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In general, women’s wage work in the market economy may be characterized as relatively insecure, low-paid, unskilled, and gender-segregated. Gender differences become more pronounced when considering the realm of the agricultural marketplace, specifically in unpaid reproductive/care work in rural areas and non-remunerative productive work on the farm. This chapter reviews a large body of academic literature on development economics and labor economics, specifically focusing on gendered labor access and opportunities in the domains of the agricultural marketplace of developing countries. First, it conceptualizes gender-contested spaces in the agricultural marketplace and how gender differences are linked with social norms, economic constraints, institutions, international processes, and policy recommendations. Second, it analyzes major patterns and trends shaping the extent and nature of women’s experience in agriculture industries. It specifically explores the relationships between women’s agricultural labor force participation and economic development, trade liberalization, the availability of opportunities to work as wage laborers vs. self-employed farmers, and the impact of job creation through global value chains. Third, it elaborates on how gender differences are constructed and sustained specifically with regard to age, perceptions, social norms, time use, unremunerated productive work, agricultural productivity, landholding and management, and the allocation of land, labor, and other resources. Lastly, it extends the discussions on patterns, trends, and gender differences in the agricultural marketplace to how to dismantle the gendered structure of constraints and eliminate barriers to women’s participation. Drawing on an extensive review of relevant case studies from various parts of the world, it explores effective policies and techniques that brought impactful changes in women’s experiences. Along the way, it offers a comprehensive understanding of the drivers of success and failure and proposes recommendations for future initiatives and programs for improving women’s status in the agricultural marketplace.

Economic growth in emerging market economies has come hand-in-hand with growing demand for energy, with many of them meeting this higher demand by increased use of coal to fuel electricity generation. This paper examines the impact of pollution generated by coal fueled power units on the anemic status of children and women in India. We show that among very young children (aged 0–5 years), the number of coal units in the district in the month and year of birth significantly increases the likelihood of being anemic net of a comprehensive set of child, mother, household and district level controls. Exposure in utero matters as well for child anemia, while the number of coal plants in the district also induce greater anemia among adult women. Impacts on anemic status are driven by the growth of PM2.5 pollution attributable to emissions from coal-powered units. We undertake a series of falsification and specification checks to underline the robustness of our results. Our research adds anemia to the list of significant health costs of relying on coal-fired power generation in meeting the increasing demand for energy that emerging market economies like India face.

This study on the economics of gender differences examines whether the mining industry acts as a blessing or curse for women's well-being and economic status. The analysis focuses on the impact of proximity to mineral deposits and active mines on various measures of women's agency and health in India. Identification leverages the plausibly exogenous spatial variation in the occurrence of mineral deposits across districts. Results indicate that women's outcomes improve in the vicinity of mines with improvements in shared decision-making, reductions in barriers to accessing medical care, and reduced tolerance of physical violence. These benefits are pronounced among younger women, and in the proximity of mines that employ relatively high shares of women. The underlying mechanisms include employment gains for women and improvements in women's health near mines. Their children also experience gains in nutritional status. Men's likelihood of making decisions jointly with partners increases, and men are less likely to justify domestic violence. A key explanation for these results is the sharing of mining royalties with local groups that support investments in women and children. Findings imply that mineral mining can bring substantial benefits to women's well-being, which is critical for sustainable development.

This chapter focuses on the structural drivers and constraints associated with the transition of women from unremunerated or low-paid production to higher-value work in three important labor-market domains: entrepreneurship, agriculture, and wage employment. Understanding the drivers behind these types of employment and the constraints that women face can help to develop new policies that better support workers and their families, stimulate employment generation in countries with rapid labor-force growth, and promote entrepreneurial activities that spur innovation and progress. In the spirit of these objectives, this chapter examines best practices in transforming women to be successful entrepreneurs, farmers, and wage workers. The chapter closes with the links between gender equality and economic growth, concluding that promoting gender equality can be a 'gender-smart' way to achieve sustained economic development.

