Rationale for Gender Integration in Value Chain Initiatives in Lebanon

Gender equality and female empowerment are core development objectives, fundamental for realizing human rights and key to effective and sustainable development outcomes. Gender inequality affects production, distribution and consumption in an economy, but it is often overlooked in value chain development. Gender inequalities affect competitiveness directly by restraining productivity, growth and output as well as indirectly by hindering trade performance. Failure to understand and account for gender dynamics in value chain analyses and activities can limit the success of value chain initiatives, potentially hindering economic growth.

Gender inequalities can have a negative impact on value chain activities, including technology adoption, participation in agricultural markets and distribution of intra-household gains from livelihood-generating activities. Gender disparities also affect the achievement of broader agricultural and economic development goals, such as poverty reduction and income, nutrition and food security. For example, assets are required to participate in agriculture and non-agriculture livelihood activities. For each activity, there is a need to identify assets, consider how gender influences access to these assets and examine how gender disparities may result in differences in men’s and women’s participation in the value chain. The extent of this evidence and the manifestation of gender disparities in livelihood-generating activities vary across geographic regions and social contexts.

Analysis highlights important gender gaps in Lebanese value chains and the need to integrate gender into the design and implementation of value chain activities.

Women in Lebanon make important contributions to agricultural activities, but their contributions are often underestimated and undervalued due to cultural and policy biases. Rural women especially face legal, cultural and socioeconomic constraints that are further accentuated by gender bias in the delivery of rural services (Tailfer 2010). Women’s household responsibilities often prevent them from investing sufficient time in agricultural work or rural tourism activities. Women in rural areas also have limited engagement in formal economic and social groups and limited community leadership roles.

Purpose of the Resource Guide

The gender integration resource guide is designed by the Performance Management and Support Program for Lebanon (PMSPL) to support USAID/Lebanon and its implementing partners in articulating how to identify and address gender inequalities that can have negative impacts on the achievement of value chain development objectives. In particular, the resource guide presents a step-by-step practical approach to identifying and analyzing gender issues in value chains and in assessing the implications of any gender disparities for planned value chain development interventions.

The material presented in this guide can be classified under the following topics:

• The rationale for gender integration in value chain activity design and implementation
• The value chain approach to economic development, the different phases in the value chain development cycle and the major focus and activities in each phase
• How to conduct a gender analysis of a value chain, including the gender dimensions framework for gender analysis, and the process for integrating gender considerations into agricultural and non-agriculture value chains