Cuban peasant woman. Image:MC

By María Josefina Arce

Forty-three percent of farm workers in the world are women, who face a variety of obstacles such as access to land, agricultural materials, credit and training.

These limitations prevent them from becoming strong and competitive economic actors, capable not only of generating a better life for themselves and their families, but also of contributing to feeding others and to the country's development.

International organizations such as FAO, the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, have highlighted that Cuba stands out in Latin America and the Caribbean in the attention to the rural female population, with the implementation by the authorities of a gender equality policy.

Moreover, this segment of the population has the decisive support of the FMC, Federation of Cuban Women, a defender of women's rights and promoter of actions in favor of more equitable gender relations.

Cuban women are present in agricultural and livestock work, with salaries that are equal to the activities they perform or the results of production.

Thousands of women in the Caribbean nation have been granted ownership of land, with full access to credit, technical assistance and other opportunities.

Like the rest of Cuban women, they also benefit from education, health, reproductive rights, family planning services and an advanced Maternity Law that allows them to take pre- and post-natal leave until the child's first year of life.

The country's universities support the government's policy in favor of female empowerment.  For example, the "Marta Abreu" center of higher studies has devised projects such as PIAL, Agricultural Innovation Program, which has trained and provided work tools to women in rural areas of the Escambray, with a view to resilient development.

Also, in conjunction with international organizations and agencies, projects have been implemented to stimulate the incorporation of women into productive tasks and their performance in administrative functions.

The progress made by Cuban rural women is an example of the country's commitment to international and regional conventions and agreements in favor of this sector of the population, to which it is a signatory.