Presentation Transcript

1. Gender and Economic Transformation in Africa

   Cheryl Doss Yale University Presented at the African Centre for Economic Transformation July 18, 2012
2. Why consider gender? To obtain long-term growth and transformation of economies, all of the available resources must be utilized. These include the labor, skills, and resources of both men and women. Gender influences access to assets, property rights, skills, information, etc. Economic transformation requires secure property rights. Focus today on assets and property rights.
3. Economic transformation requires secure property rights How to define and obtain secure property rights? Formalization, such as land titling, may or may not provide more secure tenure. What is the level at which we consider secure property rights? State, community, household, individual?
4. Household or Individual Level? Data on assets usually collected at the household level. But assets are often owned individually. HH secure tenure individual secure tenure. Women – and others – may access assets through household To understand decisions about investments, need to know household and individual level property rights information.
5. The Gender Asset Gap Project To address the lack of data on individual asset ownership and property rights, the Gender Asset Gap Project collected individual level asset ownership and rights data from Ecuador, Ghana and Karnataka, India.
6. Unique Features of Survey Interviewed two adults, usually principal male and female, in each household Questions on all physical & financial assets, including multiple means of valuation Household inventory: Asked detailed questions about all forms of physical/financial assets, including identification of owners Individual questionnaire: Asked about individual ownership and rights
7. Measuring the Gender Asset Gap There are different ways to present the gender asset gap One approach is the distribution by form of property ownership This uses the asset as the unit of observation and asks how each asset is owned
8. Distribution by form of Property Ownership, Agricultural Parcels
9. Distribution by form of Property Ownership, Small Livestock
10. Distribution by form of Property Ownership, Formal Savings
11. Measuring the Gender Asset Gap A second approach is the proportion of the population of adult women, or men, who own the particular asset (irrespective of form of ownership.) We refer to this as the Gender Asset Gap or the incidence gap.
12. Incidence of Ownership of Non- Agricultural Real Estate
13. Incidence of Ownership ofAgricultural Land
14. Incidence of Ownership ofAgricultural Equipment
15. Incidence of Ownership ofConsumer Durables
16. Which approach? The distribution of assets by form of ownership indicates the proportion of assets that are owned individually by men or women or owned jointly. It does not tell us how many different men and women own these assets. It could be that many of the assets are owned by a few individuals or that they are widely distributed. The incidence gaps indicate the proportion of men and women who are owners of a particular type of asset, but do not tell us anything about whether the quality and quantity owned varies among owners.
17. The Gender Wealth Gaps The value of assets owned by men and women captures the quality and quantity dimensions The values used for the following indictors were obtained by asking the primary respondents about the market value for each asset. For assets jointly owned, the value is assumed to be shared equally among owners. The gross values rather than net values are reported. The gender wealth gaps are presented as the share of women’s wealth of that asset. These are presented next to the share of owners who are women.
18. Female Share of Business Owners and Business Wealth
19. Share of Savings Wealth, by sex
20. Share of Household Gross Physical Wealth, by sex
21. Gender Wealth Gaps In Ecuador, when individual ownership is dominant, such as for savings and businesses, the gender wealth gap favors men. Overall the gender wealth gap is more striking than the gender asset gap for each of the major assets in Karnataka and Ghana. Women are less likely to own major assets than men. Of those who do own the asset, women are more likely to own fewer of them and ones that are of lesser value than men.
22. Survey in Uganda on access to and rights over land, based on household and individual surveys. Similar format – asked one person household inventory, up to three others about their own property rights.
23. Incidence of Ownership, by sex and definition of ownership (% of respondents in each category)
24. Incidence of Reported Ownership and Agricultural Decision-Making (% of respondents in each category)
25. Incidence of Self-Reported Ownership and Rights over Land (% of respondents in each category)
26. Conclusions Asset ownership and property rights differ for men and women, in many dimensions. Concern about relationships in both directions: 1) Ensure that economic transformation does not leave women out. 2) How do differences in property rights affect economic transformation?
27. Research agenda Track and analyze men’s and women’s assets ownership and property rights through the process of economic transformation.