Training Manual on Gender and Poverty Reduction (Summary) The training Manual on Gender and Poverty Reduction is one of the outputs of Vietnam-Canadian Cooperation Programme Localized Poverty Reduction in Vietnam (LPRV). This is a cooperation project between Universities and Research institutes of the two countries, namely, National Center for Social Sciences and Humanities of Vietnam, Thai Nguyen University, Vinh University, Ho Chi Minh University for Social Science and Humanities, and University of British Columbia (UBC) and University of Laval. The objective of the LPRV Project is building the capacity of participating institutes in the development and training of methodology for policy planning and evaluation that are used in poverty reduction projects. The project works through the universities to influence on the potential target groups which have direct or indirect impacts to poverty reduction activities at local levels such as students, local administrative staff, staff of mass organizations, NGOs, and etc The details of the project are reflected in its goal, impacts, expected outputs and results, which are summarized as follows: Goal: Impacts: Results: Outputs: Poverty Reduction Poverty Reduction Policies and projects to be formulated to meet the needs of the poor in general and to reach gender equity in particular. Planning skills of staff and population to be improved. To apply participatory approach in planning and implementation of poverty reduction activities. To achieve these objectives, the project has carried out a range of activities such as training, capacity building in research and teaching capacity for teachers and researchers of universities and institutes, organizing information network among participating institutions, formulating and implementing pilot poverty reduction projects at commune levels, establishing centers for poverty reduction research in five universities in Vietnam. To develop a training manual on methodology of planning and implementation of poverty reduction projects is one of the important activities under the project. At the same time this can be one of the outputs of the project. LPRV Project has given a special attention to gender. It was identified from the beginning that gender equity promotion is one of the important impacts of the project. Hence, the project activities, gender, together with ethnicity are the cross cutting issues. They can and must be incorporated in all other activities. Under the project framework, the Gender Working Group was established and led by Dr. Do Thi Binh, Center for Family and Women s Studies. The members of the group are researchers of the National Center for Social Sciences and Humanities of Vietnamese and teachers of the five Institutes and Universities. In the first three years of the project, the Gender Working Group initiated and carried out various activities aiming at
awareness raising and gender analysis skills for the participants of the project from five universities. The training manual is one of the activities in the third year of the LPRV project. The training material provides students, local staff the knowledge on gender issues in poverty reduction together with the basic analysis skills and skills to incorporate gender into research, planning and implementation of poverty reduction project. The development of this training material is due to the reality in Vietnam where poverty becomes a social concern. Poverty reduction requires local staff and researchers to have skills and methods to mobilize local people in research, planning and implementing the poverty reduction activities in the sense of increasing the capacity of men and women to solve the problems by themselves, encouraging the proactive and innovative activities of the poor and the whole community. This approach leads to a sustainable poverty reduction at the community, which is based on the principle of maximizing the mobilization of local resources, primarily human resources, especially women, ethnic minorities and all people who have concerns about poverty reduction and gender equity. Developing this training material is a process in which the authors have leant useful lessons. Exchange the ideas while working on the outline and preparing the materials has reflected the team spirit and promoted active participation of all members of the Gender Working Group. By mentioning the working process we want to emphasize that sharing experience, discussing opinions in a group, expressing accountability, and personal initiative are the most valuable lessons for the Gender Working Group when processing the materials. Because the members of the Gender Working Group are in six different cities, the Group took advantage of common workshop under the project framework to discuss in order to reach a common consensus and make the division of work among the members. During the development of the materials, the participating members have exchanged their opinions/ideas by email. The timetable for the development of the material is showed in the table below: Date Venue Activities 4 Aug 2000 Vung Tau Discussion on: Who are the Users and the Title of the Training Material. Opinions are different 15 Aug 2000 Do Son Continue to discuss on the contents: the consensus was reached. It will focus on the students and staff at local levels. Initial division of work among the members, continued to work on the details and outlines 24 Oct 2000 Nui Coc Translation of the Guidelines into English for Nora s comments 15 Dec 2000 Hue Huguette (Laval) and Nora continued the communication on the joint material development. The translation of the whole training set into English is a major constraint for the participation of Canadian colleagues. This issue is opened. 19-20 Feb 2000 Hanoi Discussion on training material: Comment for each part, based on the outlines 2
