A survey released this week at the fourth World Congress of Rural Women showed that urban and rural women lead vastly different lives and that rural women have much more of an uphill battle than their city sisters.
The Markinor survey showed that nearly half of urban women have matric or higher qualifications, compared to only 15% of rural women. Just more than half of urban women live in households with an income of R2 500 per month or more, while rural women are struggling to make ends meet.
It also revealed that nearly four out of every 10 or 38% of rural women are unemployed and looking for work, and only two out of ten have full- or part-time jobs. In contrast, 36% of city women have jobs and 27% are looking for work.
Nine in every 10 rural women give government credit for making a difference to their lives. Urban women, in turn, are more positive regarding the delivery of basic services such as water and electricity and the promotion of gender equality.
Speaking at the conference, Deputy President Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka said it was a fact that negative conditions in rural areas have a great adverse effect on women living there.
“Rural women are trapped in a vicious circle of poverty and powerlessness,” she said. “They are more affected by unrewarding seasonal wage work. Also, as unskilled casual workers on large-scale farms, their overall value is not recognised.”
She added that their circumstances are often not aided by traditional views on women’s roles.
“Many girl children in this situation are destined to carry the load and burden of family responsibility,” she said. “In most developing nations. women work well beyond the normal retirement age and they remain the poorest of the poor all their lives.”
The conference’s background document revealed that women make up the majority of the world’s poor and two-thirds of the illiterate in the world are women. Most of these marginalised women are rural women, the conference heard.
“Rural women’s contribution to building social and economic capital remains concealed, because they are invisible in plans and programmes. This denies them access to resources which could enhance their socio-economic contribution to society,” the paper said.
It further revealed that worldwide there are 1,6-billion rural women — mainly farmers — who make up more than a quarter of the total world population. Yet women own only 2% of the land and receive only 1% of all agricultural credit, despite producing more than half the food.
“Women only have 1% access to 1% of the world’s land, and without land women have no access to credit,” the paper noted.
In Africa, rural women’s roles are even more critical. Research showed that women produced up to 80% of the food in their countries on the continent, and one-third of rural households in sub-Saharan Africa were headed by women.
“Even within the overall severe dislocation facing all rural women, there are subcategories of them that can be singled out as facing special desperation: widows, older women living alone, elderly women who have had to take responsibility for orphaned children — often in the context of HIV/Aids — and married women who have adopted orphans,” the paper said.
The lineup of speakers included ministers and civil society leaders from India, China, Brazil, Mexico and Palestine.
A host of South African ministers also spoke at the conference, including the deputy president, Minister of Home Affairs Nosiviwe Nqakula and Minister of Social Development Zola Skweyiya.
The social development minister spoke about rural women’s dependence on government grants and argued that the persistence of poverty, unemployment and under-employment of women had resulted in their overwhelming dependence on social welfare transfers.
“Already, concerns have been raised that the rate at which social transfers in South Africa are increasing may not be affordable and sustainable in the future,” he said.
“The extent of poverty in women is such that it is almost impossible to talk about poverty and not see the face of a woman as a symbol thereof.”
The three-day international congress, which ended on Wednesday, brought together women in civil society and government from across the globe to discuss how to help rural women to empower themselves.
The inaugural conference, which happens every four years, was held in Australia in 1994, while Spain hosted the last conference in 2002. South Africa was supposed to hold the congress in 2006, but could only accommodate it this year.
Many delegates called for the need for a proper education for women, both young and old, while others demanded that women receive access to water, land and funds.
Other themes discussed at the conference were globalisation and eradication of poverty, peace and security, and the access to and control of environmental resources. The delegates also discussed governance for rural development at all levels, and they flocked to the session on health and well-being, which was attended by Winnie Madikizela-Mandela.
The session revealed that 75% of all people with HIV/Aids were women. In Africa, about 59% of adults living with the disease — 13,2-million people — are women.