage in relation to other population groups due to social, economic and cultural reasons. Specifically, our interest focuses in five inequality gaps: a) External gaps • Gender gap: separates young rural women from rural men of the same generation. • Area of residency gap: separates young rural women from their urban contemporaries. • Generational gap: separates young rural women from their rural mothers and grandmothers. b) Internal gaps • Poverty gap: it distinguishes, within the group of young rural women, those who live in a poor household from those who live in a non-poor household.
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www.nuevastrenzas.org • Ethnic gap: this is also an internal gap that differences within the group of young rural women those who come from an indigenous background from those who come from other cultural backgrounds. Analyzing these gaps allows us to see young rural women’s the opportunities and challenges. It will also allow us to analyze this collective’s recent evolution, the aspects that have improved, and the road still ahead.
How many are they?
Young rural women (between 14 and 35 years old) represent 4 percent and 10 percent of the total population; and between 15 percent and 19 percent of the analyzed countries’ rural population. In total, in the countries where Nuevas Trenzas works, young rural women amount to over 5.6 million. Country
Young Rural Women
Colombia
1,758,452
Ecuador
965,213
El Salvador
410,801
Sources:
Guatemala
1,257,035
Guatemala: NSLC 2006 Nicaragua: LSMS 2009 Perú: NHS 2010
Nicaragua
472,787
Peru
1,301,760
Table 1 Total of Young Rural Women in the Countries Where Nuevas Trenzas Works.
Colombia GIHS 2010 Ecuador: Census 2010 El Salvador: Census 2007
Different Stories but Similar all the Same
The six analyzed countries add up to nine million young rural women. This means nine million different stories, each with its own particularities, dreams, problems, and aspirations. One of Nuevas Trenzas’ main findings, however, is that beyond each country’s particular geographies and cultures these stories are, ultimately, very similar. In that sense, the experience of being a woman and being rural is more significant than any geographical or cultural difference. 100% 90% 80% 70% 60%
Graphic 1 El Salvador Main activities of Young Rural Women According to Age Cohort.
50% 40% 30% 20%
Source:
10%
Census 2007 Preparation: Nuevas Trenzas’ team in El Salvador
0%
14 - 17 years old
18 - 25 years old EAP
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Students
26 - 35 years old Housework
Over 35 years old Others
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100% 90% 80% 70% 60% 50% 40%
Graphic 2
30%
Colombia Distribution of the Working-age Population (WAP), According to Area of Residency and Age Cohort.
20% 10%
Source:
0%
GIHS 2010 Preparation: Nuevas Trenzas’ team in Colombia
Stories of Change
Cities
Headers men Inactive
Rural Students
Headers Women
Cities Family Labor
Rural
Assets
The second key idea is change. Stories of young rural women in Latin America are stories of fast change. This makes the current generation of young rural women very different from their mothers and grandmothers. Young rural women are: • More educated: The gap in accessing education between men and women has disappeared. Furthermore, in some countries such as Nicaragua or Colombia young rural women study more years than their male peers. • More connected: In most countries, young rural women have access to technological innovations. Many are users of mobile telephony and, in a lesser measure, they also access the Internet. This reflects important change in their social relationships and economic perspectives. • More empowered: These women are very aware of their rights. This means unprecedented opportunities for political and economic development, opportunities their mothers and grandmothers did not have.
25
3.5 3
20 2.5
Graphic 3 Changes in young rural women’s life projects (Peru): While the number of children young rural women has decreased, the percentage of women who go to school increases.
1.5
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10
1 5 0.5 0
Source: National census (Women between 14 and 35 years of age)
15
2
1961
1972 Average number of kids (left)
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1981
1993
2007
0
Goes to school (right)
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The Most Prepared Generation
All of these changes reflect on a strong improvement in terms of human capital. The most relevant information refers to education. In Latin America, the gap in accessing rural education, so significant in other regions, has basically disappeared. Today, rural girls study as much or more than boys of their same generation. Another important aspect is the improvement in the relationship with the State and other actors from the rural world: almost 90 percent of young rural women in the studied countries possess an identity document and more that 60 percent give birth in medical facilities. 1.2 1.1 1.1 1.1
1.1 1.0
Graphic 4 More educated: Young rural women study the same or more than young rural men. The graph shows the number of years studied by a young rural woman in relation to each year studied by a young man.
1.1 1.0
1.1 1.1 1.0
1.0 0.9
0.9 0.9
0.9 0.8 0.7
Sources: Colombia: GIHS 2010 Ecuador: Census 2010 El Salvador: Census 2007 Guatemala: NSLC 2011 Nicaragua: LSMS 2009 Peru: NHS 2010
Colombia
Ecuador 14 -17 years old
Persistent Gender Biases
El Salvador
Guatemala
18-25 years old
Nicaragua
Peru
26-35 years old
These improvements are very important and they place Latin American rural women at the vanguard of the developing world. However, there still are many problems they must face. Nuevas Trenzas’ research confirms that critical gender biases persist in areas key for rural women’s quality of life. • A first problem refers to accessing resources key to rural economies. In spite of legal gender discrimination having been eliminated, in rural areas of Latin America social and cultural patterns persist, which put women in a position of disadvantage when accessing property or the use of land, water and other means for livelihood. • A second problem is the extent of non-remunerated family work. Nuevas Trenzas has found that in most countries almost half of young rural women still devote their time to non-remunerated chores, which limits their possibilities for decision making possibilities and carrying autonomous and wholesome lives. • A third problem is inequality of gender in family strategies. Women’s life stories in all six analyzed countries show that -even when in a better situation than their mothers and grandmothers- young rural women have
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www.nuevastrenzas.org still little capacity for choosing where and when to start a life as a couple, as well as on the number and time of having children. When adding up all these problems, the result is the existence of a “breaking point” in the lives of young rural women. Their life stories show that their personal trajectories suffer a sudden spin between the ages of 18 and 22, approximately. At that point in their lives their expectations, that feed on the new paradigms of being a rural women (more educated, more empowered), are frustrated almost every time because of the reality of life in the rural world. Thus their sadness and disillusion which may be perceived in many of the stories collected by the Nuevas Trenzas’ teams in all six countries.