Until 15 Apr 2000 Until 30 Apr 2000 e-mail e-mail Initial discussion on methodology Division of work First draft sent to the lead person for review and comments, then the author makes edition, revision Draft manuscript sent to the editor in Hanoi Training material Gender and Poverty Reduction is served as a reference document used in training students in university and staff of local organizations. It can be also a reference document for rural sociology, extension, and community health. The manual is presented not as a set of ready lectures, rather the contents of the material are organized in such as way that the users can easily use these reading to prepare lectures on specific themes concerning poverty reduction and gender equity aspects. This reference is to help the users to prepare lecture on topics such as Study on Poverty in Vietnam, Poverty Participatory Study, Gender Sensitive Poverty Research, Experience in Implementing Poverty Reduction Project from Gender Perspective The manual consists of three main parts, which are as follows: A. The first part is divided into three chapters. Chapter 1 is on research methodology, which provides the reading materials and the list of existing materials developed by international and national organizations and by the authors themselves, basing on research, and pilot development projects on poverty reduction. This chapter pays special attention to the analysis of research approach from a gender perspective. The research approach/method is understood as an angle that the researcher chooses to look through when studying poverty issues. The approach can focus into one aspect, e.g. economic aspect of poverty in a farming household. The approach can be synergic, e.g. to study the situation and cause of poverty in economic, social, cultural, legal aspects. Poverty research from a gender perspective is a set of methods used for collecting and analyzing information on poverty focusing on gender or taking gender into consideration while using different analysis. In other words, it is aimed at addressing questions such as: how do gender relations have impacts on poverty situation? Are there any differences in poverty levels between men and women? Do gender relations determine the cause and factors leading to poverty of men and women? And if gender relations, be adjusted, would it have impacts on poverty reduction? In short, it is the study of the similarities and differences between the two sexes and the interaction mechanism of gender relations while analyzing specific problem and aspect of the reality and cause of poverty as well as in seeking solutions for poverty. Gender approach can be reflected in a specific poverty research, in which problems and aspects of poverty are studied from gender lens, so that the similarities and differences between men and women in poverty levels, capability and opportunity to get 3
out of poverty will be pointed out. Such a research can be called in-depth research on poverty from a gender perspective. However, this type of research is not popular. More often there is research on poverty from different angles or approaches that have a focus on gender. The chapter followed describes the issues occurred in gender sensitive research on poverty. Specifically it gives answers to questions: How poverty research address gender issues? How gender is incorporated into poverty research? Why it (not) included? And what needs to be done to promote gender in poverty analysis? To find the answers to these questions, poverty research is reviewed at different levels, and is analyzed according to the theoretical framework and research hypothesis. At the same time, some of the main research is reviewed according to the identification of poverty, the cause of poverty and the ways to get out from poverty. Chapter 2 concentrates on some gender concepts. It helps the users to distinguish gender and sex as well as the basic gender differentiation and gender roles. In reality, there is gender inequity almost everywhere. This is reflected in the perception, attitude and the ways of appreciation for men and women, by the society. Due to the triple roles, women often have longer working hours than men, that influences on their health, and thus women do not have time for other social activities, entertainment and leisure and or for improving their knowledge Therefore the struggle for gender equality is supported largely among groups of population, especially among women. However, the progress of this struggle is still modest. Human Development Report of the United Nations in recent years pointed out that despite the progress made during the last two decades in improving the gender equality, yet there is not any country where women are fully equal with men. Women have to face with