Making Rural Services Work for Women and the Poor: An Institutional Analysis of Five Districts in Ethiopia

Agriculture dominates economic life in Ethiopia, accounting for eightyfive percent of employment, eighty percent of exports, and forty-four percent of the gross domestic product. About forty-five percent of rural Ethiopians live in poverty, and most farmers cultivate less than one hectare. Much of the agricultural production is on a subsistence or semisubsistence basis. The quality of public services such as support for agriculture and education, health care, water, and sanitation in rural areas is thus a pressing matter.

In most parts of the country, women are intimately involved in all aspects of agricultural production, marketing, food procurement, and household nutrition. Nevertheless, the view is widely held that women do not farm. This cultural perception remains strong, even though numerous agricultural tasks are deemed "women's work," including weeding, harvesting, preparing storage containers, managing home gardens and poultry raising, transporting farm inputs to the field, and procuring water for household use and some on-farm uses