Ethnic discrimination Discrimination by assets Discrimination by area of residency
Graphic 5
Discrimination by age
Added and intertwined inequalities Intersection of inequalities that define the situation of young rural women in Latin America.
New Challenges
Discrimination by gender Woman
Young Woman
Rural Young Poor Rural Woman Young Woman
Indigenous Poor Rural Young Woman
Young rural women’s expectations get closer by the minute to the paradigms of urban women of their generation. Everyday reality, however, presents great differences due to the rural world’s situation and the persistence of gender biases deeply rooted in the rural world’s practices and discourses. Confronting these problems entails new challenges that go beyond development policies that have been applied to this collective over the past decade. Investment in human capital, through equitable access to basic services, education and health, along with the efforts in empowerment, has had extraordinary results, but they seem to be reaching a saturation point. Young rural women are more empowered but they migrate out of rural areas in the search for better opportunities. For avoiding this situation, there is a need for a new generation of development projects and public policies that will allow taking advantage, promoting, and valuing young rural women’s new profile. There are two key topics: • Encourage change in social and cultural imaginaries and structures that cause gender discrimination to persist within Latin American rural families and communities. • Encourage changes in economic structures that make accessing resources sources and quality employment extraordinarily hard for rural women, preventing them from achieving new life expectations.
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Graphic 6
1.2
Rural women are leaving: 1.1
Femininity rates are higher in cities than in rural areas.
1
In four of the six countries, women constitute less than 50 percent of the total rural population.
0.9
In all six countries, women constitute more than 50 per cent of the urban population.
0.8
Sources: 0.7
Colombia: GIHS 2010 Ecuador: Census 2010 El Salvador: Census 2007 Guatemala: NSLC 2011 Nicaragua: LSMS 2009 Peru: NHS 2010
For closing: a key moment Graphic 7 The key moment: Homes where young rural women live are more heterogeneous. This is a risk as well as an opportunity.
0.6
Colombia
Ecuador
Peru
Rural femininity rate
El Salvador
Guatemala
Urban femininity rate
Latin America’s young rural women are currently living a key moment: they are the largest and most prepared generation in the history of the continent. This situation is the result of a shared effort between every state, development organizations, rural communities, and, above all, of all rural women who look for a better life for their daughters as well as for themselves. Much has been accomplished… but there is still plenty left to do. And now is the time to go for it.
20% 23%
16% 24%
17%
25%
23%
Sources: 18%
Graphic 7 Colombia: Great Integrated Household Survey 2010
17%
Nicaragua: Living Standards Measurement Survey 2009
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22%
23%
25%
45%
43%
30%
31%
40%
37%
36%
28%
66%
50%
22%
31%
30%
43%
22%
28%
26%
43%
50%
65%
50% 52% 45%
40%
54%
50%
52% 36%
39%
33%
41%
35%
27%
14-17
18-25 26-35 Peru
Peru: National Household Survey 2010
21%
19%
30% 33%
El Salvador: Multipurpose Household Survey 2007 Guatemala: National Survey of Living Conditions 2006
16%
20% 25%
30% 34%
Ecuador: Survey of Employment, Unemployment and Underemployment 2010
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Nicaragua
14-17
18-25 26-35 14-17 Colombia
Non poor
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18-25 26-35 14-17 Ecuador
18-25 26-35 14-17
El Salvador
Poor
18-25 26-35 14-17 Nicaragua
18-25 26-35 Guatemala
Extreme poor
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Four Reasons to Pull for Young Rural Women
1. They represent underutilized human capital which has not been made the most of by neither rural communities nor development programs. 2. They are a collective with the capacity for bridging the gap between the rural and the urban world given that many young Latin American rural women have “urban� experiences from an early age: they go to school or to work in cities and adopting in the process many urban patterns, habits, capabilities, and aspirations. 3. They are a collective with high potential for innovation. Many of the micro innovation experiences in the rural world take young rural women as their main actors. As they do not have easy access to key assets for traditional economic activities, young rural women must come up with ways for finding opportunities and generate income innovatively. 4. Given their urban experiences, their higher and better levels of education, and their openness to new ways of communication, young rural women are a generation particularly sensitive to situations of discrimination and participate actively in the promotion of their rights. In this sense, the work with this collective is an exceptional opportunity for breaking downsocial legitimacy of discriminatory gender practices that still exist in the rural world.
Nuevas Trenzas is possible thanks to the financial support of:
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