As the Team Lead for Propcom+ at Palladium International Development Limited, Dr. Adiya Ode is at the forefront of an agriculture and climate change program funded by the UK-FCDO. In this interview, she speaks on gender perspectives in agricultural businesses and advocates for reassessment of land tenure systems and improved access for finance and land for women in agribusiness, among others. Excerpts:
It is interesting to note that you have a background in veterinary medicine at what point did you transition to agricultural economics?
I wish I have an inspiring story to tell about my journey into agriculture of course is from the course I read, but you are Nigerian just like me, you know the JAMB stories since my original love was architecture. I wanted to be an architect. Unfortunately, I didn’t have the scores in physics that I needed to read architecture. And I was determined to go to school but on top of that, I had chosen University of Jos as my first choice, but here I was in ABU trying to get into architecture and they said well, but only faculties of engineering and vet medicine consider second choice candidate so you have a choice. Without physics, I couldn’t read engineering so I went to vet medicine. And my thought then was, okay let me just hang in there for a year and next year, I’ll be gone but once you have started it’s hard to let go and with vet medicine that one year it is like passing through a storm and having weathered that storm, you also bond with classmates and I didn’t even make any effort to leave after that I stayed.
So that’s how I started that journey. But even while I was in vet medicine, while I loved the practice of medicine, and I mean, I took a lot of joy from seeing animals get healthy, after you treat them and incidentally I was also a prize winner for the clinicals I was the best student in the clinics.
We also had courses in policy, livestock policy, and I was like, wow, I want to be in the middle where you can take decisions that affect the profession that affects something that’s always a driving factor for me; impact. How much impact can you make? So I moved from there to work, I was at NAACP and somehow found myself working in the federal ministry of agriculture, in livestock planning.
Can you share some key insights you gained over the years on inclusion that influence the work you do in your present position?
Going back in time, one of the first recognition for me was that women are special and special attention has to be paid to them.
Beijing Conference opened up peoples’ eyes worldwide to the fact that women have rights as a people and we have to make sure that they can access and activate those rights.
Maryam Babangida’ Better Life Programme was the first recognition for me to the fact that yes women are disadvantaged but we shouldn’t leave them at that disadvantaged position. We should try to level the playing field for women. That inspired me in the course of my work in agriculture where you find that most farm labour is carried out by women but they don’t own the assets, so women labour, but do not own the money that comes out of the labour.
I remember there is a move for women to get access to micro-loans, so many women embraced this but it underscores the fact that women don’t have access to productive assets.
You want to get a loan and they will ask for your husband that is exclusion because you can’t make a decision about investment without your husband having a say in that decision. We have to tear down some of those barriers to women’s economic growth.
How has your background in agricultural economics informed your approach to governance and gender issues?
Agriculture economics is for communities and societies where agriculture is the key fact of our life, it gives us the insight into the functioning of those societies and the economic base of the society.
Most rural Nigerians derive most significant portion of their livelihoods from agriculture so it is important in society.
As a gender advocate, how would you assess gender in the context of o35% affirmative action in Nigeria especially in the agricultural space?
Truth is the governance space seems to seat somewhere and agriculture somewhere else. If we have committed to 35%, then the 35% should apply to public schemes for agriculture so there should be access to land, finance, rights that women should have.
The biggest challenges for women in agriculture is access to finance, access to land. Traditionally, women are excluded from land ownership and inheritance in many of our societies so that limits their access to land and key factor of production and so it confines them to agricultural labour with no control over decisions on how long will I utilise this land, they cannot predict with decisions on what to farm or crop rotation to maintain the land fertility. We talk about agricultural finance, how many rural women can walk into a bank to ask for loans, they don’t even have bank accounts.
What reform initiatives would you recommend in the context of gender equity to bring women at par with men in terms of growing their businesses?
One of the things I think is critical is not to treat the population as homogeneous but to understand that there are peculiarities in different populations and to ensure that whatever we put in place is something that takes into consideration those peculiarities.
Our land tenure systems have to consider the role of women starting from if a woman needs land to farm, how does she apply for that land, where does she get that land? The land tenure systems have to be revisited and they have to be special provision for people who have been excluded in the past.
What advice would you give to young professionals who are aspiring to make a difference in governance and gender policy?
One thing I would say to them is that it is achievable if only you do it. I’ve learned that the will to do something is all that is needed. If you have that will as you go out, you will find others who are like minded. You will find others who want to do something about things, who want to effect change, who don’t want things to remain the same and you can work together. I should say not much is achieved if you work alone and that is one thing younger professionals should realize. Working together, partnerships; owning businesses together. When I was in business school, I learnt that many successful businesses are started by three people who bring different skills and support each other. It’s a lonely thong to struggle alone. I think working together is a very good idea, I always advise you work in partnerships, seek partnerships, seek mentorship where it exists.
