Gender Mainstreaming the Rural Development Programme: Updating a case study of Northern Ireland

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This research will update former research on how to more effectively engage women in the Rural Development Programme (RDP) for Northern Ireland. The EU is committed to gender equality through gender mainstreaming. RDPs delivered across Member States incorporate a commitment to gender mainstreaming. This is enshrined in Article 8 of the Rural Development Regulation 2007-2013.Our project will update research on how to increase the impact of the RDP on rural women. We will update desk research, qualitative interviews, and focus groups. There is concern at a regional and EU level that the RDP is not having a sufficient impact on women. While we will specifically focus on Northern Ireland, lessons will be relevant to other regions in the EU. This research will also contribute to the theoretical literature on gender mainstreaming, specifically by critically reflecting on the notion of gender mainstreaming the RDP, seen as one of the most male policies in the EU. This research will consider how the RDP might be mainstreamed, and whether there are tensions between the EU's commitments to gender mainstreaming and a viable agricultural industry. There are inherent difficulties in trying to gender mainstream RDPs. In general across Europe, men inherit land. While women are rarely the holder, they are key contributors to the farm family labour force, and frequently their off-farm labour is essential to the viability of the family farm. It is unclear how gender mainstreaming can apply to an industry that is intrinsically premised on the exploitation of family labour. We will also examine if the RDP is adopted in ways that reflect existing gender imbalances. It may be the case that gender mainstreaming is circumvented by cultural norms and established patterns of practice, and this normative knowledge shapes how the programme is implemented. This is particularly relevant for those elements of the RDP aimed at women in rural areas not on farms. These women are not bound by the same cultural and historical constraints as those involved in agriculture, yet women continue to be under-represented in monitoring boards and implementing bodies. The European Commission and Parliament have expressed concern about the differential gender impact of the RDP across Europe. In the NI context, a policy report was commissioned in 2000 to make recommendations on how to increase the impact of the RDP on women (Shortall and Kelly, 2001). While there is awareness of the need for gender equality, the Mid-Term Evaluation Report of the current programme specifically notes that there is little evidence to date of active targeting of women in the current programme, and recommends that DARD actively engages with relevant organisations to use their expertise to reach this target group to promote the programme. It states the need to do this many times but it does not suggest how this might be achieved. The research process will actively engage with policy makers, civil society sectors, and the political sphere. It will be designed in close consultation with DARD, the Local Action Groups who deliver the programme, women's networks, key rural development and agricultural organisations, and political actors. The research will produce a final report and briefing notes for the relevant sectors engaged with the project. It will produce academic journal articles and conference presentations for academic audiences. There will be collaboration throughout the project, bringing together a university, a government department, civil society groups and the Northern Ireland Assembly, in an innovative four way transfer of knowledge. There will be a final project launch, media interviews will be given and it will be publicised on Queen's University's website.