various political, religious, cultural, economic and social barriers when participating in social activities. In education: two third of about one billion illiterates in the world are women, 70 percent of children who do not go to school, are girls. In economic field: women in many countries are discriminated in having right for property, inheritance, and work. The salary and wages for women in many countries are equal three fourth of the men s one. In politics: all the countries (except the four Northern European countries), the number of women s representatives in elected bodies is much smaller than the number of men s. In social aspects: every year, there is about one million girls are pushed into prostitution and millions of women are raped. In this situation, the struggle for gender equality is continued and promoted widely in the world. 4
The following chapter is dedicated to presentation of methodological views on women s studies, and the evolution from Women and Development to Gender and Development. Besides, the Gender Working Group also presented in this chapter some basis for gender equity. To support women to achieve equality in the society, western feminists have introduced appropriate approaches, which are known as welfare, equity, poverty reduction, efficiency and empowerment. To our opinions, it is necessary to apply these feminist views. This part gives some main points of feminist views in poverty reduction research. In Vietnam, Gender and Development approach is applied in many development project, particularly in poverty reduction projects. Therefore to mainstream gender into all stages of the project circle is a requirement. This is also served as a basis for comparison when developing a training material set on Gender and Poverty Reduction in Vietnam. Chapter 3 presents a brief overview on poverty situation in Vietnam at present. Why to link poverty with gender? To some extent, poverty is widening the gender gaps. There is not yet a single country in developing world, where women are fully equal with men. As many other poor countries in the world, in Vietnam, there are existing barriers that prevent gender equity: these are limited access to resources such as land, lack of extension services and credit. Women are under represented in leadership at different levels, women have less decision making power in many aspects in the family and in the society. This is the main reason leading to poverty of disadvantaged groups, among them many are women. This is clearly seen in various aspects: access and control over land in the household for men and women, gender, decision making power, division of labour and working time between men and women, poverty and domestic violence, poverty and health, and gender, education and poverty. Based on the above, the conclusion can be made that: poverty in a large scale is a challenge to the development in Vietnam. To reduce poverty efficiently, it is necessary to integrate gender into development projects. Gender is obviously a comprehensive tool for analyzing the cause of inequality between men and women and therefore helps us to develop gender sensitive policies. It is why there is a need to integrate gender into poverty reduction policy in Vietnam. Gender integration means that it must be sure that gender analysis will be made and will be integral part of policy analysis and all of that will contribute to the formulation of policies which reflect priorities and needs of both men and women. 5
Hence, gender analysis and gender integration at planning stage of a development project is very important. However, in practice, there are many issues that have to be solved in order to achieve a higher level of gender equity in Vietnam. At present, there are problems, and various policies on socio-economic development are now implemented such as multisectoral development policy, economic reforms, land allocation to household for long term use, trenching of staff in state sector, cut off subsidize in health, education, cultural services Besides the positive impacts of these policies, there are negative impacts such as limitation of access to resources, lack of decision making power, less benefits in development and women and children often are the victims of these negative impacts. Therefore to balance the relationship between the two sexes toward gender equity and sustainable development requires the scientists, policy makers, and development activists to study in order to find the most efficient solutions. B. The second part presents the tolls used for data collection and gender analysis in poverty research. Chapter 1 presents the methods of collecting data, and information in poverty research such as: Quantitative method (analysis of existing data, survey methods); quantitative method (observation, in-depth interview, focal group discussion); participatory methods The last section of this chapter is about the tools that can be applied in participatory gender-sensitive research. This part is a bit long as it presents different techniques and skills to collect data in social/anthropological research, therefore some possible overlapping with the other parts which are developed by other CPR, can be found. But this will be adjusted and improved in the next chapters. The contents of the two following chapters