View source for Gender in Aquaculture and Fisheries Conference 2022

DFM presented three panels under the Special session "'''Gender and the Social Economy of Dried Fish'''" at the GAF8 Conference in Kochi on November 21, 2022.

'''Panel 1 – Gender and dried fish value chains in Sri Lanka and Bangladesh'''

*''“GENDER THEORY AND PRACTICE IN AN INTERNATIONAL PARTNERSHIP ON THE SOCIAL ECONOMY OF DRIED FISH”'' – Derek Johnson & The Dried Fish Matters Team
*''“AN INTEGRATED FRAMEWORK TO BETTER UNDERSTAND GENDER RELATIONS IN DRIED FISH VALUE CHAINS”'' – Madu Galappaththi, Andrea Collins, Derek Armitage, Prateep Nayak (technical problem meant that could not be presented)
*''“GENDERED ENGAGEMENT IN DRIED FISH VALUE CHAINS IN SRI LANKA''” – Koralagama D N, Adikary A, Wickrama S, Weeratunge, N.
*''“UNVEILING AND ADDRESSING GENDER INEQUALITY IN DRIED FISH SECTOR: A BANGLADESH PERSPECTIVE”'' – Mostafa A. R. Hossain, Mirza T. Sultana, Md. S. Rahman, Md. Shahjahan, Md. S. Alam, Sayeed Ferdous, Rasheda Akhtar, Mahmudul H. Sumon
*''“PRECARITY, GENDER AND WELLBEING IN THE DRIED FISH PROCESSING IN BANGLADESH”'' – Md. Mahfuzar Rahman
*''“WOMEN IN DRIED FISH PROCESSING IN BANGLADESH: NEGOTIATING AND BARGAINING WITH PATRIARCHY”'' – Mirza Taslima Sultana, Yeashir Arafath, Dyuti Tasnuva Rifat, Sayeed Ferdous, Mahmudul Hasan Sumon

'''Panel 2 – Gender and dried fish value chains in India'''

*''“WHY FISH MATTERS FOR WOMEN? INSIGHTS FROM A SCOPING STUDY IN GUJARAT”'' – Tara Nair, Durga Fofandi
*''“IMPACTS OF COVID9 ON WOMEN DRIED FISH PROCESSORS OF KARNATAKA: SOME EMPIRICAL EVIDENCE”'' – Prasanna Surathkal, Ramachandra Bhatta, Amalendu Jyotishi
*''“PHOTO NARRATIVE ON WOMEN IN DRIED FISH SECTOR IN KERALA, INDIA”'' – Nikita Gopal, Abhijith S, Jiswin Joseph, Holly Hapke, Ramachandra Bhatta, Amalendu Jyotishi
*''“BARRIERS TO WOMEN’S EQUITABLE ENGAGEMENT IN TRADITIONAL DRY FISH INDUSTRIES OF INDIAN SUNDARBANS: SOME CROSS CUTTING ISSUES”'' – Aparna Roy, Basanta Kumar Das, Pranaya Kumar Parida
*''“SEEING LIKE HAJIRAS: CONTEXTUALIZING GENDERED INTERSECTIONS OF SES IN THE DRIED FISH SECTOR OF THE INDIAN SUNDARBANS”'' – Raktima Ghosh, Jenia Mukherjee

'''Panel 3 – Gender and dried fish value chains in Southeast Asia'''

*''“RETHINKING MARGINALIZATION: WOMEN IN SMALL SCALE FISH PROCESSING IN CAMBODIA''” – Gayathri Lokuge, Kyoko Kusakabe, Prak Sereyvath
*''“GENDER ANALYSIS OF THE CHANGING IN PRODUCTION AND CONSUMPTION OF FERMENTED FISH PASTE (PRAHOK) IN CAMBODIA”'' – Uon Sokmoly
*''“THE IMPACTS OF ACUTE POLITICAL CONFLICT IN MYANMAR ON WOMEN’S ENGAGEMENT IN DRIED FISH VALUE CHAINS”'' – Wae Win Khaing, Derek Johnson
*''“UNDERSTANDING SOCIAL WELL-BEING AND VALUE OF THE DRIED FISH: A STUDY OF MYANMAR MIGRANT WOMEN PROCESSORS IN THE DRIED FISH VALUE CHAIN IN SAMUT SAKHON PROVINCE, THAILAND”'' – Si Thu Lin (technical problem meant that could not be presented)

The conference program is [https://gafconference.org/schedule.htm here].

