I used my JASTRO award to research women’s participation in Senegal’s rice sector under its National Plan for Self Sufficiency in Rice (PNAR), launched in 2008. Originally, this project was designed to include in person interviews in Senegal, however, the COVID-19 pandemic led to a restructuring of my project. It is now a meta-analysis of secondary sources with key informant interviews (conducted remotely). After redesigning my research, JASTRO funding allowed me to cover my living expenses in fall 2020 to free up time that I would have spent working; I was able to conduct interviews over phone or video call with key scholars in the field such as Judith Carney, Michael Kevane, and William Moseley. I was also able to speak remotely with Senegalese practitioners working in the Senegal River Valley. Here are some results from my meta-analysis and the key informant interviews.

 West Africa was one of the first places in the world to domesticate rice and it is Senegal’s primary staple food. Currently, Senegal is import dependent on rice, primarily rice from Southeast Asia; PNAR is an initiative to increase domestic rice production with the goal of escaping import dependency. Before colonialism, in Mandinka and Jola societies, rice was considered a woman’s crop. Women were responsible for its production and held agronomic knowledge such as seed selection, transplanting and milling techniques. During colonialism, agriculture was restructured into men cash cropping and women subsistence farming. Post-colonialism, women have been excluded from investments in the rice sector that treat rice as a cash crop, such as the distribution of 90% of irrigation subsidies in the 1990’s to male heads of household. In light of this history of exclusion, my research focuses on efforts to include (or re-include) women as the sector goes through another wave of structural changes, and where those efforts fall short. There are new work opportunities in growth industries of the rice sector, but structural barriers prevent Senegalese women from participating.

In its early stages, PNAR used double cropping and irrigation to increase rice yields. Since 2014, rice production has more than doubled. After this initial jump in quantity produced, domestic producers found that important obstacles to competing with imports were qualitative characteristics such as ease of cooking (uniform grains), texture, and taste. Responding to these new challenges, in the last five years PNAR has pivoted its investments towards high quality, certified hybrid seeds (New Rice for Africa or NERICA seeds), better processing, and better marketing to encourage demand for domestically produced rice. PNAR is also extensively investing in agricultural research and development to adapt NERICA hybrid seeds to meet the needs of its heterogeneous group of majority smallholder rice producers.

New areas of investment under PNAR, or growth industries in the rice sector in Senegal are more specialized and require more post-high school or tertiary education than work opportunities in the rice sector before 2008. There was a consensus in the literature and among scholars that I spoke with that pre-PNAR, access to land was the primary barrier to participation for women in Senegal’s rice sector. Most rural land in Senegal belongs to men, either formally or through customary arrangements. Now, the gender gap in education, especially tertiary education (see graph) is emerging as a primary barrier to participation for women. Education is free and compulsory for children under 16 in Senegal, so there is no gender gap for primary or secondary school enrollment. However, for post-secondary training or education, which can be very expensive, there is a persistent gender gap.

There are already impactful programs to boost women’s participation in the Senegalese rice sector, such as UN Women supporting women rice farmer collectives. UN Women facilitates women’s access to land, capital and markets and helps women farmers process and market their rice. There are also efforts to close the gender gap in tertiary education, from African Women in Agricultural Research and Development, an organization that provides fellowships and other support for women earning agricultural degrees. However, this organization is continent-wide, and there is an unmet need for initiatives to support Senegalese women earning higher degrees in agriculture. Without addressing this structural barrier of the gender gap in tertiary education, Senegalese women will continue to be excluded from work opportunities created by investments from the National Plan for Self Sufficiency in Rice.