are the application of tools in poverty research in the field and the process of learning by working when implementing the project of the Poverty Reduction Centers at commune level. The case studies illustrate the gender relations reflected in gender division of labour between men and women in the fields of production, reproduction, and community activities. The following section describes gender issues in access to and control over resources, in decision making, in entitlement and benefits The last chapter of Part Two provides an overview on how to apply the gender analysis at local level. Three issues are discussed in this chapter, namely: (i) the use of methodology; (ii) principles for application of gender analysis and (iii) examples of gender integration in projects of Hue CPR at commune level. C. Part three provides information on gender and solutions for poverty problems. Chapter 1 presents the identification of needs and formulation of poverty reduction projects based on the experience of the project formulation at commune level 6
done by Centers for Poverty Reduction, from collecting gender data/information that are needed for project design to identification of poverty causes and the needs of the population, then what is needed for poverty reduction project. Chapter 2 presents necessary steps in implementing a poverty reduction project. The chapter gives information concerning project manager, project implementers, and skills needed for the manager and project participants. Chapter 3 is about project monitoring and evaluation. This chapter consists of two components, the first is about monitoring and the second is about the stages of the evaluation and review of a project. An example of an evaluation report is given at the end of the chapter. It is specially noted that Part Two and Part Three were based on the experience and lessons learnt during the implementation of projects for the first three years of the five Centers for Poverty Reduction. D. The Conclusion part provides some main points which are drawn from the experience of gender integration in poverty research during the first three years of LRPV project in project areas. The training manual on gender and poverty reduction is a product of a LPRV team, namely Canadian Specialists, the colleagues of five Centers for Poverty Reduction of five Universities and National Center for Social Sciences and Humanities of Vietnam. The members who gave a direct contribution to the development of the training materials are listed below. They are: Do Thi Binh and Tran Thi Van Anh of the Center for Family and Women's Studies; Pham Thi Ly, Ta Thi Phuong, Vu Thi Tung Hoa, Nguyen Van Thai of Thai Nguyen University; Nguyen Thi My Trinh of Vinh University; Bui Thi Tan of Hue University; Tran Thi Kim Xuyen of University for Social Science and Humanity of Ho Chi Minh City and Phan Thi Hong of Da Lat University. Anh. The edition work was done by a group headed by Do Thi Binh and Tran Thi Van The Gender Working Group would like to take this opportunity to express its sincere thanks to the Canadian colleagues for their time and financial support as well as their warm encouragement and valuable comments during the course. The deep appreciation is due to women and men in studied sites of five provinces in the country for their sharing and trust in our work. 7
The table of contents of the training material is presented below: TABLE OF CONTENTS Foreword Part One: Theory and Practice on Gender and Poverty Reduction Vietnam Chapter 1: Poverty Reduction Research from a Gender Perspective 1. Research Levels 2. Theoretical Framework and Research Hypothesis 3. Gender and Some Aspects of Poverty Research 4. Conclusion Chapter 2: The Concepts of Gender, the Basis of Gender Equity 1. What is Gender, why a gender perspective is needed 2. Some methodological aspects of gender equity Chapter 3: A Brief on Gender and Poverty Situation 1. A brief on poverty situation in the world and Vietnam in particular 2. Why to talk about gender and poverty 3. Review on gender integration and skills of gender integration in development projects Part Two: Methods of Data Collection and Gender Analysis in Poverty Reduction Chapter 1: Methods of Data Collection on Gender 1. Methodology 2. Quantitative method 3. Qualitative Method 4. Participatory Method Chapter 2: Application of Gender Analysis in Poverty reduction research 1. Concept and Gender Analysis 2. Gender Analysis in Poverty Research Gender division of labour Access and control over resources Decision making power Contribution and benefits Chapter 3: Some Remarks on Application of Gender Analysis in LPRV provinces 1. Methodology 2. Application of gender analysis 8
3. Approaches 4. Gender integration in projects at commune level in Hue CPR Part Three: Gender and Poverty Solutions Conclusion References Chapter 1: Need Identification and Formulation of Poverty Reduction Project 1. Gender sensitive data for project formulation 2. Identification of poverty causes and beneficiaries need assessment 3. Formulation of poverty reduction project Chapter 2: Implementation of a Poverty Reduction Project 1. The project manager 2. Selection of project participants 3. Training for project participants Chapter 3: Project Monitoring and Evaluation 1. Project monitoring 2. Project evaluation and review 9