PIND’s commitment to gender and social inclusion underpins efforts the organization is making to achieve greater gender equality as a key pathway towards sustainable poverty reduction and shared security and prosperity in the Niger Delta. By many measures, the last strategic phase marks a watershed period in PIND’s efforts to advance gender equity in its programming. With the adoption of a new strategic plan, PIND is committed to a renewed and more ambitious development in the Niger Delta. At the center of PIND’s 2020–2024 strategic plan is the achievement of gender equality and empowerment of poor women and girls, persons with disabilities and most vulnerable population.
PIND has a target for enabling at least 60,000 women with increase in their income. Therefore, women’s economic empowerment is still positioned at the core of PIND’s economic development implementation activities. Efforts are being made to:
- drive a process which will lead sustainable market reforms that are based on increased inclusion of women by ensuring institutions are better informed and equipped to respond and adapt to women’s priorities in the short and long terms;
- stimulate voice, choice and control for women to be an integral feature of PIND’s work, with the aim of raising the agency of poor rural women in their households and communities;
- establish pilot schemes to test innovative approaches to engaging more women in profitable markets and evaluate these with the aim of replicating those which show the potential for greatest impact.
In Q4, outreach and adoption continue to expand steadily, and this is coming from both direct and indirect sources. Existing partners, service providers that crowded–in and farmers that took part in demos, exposed 3,466 out of a total of 8,834 direct female farmers to improved system constituting 39.2%. Overall in 2020, women farmers constitute 39.05% of those exposed to good agronomic practices.
