Issue 16 of Southern Lens on Development by Prof. Jane Mariara
The Learning and Knowledge Management Project (LKMP)—launched by PEP in 2022—is a four-year initiative, which aims to strengthen the capacity of Canadian small and medium-sized organizations (SMOs) and their local partners in conducting impact evaluation. As part of this initiative, SMOs and their local partners will evaluate and enhance the impact of their interventions that improve living conditions, advance gender equality, and empower women and girls. The project is supported by the Global Affairs Canada (GAC).
Grounded in a simple principle—better evidence leads to better outcomes, LKMP includes two components—generation of evidence combined with training of partners in monitoring, evaluation, and learning (MEL). Building evaluation capabilities of partners can enable them to design more effective, contextually relevant and inclusive initiatives, which can be modified in real time and scaled accordingly.
To generate the evidence, the project is conducting six impact evaluations in Senegal, Bolivia, Colombia, Cambodia, Kenya, and Ethiopia. While the one in Bolivia is completed, Senegal and Colombia are close to completion. The other countries are at different stages of progress, including preliminary analysis, data collection and design.
In this edition of my newsletter, I deep dive into the findings of the impact of two key programs on enhancing gender equality in Bolivia and Senegal, and the learnings that emerge.
The story of gender empowerment in the fishing sectors of the two countries
In both Bolivia and Senegal, intentional measures were introduced to empower women in the workforce. Bolivia introduced the Peces para la Vida - Empoderamiento y Sostenibilidad (PPV E&S) or Fish for Life - Empowerment and Sustainability program to position sustainable aquaculture as a pathway for rural women’s inclusion in work, especially since fish farming as an emerging sector provided an opportunity with less rigid gender norms.
Senegal’s Governance and Innovation for Women (GEFI) project—implemented in the Saloum islands—built capacities of women fish processors through providing technical training (sustainable processing, marketing, financial management, climate adaptation) to strengthen their participation in economic governance.
Although the two programs had different entry points (bringing rural women into the workforce in Bolivia while promoting leadership of women fish processors in Senegal) with varied outcomes, they addressed common structural barriers faced by women in both countries. These included unequal access, regressive socio-cultural norms, limited decision making power and lower representation in leadership positions.
The findings show interesting results and important lessons, including:
- Multi-dimensional approach works – The Fish for Life program was compatible with rural women’s time constraints and care responsibilities in Bolivia given its proximity to the household and consequent accessibility. A multi-dimensional initiative (technical training, gender sensitization, building soft skills) designed to address key socio-economic challenges, including food security, gender equity, and poverty reduction, Fish for Life ensured that the resultant empowerment was also more than income. It laid the pathway for frameworks that incorporated interlinked aspects of women’s self-agency in policymaking.
- Empowerment goes beyond income – In both countries, the findings showed that women’s empowerment is multi-faceted with the potential for multi-generational benefits. It includes decision-making power, leadership, time autonomy, self-confidence, and collective voice. In Senegal, for instance, promoting inclusive access to governance of fish processing units in the three villages of Niodior, Dionewar, and Falia marked by female poverty not only increased incomes, but also had an overall positive impact on dignity and security.
- Benefits are based on context – Context plays a role in how women benefit from the programs both in increased incomes and improved leadership. In Bolivia, given that the PPV E&S placed strong emphasis on building peer-to-peer support networks to reduce poverty and enhance women’s overall well-being, the findings revealed that women showed a greater willingness to take the lead in female majority groups. The lack of decision-making and leadership continued to remain a notable gap otherwise. In Senegal, the benefits of the training were more concentrated among those beneficiaries who had pre-existing resources, skills, or adaptability—highlighting the need for tailored support strategies for vulnerable populations. Even the positive impact on increased incomes and living standards were lesser for the poorest quantiles in Senegal.
- Technical trainings empowered women – In Bolivia, women benefitted the most when technical trainings were combined with gender sensitization leading to significantly increased levels of empowerment. In Senegal, nearly half of the participants claimed satisfaction with the training provided in resource management, circular economy, marketing, financial management, and climate change. Overall, the trainings were critical in providing skills, confidence and a sense of greater agency to women.
Lessons learnt
The findings of the impact evaluations offer clear learnings while demonstrating success. These include:
- The projects demonstrated that Female leadership flourishes in gender-responsive environments, which underscores the importance of gender composition as a crucial design factor for relevant policies.
- They also made it clear that content and delivery methods of programs must be tailored to local contexts to increase receptivity and effectiveness—reinforcing that culturally adaptive program design in empowerment initiatives is non-negotiable. For instance, in Bolivia, it was suggested that regional hubs be created to customize training content and delivery to local languages, cultural norms and social contexts for greater effectiveness.
- Another important learning included extending the duration of the projects to allow for scaling up, especially in Senegal, where despite the trainings, community wide diffusion of women’s leadership continued to remain low. A longer duration would also allow for women’s groups and networks to become stronger so as to facilitate governance, access to credit, knowledge-sharing, and income growth.
- Lastly, sensitization drives and awareness campaigns for broader engagement were also important suggestions for increased uptake by women.
Conclusion
The findings from the evaluations in Bolivia and Senegal and the lessons that emerge have clearly demonstrated that empowerment does not happen by accident—it must be intentionally designed and nurtured. These lessons can also feed into the ongoing work in the remaining countries, and we at PEP hope that through this project and by building capacities in developing countries, a pathway for real and lasting change is being created. As always, I welcome your comments and feedback. I also encourage you to follow our work on this initiative and reach out to us with your ideas.
