Nuevas Trenzas Informs
October 2012 N° 1
New (and old) stories about young rural women in Latin America Raúl H. Asensio, Coordinator, Nuevas Trenzas Program Instituto de Estudios Peruanos Over the last two decades, young rural women have experienced many changes: not only in regard to the transformations originated in rural areas, but also due to changes in the gender and generational gaps. The objective of the Nuevas Trenzas program is, precisely, to study this phenomena that affect young rural women,in order to identify what opportunities maybe seized and what problems must be solved by means of public policies or private initiatives so that this collectivemay develop integrally. What inequality gaps do young rural women face? Young rural women are a collectivemarked by “intertwined inequalities”, that is to say, by the existence of different gaps that intersect, generating a situation of disadvantage in relation to other • Gender gap: separates young rural women from rural men belonging to 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. • Poverty gap: within the group of young rural women, it distinguishes those who live in a poor household from those who live in a non-poor household. These gaps directly affect young rural women’s “ability to do”. This ability to do may be broken into the following competencies: technical competence (managing the necessary skills to do something), legal competence (existence of a legal framework that allows doing something), and subjective competence (the subject’s capability for perceiving herself with the ability to do something). This, ultimately, affects young rural women’s possibilities of having an autonomous life strategy. Which gaps affect young rural women? Young rural women (between ages 14 and 35) represent between 9.7 percent and 4 percent of the total population, and between 15.5 percent and 19.1 percent of the analyzed countries’ (Colombia, Ecuador, El Salvador, Guatemala, Nicaragua, and Peru) rural population (see Graph 1). In every country where Nuevas Trenzas works, young rural women add up to a total of over 5.6 million (Chart 1). Among Nuevas Trenzas program’smain findings that affect the situation of young rural women, we have the following:
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Graph 1 17.9 %
16.6 %
19.1 %
18.7 %
19.1 % 15.5 %
9.7% 6.7%
9.2%
7.2% 4.1%
4.0%
ColombiaE aEcuador
El Salvador Guatemala Nicaragua
In relation to the national population
Perú
In relation to the rural population
Total of young rural women in the countries where the program Nuevas Trenzas works Country
Percentage of young rural women over the total national population and rural population of each country.
Young rural women
Sources: Colombia: GEIH 2010 Ecuador: Censo 2010 El Salvador: Censo 2007 Guatemala: ENCOVI 2006 Nicaragua: Censo 2005 Perú: ENAHO 2010 Chart 1 Total of young rural women in the countries where the program Nuevas Trenzas works
Colombia
1,758,452
Ecuador
965,213
Sources: Colombia: GEIH 2010 Ecuador: Censo 2010 El Salvador: Censo 2007 Guatemala: ENCOVI 2006 Nicaragua: EMNV 2009 Perú: ENAHO 2010
El Salvador
410,801
Guatemala
1,257,035
Nicaragua
472,787
Perú
1,301,760
• defeminization of rural areas: data shows that the percentage of women over the total rural population is fewer than 50 percent in almost every country analyzed. In rural areas, social and economic dynamics that expel rural women towards citiesprevail, especially in the case of young women, due the persistence of institutions (mostly informal) that make it difficult for women to access key assets, as well as to the prevalence of family strategies with a strong gender bias.
chnologies over the last few years: there has been a deep penetration of cellular telephones in rural households comprising young women, reaching, in some countries, near 80 percent. • the break point: life stories gathered over the course of the program show that there is a breaking moment in the personal trajectories of young rural women, around the ages of 18 and 22. At this point, their lives change radically mostly due to the difficulties rural women face for developing autonomous life strategies. This limitation is caused by two main motives. On one side, we find that in almost every rural space in the continent, institutional frameworks with gender biasesprevail. On the other side, it is difficult for them to access professional specialization. • persistence of family strategies with gender bias: interviews and life stories show that the step into couple life is often perceived by young rural women as a traumatic moment: a definitive rupture with their hopes of leading a life different than their mothers’ and grandmothers’. The result is a widespread perception of frustration. Decisions regarding couple life and family formation determine the life of rural women. In this sense, the persistence of very high rates of non-paid domestic work is a key issue.
• increase of women’s practical competence: this change is most reflected in data regarding human capital, especially in relation to access to education. In rural areas, the gender gap is no longer a problem in terms of basic education. Even if to a lesser extent, the area of residency gap in educationhas also diminished. Another important aspect is the progress achieved regarding the relationship with the State and other actors of the rural world: we can observe, for example, an increase in the possession of identity documents (in general, it exceeds 90 percent in the studied countries), as well as a closer • poverty gap: in Graph 2 we obserrelationship with the healthcare system (the percentage of birth in healthcare ve that in almost every country, the facilities exceeds 60 percent in all countries). group with lower poverty percentages corresponds to households • decrease of the geographical gap and intensification of the generational with women between theages of gap: the gaps that determine the situation of young rural women are not 18 and 25. These households prestatic. An example of this is the impact of Information and Communication Te-
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www.nuevastrenzas.org sent two characteristics: (i) presumably, most of the time, young rural women are the head of the household, and (ii) they comprise women that have been able to take advantage of the past decades’ improvements in education. Why is it important to focus in this collective? Young rural women can be key actors in rural development processes due to the following reasons:
23%
20%
24%2 5%
16% 17%
23%
25%
20% 16% 19%
31% 18% 30% 34%
17% 31%
26%
33% 25%
30%
28%
21% 22% 23% 22%2 2%
30%
30%
40% 37%
28%
35%
50% 45%
43%
Graph 2 Percentage of households where young rural women work, according to their condition of poverty
Sources: 66%6 5% 40%
52%
45%
50% 54% 52%
36% 39%
41%
Perú
Colombia Non poor
Ecuador Poor
El Salvador
Nicaragua
14 - 17
26 - 35
18 - 25
14 - 17
26 - 35
18 - 25
14 - 17
26 - 35
18 - 25
14 - 17
26 - 35
18 - 25
14 - 17
26 - 35
18 - 25
14 - 17
27%
33% 35%
26 - 35
50% 43% 50%
18 - 25
43%
Guatemala
Colombia: GEIH 2010 Ecuador: ENEMDU SIEH2010 El Salvador: EHPM 2007 Nicaragua: EMNV 2009 Peru: ENAHO 2010
Extreme poor
• They represent anunderutilizedcapital not being seized, neither by traditional mechanisms of human capital enhancement that apply in the rural world, nor by development programs. • They constitute a group with great potential for building bridges between the rural world and the urban word, given that many Latin American young rural women have “urban experiences” since an early age: they go to school or to work in cities, and adoptin this processmany urban patterns, habits, skills, and aspirations.
• Given their urban experience, their higher education and openness to new • They constitute a group with a high potential for innovation. Many of forms of communication, young rural women constitute a generation particuthe micro-innovation experiences larly sensitive to discrimination situations, reason why they are fairly active in in the rural world have young rural promoting their rights. This condition represents an exceptional opportunity women as leaders. In the measure to work in programs or initiatives that will help break the social legitimacy of that they do not have easy access gender discrimination practices that still exist in the rural world. to key assets for carrying out traditional activities, they must manage to come up with opportunities for generating income in innovative ways.
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To access the full (Spanish) version of this document go to Nuevas Trenza’s website.
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Nuevas Trenzas is posible thanks to the financial suport of
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