Minutes from the post-conference DFM planning meeting are [[DFM minutes GAF8 2022-11-21|here]].

The conference organizers requested us to provide recommendations from our presentations. We prepared the following points:

=Recommendations from DFM Panels at GAF8=

==Legal frameworks, governance, and development interventions==
Though fishers are included in the definition of farmers in India, institutions like banks are still not willing to accept it or are not aware of it. Sustained advocacy efforts are required to bring this to their attention and action.

Land and tenurial rights are critical for small scale dried fish value chain actors. Dried fish producers need legal mechanisms that assign them rights to the water bodies and lands that they use. This point has important implications for post-harvest processing and value addition where women are involved in large numbers. Also the right holding instrument should allow for the possibility of women as rights holders or for joint holding in the names of men and women. 

Our results show that the pandemic disrupted the dried fish processors and traders substantially. Though the demand for dried fish was (as perceived by them), supply side was significantly disrupted. The effect of this was much higher for the processors from around small landing sites. Small scale fisher families and especially women are engaged in post-harvest activities and, they face numerous disruptions and are prone to such disruptions (due to climate change and blue economic activities). Given this, social protection measures from a welfare perspective, especially targeting women engaged in fish processing and trading would be useful. The protection can take the form of financial assistance, credit availability, cash compensation and transfer, insurance (including health insurance) will be useful. 

*We recommend a regulatory guideline provided by the government and agreed by all the parties that stipulates the following:
*Minimum and identical wages for women and men working in fish drying yards
*Provision of a healthy and hygienic environment with drinking water and toilet facilities
*Primary and basic medical facilities in the yard
*Course of action to deal with no work- no pay during the drying season
* Alternative livelihood options for women during off-season supported with training and cash incentive
*Clear and doable instruction and safeguards for the employment adolescent girls 
*Provision of education – mobile or night schools for women and children
* Strict measures to prevent all sort of violence against women in the drying yard

The dried fish industry in Sri Lanka is gendered, where women predominantly represent the lower stream of the value chains with much hardworking – de-gutting, drying under the sun, handling waste, etc.  In contrast, men at the higher stream of the value chain receive attractive profits. Thus, this study recommends, which also iterated by women dried fish producers and traders – to have a regional market place or a central market for each coastal province at least for wholesaling and retailing in order to give women greater chance to access these spaces and engage in more lucrative value chain activities.

==Knowledge gaps and knowledge production==
We recommend interdisciplinary research to better understand and assist with policy and practice concerning gender in dried fish sector. Future work must focus on gender equity to ensure that research and development interventions are inclusive, equitable in process and outcome, and meet the specific needs of women working in fish drying.

Despite women's significant contribution to fish production and exposure to multiple social-institutional, climatic and ecological risks, they have remained invisible in policy templates and there is no gender segregated data for dried fish production (as in the case of West Bengal). Therefore, we recommend implementation of robust research methodologies through which baseline data for the dried fish sector can be generated. 

Participatory approaches such as knowledge co-production (goal-oriented, interactive, context-specific and pluralistic), need to be applied in research to foster critical discussions, identify areas of challenges and opportunities, and simultaneously, co-design short-, intermediate- and long-term pathways through which the practices could be improvised and upscaled for an improved dried fish production.

More research is needed on how women struggle to balance household or reproductive responsibilities with the demands of dried fish processing, trading, and retailing work. This research needs to be linked to policy that provides supports to reduce women’s double burden of work through the social protection and income measures listed above.

There needs to be greater recognition of the ways that women who work in dried fish value chains are systemically disadvantaged, including through diverse and changing forms of patriarchy. Disadvantage is often compounded by other social and economic factors such as ethnicity or caste. Recognition of systemic disadvantage needs to be translated into research and policy.

Notwithstanding the previous point, we also need to recognize the ways in which women exercise agency and learn from these examples in co-designing supporting initiatives for them.

==Dried Fish processing recommendations==
The preservation of 'know-how' of processing fish-based products beyond the current generation of processors 

Women’s engagement in value addition in Sri Lanka is limited to de-heading (sprats), de-gutting, cutting, and grading. Yet, more opportunities are available but mostly overlooked. Value addition on waste and fish byproducts that are currently discarded (e.g. conversion to fish meal), and dried fish itself are recommended with intensive training and demonstration with the support of market linkages.