Women play an important role in fishery value chain activities, this includes aquaculture, mariculture, post-harvest processing, fish marketing and distribution. According to recent study findings of Illuminating Hidden Harvests (IHH), 45 million women participate in small-scale fisheries value chain, this represents 40 percent of the estimated labour force engaged in small-scale fisheries (SSF). Worldwide women are engaged in post- harvest activity where they account for roughly 50 percent of the labour-force in the processing (sorting and grading), transporting, trading, and selling of small-scale fisheries catch. Fish processing facilities employ a workforce predominantly comprising of women working on an output-based contract basis with minimal insurance and social security benefits. Further, in addition, women face constraints to access essential productive resources and services, technology, market information, financial assets, and financial services to fulfil their working capital requirements as well as household life cycle needs.
Although women’s contribution in SSF is economically and socially important, it receives minimal attention while formulating fisheries policies and programs. Hence, it is critical for policy makers and financial service providers (FSPs) to recognize the role of women in SSF value chain activities. Taking into consideration the unique business characteristics of small-scale fisheries sector, there is a special need to design and develop well-suited products and services to facilitate an inclusive financial services programme and provide them an opportunity to harness economic benefits from the profitable SSF sector.
The FAO supported initiative, CAFI-SSF Network has organized several knowledge sharing webinars, that covered Microfinance and Insurance Guidelines for SSF, Role of fish farmer producer organizations in facilitating inclusive financial services for SSF, Best practices within fisheries and aquaculture insurance sector. This webinar focuses on women in small-scale fisheries to enhance their entrepreneurship skills and access to financial services by applying best practices that may be beneficial to nations and institutions for replication.
CAFI SSF through this webinar brings to its member organizations and interested participants an informative session on initiatives in Asia and Africa regions that support access to finance for women in small-scale fisheries value chain.
For more information is available at: https://www.fao.org/artisanal-fisheries-aquaculture-2022/events/events-detail/fr/c/1609470/