India's women farm workers suffer job losses from climate shocks
What’s the context?
Extreme weather - from droughts and floods to heatwaves - are hurting Indian farmworkers, with women the hardest hit
- Indian women farm workers lose out due to extreme weather
- Women in agriculture bear brunt but have little recourse
- Activists say many rural women unaware of government aid
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While three-quarters of working women in rural India rely on agriculture to make a living, government data shows, very few are recognised as farmers themselves or own farmland, which means they struggle to secure credit or access government subsidies and aid programmes.
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As extreme weather events such as drought, floods and heatwaves increase, the country's poorest farm families are under growing pressure, with female farm workers often suffering the most, according to academics and activists.
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For example, Devanabai said she used to pick up four or five days of farm work a week before 2020, but that it had dropped to one or two days in recent years due to worsening droughts and heavier rainfall throughout the seasons, as well as hailstorms.
Saraswati Sevabhavi Sanstha, a local NGO that helps rural women, said that while farmers receive state compensation for their losses, the women like Devanabai who work for them have no such support.
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Yet in Maharashtra, Sunita Mhaiskar, the deputy commissioner of the state's labour department, said agriculture workers fell into the category of unorganised labourers and that there is currently "no specific act or scheme for female farm workers".
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