Rural Women, Poverty and Natural Resources: Sustenance, Sustainability and Struggle for Change

Background

Rural women have long been central to family subsistence, but limited access to resources and environmental degradation increasingly undermine their ability to fulfill this role. Often the primary economic providers in their households, systemic inequities shaped by both class and gender constrain them, restricting their access to essentials like food, healthcare, employment, land, technology, and common property resources such as forests and grazing lands. The growing dependence on men and the depletion of natural resources have replaced women’s early autonomy as agricultural producers, intertwining poverty with environmental destruction. Despite these challenges, rural women actively resist these injustices by leading grassroots initiatives and participating in ecology movements that promote sustainability and challenge dominant development paradigms and power structures.

Conclusions and Takeaways

The author highlights how poor rural Indian women face significant challenges in sustaining their families due to unequal access to resources, employment, and healthcare, compounded by environmental degradation and the privatization of communal resources. Gender-based inequalities within households and communities place a disproportionate burden on women, who are primarily responsible for family subsistence. The author urges policymakers to shift from relief-oriented strategies to transformative approaches that tackle the root causes of poverty and environmental destruction. They emphasize that policymakers should consider factors such as product composition, technologies, decision-making processes, knowledge systems, resource appropriation methods, and scale. Additionally, the author advocates for further research into how gender inequalities intersect with other forms of marginalization, such as caste and class, and the effectiveness of various development approaches in improving rural women's lives. Finally, the author urges practitioners to focus on empowering women and ensuring they have equitable access to resources and opportunities, fostering sustainable and inclusive development.