This paper considers gendered labor access and opportunities in the domains of the rural landscape and agricultural market place of developing countries. By rural landscape we mean women’s time use in non-remunerative activities like fuel and water collection, reproductive care and domestic work, and uncompensated agricultural labor in rural regions. When considering the agricultural market place we focus on women’s ability to engage with local or international markets in obtaining fair value for their labor or produce. In particular, we consider agricultural wage labor in non-farm work, in local and global value chains, and in self-employment (especially small businesses). The rural landscape and the agricultural market place may be gender-contested for a variety of reasons including credit and land market imperfections that have differential consequential impacts by gender, as well as long-standing socio-cultural norms that dictate gender relations and sanction the manner in which women are expected to engage with non-domestic spheres.

This study uses household survey data from five developing Asian economies to explore gender differences in employment, wages, educational attainment, and occupational distributions. These five economies – India, Indonesia, Philippines, Taipei,China, and Viet Nam – span a range of per capita GDP levels and have demonstrated varying success rates in closing gender gaps in education, occupational distributions, and earnings. Taipei, China stands out for its relatively high per capita GDP in the face of strong improvements in women’s educational attainment and labor force participation, but the female-male earnings ratios are not particularly high, not even by global standards. The Philippines is conspicuous for having near gender earnings parity—a rarity globally, not just for its income level. India stands out at the other end of the spectrum for persistently low female labor force participation rates as well as high rates of female illiteracy and the continued clustering of women in low-wage or unpaid jobs in the agricultural sector. In between these extremes lie Indonesia and Viet Nam, well into their structural transformations away from agriculture toward economies dominated more by services and manufacturing, with women in Indonesia experiencing relatively low but improving gender earnings ratios and women in Viet Nam experiencing the opposite: relatively high relative earnings that have been declining in the past decade. Common to all five countries are large unexplained portions of the gender wage gap reflecting unobservable characteristics and gender disparities in returns to worker characteristics that may be undermining any gains that women have made in accumulating education and experience.

An important innovation in agriculture is the formalization of land ownership through individual land titling to women farmers and joint titling to married couples. The existing evidence closely ties land tenure with increased investments in land and improved agricultural productivity, but also shows that very few women farmers share land or own land directly. In every developing region, women own substantially less land than men. This study offers a meta-analysis of the channels through which land titling affects women’s productivity and earnings in agriculture, as well as other indicators of women’s well-being and autonomy. As is understood, a strengthening in autonomy can have direct beneficial effects for women in terms of lower fertility, improved health and freedom from domestic violence.

This study examines how the 2008-2009 surges in international food and fuel prices and coinciding global financial crisis impacted the Philippine labor market, with a focus on gendered outcomes. A battery of descriptive statistics and probit regressions based on repeated cross sections of the Philippine Labor Force Survey indicate that both men and women experienced declines in the likelihood of employment, especially in 2008 and in manufacturing. While men's job losses were limited to wage employment, women lost job opportunities in wage- and self-employment, and they experienced increases in unpaid family work. Real wages fell for men and women, with much of the decline at the upper tails of the wage distribution. If one considers education as a proxy for skill, results suggest that unskilled workers were affected most adversely when the crisis began, especially in terms of employment losses, but as the crisis conditions wore on, skilled workers experienced negative impacts as well, especially in terms of real wage cuts.

The analysis uses data from Vietnam’s 2008 Household Living Standards Survey (VHLSS) to explore how men and women in Vietnam differ in educational attainment, labor market status, health status, and land-use rights. The analysis also examines how indicators such as income, ethnicity, region, and household structure are related to gender differences, and how they enrich measures of inequality. Such an analysis matters because inequalities based on gender, ethnicity, and wealth groups undermine the ability to care for families. Furthermore, inequalities in areas like education and wages can have macro-level impacts through such channels as the productivity of workers and the full utilization of the country’s resources. These 2 concerns emphasize the importance of considering both micro and macro-level policies that are likely to promote broadly shared development.