The roles of women in decision‑making for innovation in smallholder cattle production systems ‑ a study from Vietnam Northwest province of Dien Bien
Creators: name: Nguyen, Thi Da Thao
Publisher: name: University of Tasmania
Year: 2024

description: According to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), gender equality and empowering women are critical for agricultural development (FAO, 2011b). In many rural areas of Vietnam, women are actively involved in smallholder beef cattle production activities. However, their role in such production systems has not been well understood. Moreover, the participation of women in decision-making for practice change is not known. Therefore, it is of importance to conduct a comprehensive study on the role and participation of rural women in decision-making for innovation adoption in cattle production systems. The study reported in this thesis fills the identified research gap by exploring how women contribute to decision-making related to new practice adoption in smallholder cattle production.<br>This study adopts an explanatory mixed method design which has two distinct phases. The study starts with a quantitative phase employing a survey of twenty-four female farmers to investigate the role of women in the household cattle production system. The second phase is qualitative semi-structured interviews of eighteen interviewees with four key informants and fourteen female farmers to explore women’s influence on decision-making for the new cattle production practice adoption, factors affecting women’s role in decision-making and how engaging with decision-making affects women’s empowerment. Originally, a case study research approach was intended with two study sites as two research cases. However, the findings showed no substantial difference between the two sites in relation to women's empowerment or their role in smallholder cattle production and decision-making. Therefore, the findings have been combined in the results chapters as per a qualitative mixed method approach. This study uses the Theory of Planned Behaviour as a framework to understand the factors affecting women’s engagement with the decision-making process for adoption of new practices in household cattle production.<br>This study confirmed that women played a critical role in smallholder cattle production. Women appeared to either have the role of main person or of helper in smallholder cattle production.<br>A major finding of the study was that there are four levels of women’s influence on decision[1]making for new practice adoption in cattle production. From the lowest influence to the highest influence these were: informing, consulting, collaboration and empowerment, and are equivalent to the roles of women in decision-making as informers, consultants, collaborators or final decision-makers. Which role the women played mostly depended on the type of decision were made. At the empowerment level, women had the strongest influence on decision-making for the new practice adoption in their smallholder cattle production. They dominated the decision-making process and had the power to independently and finally make decisions. The majority of women were final decision-makers in their household for the new practice adoption in training and learning for new cattle production knowledge/practices decisions. Regarding financial, management and technical farming decisions, the roles of women in decision-making were mainly as informers, consultants or collaborators. The findings also revealed that there was an only a small number of women who substantial shared decision-making for the new practice adoption with their husbands. Apart from the husbands, other stakeholders such as parents-in-law, other farmers, Beef Interest Group, local staff from the Farmer Union at communal level, Department of Agriculture and Rural Development at the provincial and district levels from Government projects/programs and researchers from Non-Government Organizations/projects, National Institute of Animal Husbandry and Universities also influenced on women’s decision-making for new practice adoption in cattle production.<br>The study found that through engagement in decision-making process for the adoption of new practices in smallholder cattle production, women seemed to be empowered. Women valued a range of human, social and finance capitals that they gain through their engagement in decision-making for adoption of new cattle production practices.<br>The study also found that there are several factors that both positively and negatively affected women’s roles in decision-making related to new practice adoption in cattle production. The overall attitude of women towards engagement with decision-making for new practice adoption was positive because they were aware of several benefits not only associated with new practice adoption, but also of being involved in decision-making for the adoption of new cattle production practices. Support of other stakeholders was a positive social influence for women’s decision-making for new practice adoption in cattle production. Six key personal characteristics of women: age, education level and experience, health, ability to ride a motorbike, being the main income generator in the family, and relationship to household head, emerged as the main perceived control factors influencing the women’s role in decision-making.<br>Regarding actual control factors, the government initiatives to encourage women in smallholder cattle production were reported as a positive actual control factor and the complexity of new practices to limit the understanding of women about new practices was considered a negative actual control factor.<br>There are some policy changes aimed at capacity-building and improving the knowledge of women required to support their participation in smallholder cattle farming and promote gender equity in agriculture. The main findings of this study related to women’s role in decision-making for the adoption of new practices are of profound importance. The new knowledge might be used to better understand, design and implement training or innovation interventions for policy-makers, researchers, cattle producers, and women in particular.