Gendered Labour, Decision-Making and Power Relations in Farming Systems

This chapter explores the gendered organisation of labour, authority and decision-making within farming systems. It demonstrates that women’s agricultural work extends beyond visible field operations to livestock care, seed selection, post-harvest management, household food processing, water collection, fuel collection and unpaid care responsibilities. Despite this extensive contribution, women commonly have limited influence over land use, crop choices, technology adoption, input purchase, credit use, marketing, income allocation and farm investment decisions. The chapter analyses farming households as sites of cooperation as well as unequal bargaining, rather than assuming that household benefits are distributed equally among members. It discusses the role of social norms, property rights, mobility restrictions, patriarchal institutions, caste, class and education in shaping women’s power within agriculture. Particular importance is given to the issue of time poverty, as women often combine productive work with reproductive and care work. The chapter calls for workload-sensitive agricultural planning, labour-saving technologies, shared household responsibilities, women’s access to machinery, institutional support and stronger decision-making roles. It concludes that agricultural productivity and sustainability cannot be improved by treating women only as labour providers; women must be recognised as farm managers, knowledge holders, entrepreneurs and decision-makers.