The impact of electrification on rural women's participation in agriculture and their welfare.
Loading...
Date
2021
Authors
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
Abstract
South Africa’s National Development Plan highlights support to smallholder farmers and rural
electrification as strategic interventions aimed at fostering economic growth. The government has
assigned significant financial investments toward smallholder support programmes and multibillion
rand projects have spent on electrification on the premise that electrification will alleviate
poverty. Development strategies that lack empirical research to guide policy can result resource
misallocation, and adverse consequences for intended beneficiaries and growth sectors.
Electrification is a time-saving technologies that can free up farmers' time, especially women's,
enabling them to increase their participation in agriculture. There are very few studies that analyse
the impact of electrification on agriculture in South Africa. The few studies from South Africa and
other countries show mixed results on the effect of rural electrification on time allocated to
agriculture by women and the impact on their welfare.
This study analysed the relationship between access to electricity and smallholder farmers'
participation in agriculture using data from a sample of 243 households in Ward 14 in Msinga
Local Municipality of KwaZulu-Natal Province of South Africa. The data from the sample was
also used to analyse the impact of electrification on female-headed household's income. The
relationship between access to electricity and smallholder farmers' participation in agriculture was
assessed using descriptive analysis, Categorical Principal Component Analysis and Principal
Component Regression. The study results show a negative relationship between participation in
agriculture and access to electricity, high household income per capita, household head
employment in fulltime off-farm employment, household ownership of television, and radio
ownership. Households that spend more time collecting firewood and cooking allocate more time
to agriculture despite the time demands of their home-based chores. Young and elderly smallholder
farmers participate more in agriculture compared to middle-aged smallholder farmers.
Entrepreneurial smallholder farmers with small plots participate less in agriculture compared to
non-entrepreneurial smallholder farmers.
Ordinary Least Squares regression was used to analyse the impact of electricity and other
household attributes on households' welfare. The econometric results show that female-headed
households have higher income per capita than male-headed households. The results suggest that
the income advantage is from smaller family sizes and access to electricity. The study also found
that access to electricity, age, education, time spent in off-farm employment, and occupation of
household head impact household income. The results suggest that most households are engaging
in subsistence farming out of necessity. Therefore, policies that seek to improve agricultural
participation and productivity in rural areas must focus on creating awareness amongst households
on the benefits of farming as a business. Trends in the sample that contradict findings at the
municipal level also show that agricultural programmes and assessments need to consider microdata
for more effective implementation and evaluation. The pivotal role of women in the study
area emphasises the importance of a gender-sensitive approach in rural development policies and
strategies.
Description
Masters Degree. University of KwaZulu-Natal, Pietermaritzburg.