Acknowledging gender makes for fairer, more relevant science

The essentials

"Gender" is a social construct, a system that splits society into two hierarchized categories: men and women, and the values associated with each. However, this binary vision and the resulting social perceptions have real consequences. In research, this has impacts on every level, from the methods used and the results obtained to men's and women's careers.

This is a thorny issue. Stereotypes are prevalent, but data are often in short supply. In their book on gender in research Le genre en recherche : évaluation et production des savoirs, a group of researchers makes some suggestions, with just one certainty: acknowledging gender improves both the quality of research and the working lives of the people doing that research.

Magalie Jannoyer is an agronomist and CIRAD Regional Director for the French West Indies-French Guiana. We look with her at some of the salient features of this collective work co-published with the Agence nationale de la recherche (ANR), focusing on agricultural research in the global South, CIRAD's main remit. The book is available as a free e-book. 

Ignoring women is a denial of reality

Are men and women treated differently in research? What do we see if we look at gender issues?

Magalie Jannoyer: For a long time, in many scientific fields, women were either invisible or marginalized as objects of research. This gave results that were at best partial, at worst absurd. In medicine, until recently, many studies only looked at male subjects. Chapter 4 of the book illustrates this, with examples of research from the 1990s on the effects of obesity on the trigger factors behind breast cancer or cancer of the uterus that only studied men.

Gender accounts for why women have often been seen as "specific" objects of research, hence overlooked by science. For an institution like CIRAD, working on agriculture in the global South, it is vital to look at the roles of both men and women on farms. In almost every case, men and women have different tasks. It is crucial to understand what those roles mean, in order to determine how food systems function and identify operational levers for action to change those roles if needs be.

In practical terms, what difference does looking at women in agricultural research make?

MJ: As an example, in sub-Saharan Africa, most postharvest operations are done by women. In particular, this mean agricultural product processing or sales. Overlooking women, in this case, means missing information on several links in the food system. In concrete terms, not involving women in our research projects risks making our work useless. This is explained in chapters 8 and 9.

Varietal breeding programmes in Africa paid the price of this for years. These programmes are intended to improve seeds, generally in order to boost yields. For a long time, none of them looked into how crops were used once harvested. The snag is that if a new tuber takes twice as long to cook, it is not likely to be adopted. And it is women who are most interested in such aspects, since on the whole, it is still women who do the cooking in rural Africa.

At CIRAD, the RTBfoods project focused on root, tuber and cooking banana consumers in sub-Saharan Africa. Yam was one of the tubers studied. It is a staple food for more than 500 million people worldwide, and Africa accounts for 98% of global output. Yam is generally pounded, a job done by women, and the time the operation takes depends on the variety. Some yam varieties take three times as long to pound. RTBfoods members therefore questioned women to understand their constraints better and work together to set criteria for choosing suitable yam varieties.

In addition to ensuring greater impact for our research, this type of approach makes women more visible and gives them power. Including them in decision-making gives them a place in arenas from which they were previously absent. This is what is known as empowerment.

The bridge between research quality and professional equality

The book looks not just at the content of research, but at researchers' working conditions. What are the possible bridges between the two?

MJ: Looking at gender issues in our research inevitably means looking in the mirror. The relations between male and female researchers, the way in which our organizations are structured and the research methods we use are imbued with biased gender-related ideas. If we are now more interested in rural women, it is because research institutions themselves have become more inclusive over the years.

The opposite is also true. CIRAD implemented a project called RELAX in Burkina Faso, studying the nutritional deficiencies observed among rural women. Those deficiencies were worse than those suffered by mean and children, despite the fact that women are in charge of cooking and consequently of their family's nutrition. The aim of the project was to be as inclusive as possible, with the idea that sound working methods mean sound results. Economists, nutritionists and agronomists have had to change their practices to reduce the gender bias inherent in the methods that have been used by each discipline for years. As regards agronomy, for instance, the "farming system" concept was modified to include family vegetable gardens or gathering activities. Those activities are often done by women, and have a significant impact on household dietary diversity, since the products in question are added to both dishes and sauces.

Thanks to several projects along the same lines, there is now a community of practice at CIRAD. It offers practical tools for including gender in research. The idea is not to systematically apply a method intended to transform things, but to take care to avoid situations that could prove harmful within our spheres of operation. The aim is to move from a "gender-blind" to a "gender-sensitive" approach. Any choices made should be informed ones rather than made by default, and justified.

Boosting dietary diversity to address chronic malnutrition

A lack of dietary diversity means that people living in the cotton-growing regions in Burkina Faso still suffer from chronic malnutrition. For four years, the RELAX project has brought together scientists from several disciplines to analyse the determinants of food diversity. This research has revealed that 80% of women are affected by micronutrient deficiencies. It has also produced operational recommendations to improve nutrition security for people in Burkina Faso.

Promoting professional equality in research

So there is still gender bias in the world of science, which often works against female researchers. What form does this take, and how can we remedy it?

MJ: The impacts of bias on women in science are often visible throughout their career, from recruitment to access to positions of responsibility. There is also a tendency for women and girls to censor themselves, before even embarking on scientific careers, often due to certain disciplines being perceived as masculine. Personal choices are thus sometimes influenced by what people see as models or alter egos in one field or another, and this is what we need to work on.

As regards gender equality in research, France and Europe have introduced several successive public policies over the past two decades. In France, research organizations are now obliged to roll out an equality action plan encompassing human resource management, measures to fight sexual and gender-based violence and including gender issues in research. At CIRAD, for instance, this means ensuring parity during the recruitment process, where possible. Efforts are also being made to raise awareness within research teams, to prevent gender bias in research operations. In terms of day-to-day functioning, inclusive practices are encouraged. For instance, we avoid team meetings after 6 pm, since we know that in France, even if things are moving in the right direction, in heterosexual couples, it is still generally the woman who does most of the housework and childcare. Without reducing female scientists to their role in the domestic sphere, taking these constraints into account serves to ensure that all colleagues have equal access to information.

There is a recurrent belief in the research world that female researchers are less productive than their male counterparts. Where does this stereotype come from?

MJ: What is clear is that women are often judged more harshly than men, for similar results. A study in Sweden of post-doc medical research grants showed that to be given the same score, female candidates had to be 2.5 times more productive than men. Combined with women’s tendencies towards self-censorship (they do not apply unless they think they tick every box), it is clear that there is persistent prejudice in terms of research evaluation. In the book, analysis of gender bias in research assessment is also covered in chapters 2 and 3, with examples of the actions conducted by national bodies, particularly the ANR in France. It is crucial to make panel members and employees more aware of these types of bias.

In addition to gender-balanced panels, we need to raise awareness of these types of bias at every level of our organization. The more inclusive the work environment, the better the working conditions for everyone, and the better our research will be.