Agricultural Transition in the Eastern Hills of Nepal: The Interlink between Commercial Cardamom Farming, Women’s Livelihood and Empowerment

Abstract

Commercial Cardamom farming has contributed largely to Nepal’s economy since its commercialisation in 1953. In recent years, there has been an increase in the demand for cardamom for export across Nepal. Cultivating large cardamom for export has been able to help alleviate poverty by bolstering the national economy and elevating the livelihoods of the poor and marginalized. Holistically, commercialization of cardamom has largely contributed to the nation’s economy. However, there has been a paucity of research on gender and cardamom farming including gender disaggregated data, gender roles, livelihood and empowerment in the front of agrarian change. . This study has provided evidence on three themes: 1) evolution of commercial cardamom farming in Salakpur, 2) livelihoods of women’s engaged in cardamom farming and, 3) factors leading to women’s empowerment through their engagement in cardamom sector, covering issues such as incomes and decision making in use or investment of income. Taken together, these three themes evolution in relation to agricultural transition, livelihoods and empowerment, this study has provided a window on the influence of gender norms and structures in regards to export-led agriculture. The study site, Ilam district of eastern hills of Nepal, has been prominent for large cardamom production since the nineteenth century. Despite being the oldest cardamom producing district, evidences on gender and cardamom farming, livelihoods and empowerment remains scant. Feminist ideology has been applied to understand the i lived experiences of women and delve into the social gender structure of the village. To obtain the lived experience, qualitative methods were applied to meet the objectives along with quantitative data. To obtain quantitative data, a census was conducted in between November and December 2015 in Salakpur covering 349 households. The agriculture transition in Salakpur shows a profound change from subsistence to commercial farming. From rice and vegetable farming, the households in Salakpur first adapted to commercial ginger farming as their first cash crop. The major reason for transiting from rice to ginger farming had been good income and less labour, less requirement for water for ginger and the trend of cash crops farming in Ilam district. In two decades of ginger farming, farmers shifted to commercial cardamom farming, firstly because they lost their ginger farms to disease. Moreover, while adopting cardamom as an alternative crop, farmers foresaw a fortune in cardamom. Compared to ginger, cardamom has provided higher return with less intensive labour requirement. Evidences indicate commercial cardamom farming has led to improved livelihoods of farmers, particularly of women from different ethnic groups. The marginalised women have been able to step out of poverty due to their engagement in cardamom farming, as a wage labourer or even as a small quantity producer of cardamom. The results of being able to earn of has been positive in the lives of women in general, in fact in the overall households, because they have been able to invest in their children’s education and even save money in the institutions. Also compared to other forms of employment some women take up roles such as tailoring and petty shop running, engagement in commercial cardamom farming has benefitted them more. The presumed idea that when women are able to earn benefits the entire households and allows women to take a stand has been reflected throughout this research. Findings show, engagement in commercial cardamom farming has empowered women financially and socially through their visible participation in institutions, particularly, women’s cooperatives. Institutional participation has led to women’s active engagement in decision-making at the household level, regarding use of income, investment in saving groups and in children’s education. Evidences also point out that despite institutional association and women’s empowerment, the patriarchal structure still deprives women of having access to property and resources, which questions ii whether women are fully empowered or not. Few gaps have been identified in the course of conducting this study, for further research. First, there is a need to research on large cardamom farming in relation to sustainable livelihoods. Second, it would be helpful to explore the changes in cardamom production and trading pattern, given that the trademark has been approved from the national government.