Employment creation for farmers, artisans and workers
As part of our Customer Social Impact survey, we asked producer groups to indicate if the number of people working in their organisation had changed over the past 12 months. Similar to 2021, the results showed that very few producers had seen a decrease. In fact, the vast majority had either seen an increase or maintained the same number of individuals working throughout different sections of their business.
Based on our internal annual review data, the producer groups we finance support 388,320 farmers, artisans and workers, an increase from last year due to changes in customer accounts and the type of business. From this year’s overall figure, 33% are women.
In terms of number of employees across both producer and buyer organisations, there was a slight increase in 2022 compared to 2021; 8,295 employees, of which 3,932 are women.
Looking only at the producer groups we finance, they collectively have 7,601 permanent employees (2021: 7,801) of which 46.5% are women. However, this is not spread equally throughout the portfolio, as the percentage of female employees in Latin America is lower compared with Africa. Although there is a higher number of male farmers in the organisations we work with, they are trying to mitigate the gender gap by ensuring the number of female employees represent nearly half of their workforce. In addition, during the producer committee held in Ivory Coast, some organisations mentioned that they supported women’s groups through different projects such local processing of chocolate and honey as part of income diversification initiatives, or supported female farmers to establish and invest in rice cultivation.
Training and mentoring
Through working with in-country partners, Shared Interest Foundation continued to provide specialised business training to producer organisations and community groups across Africa and Latin America.
Key achievements:
- 50 coffee farmers in Rwanda received training in agri-business management skills
- 50 women in rural Burkina Faso received training in agro-processing techniques, entrepreneurship and agri-business management
- 1,040 coffee farmers in Uganda and Rwanda received training in organic compost production
- 1,125 sphagnum moss harvesters in the Andean highlands received training in sustainable moss harvesting techniques
Increase in entrepreneurial and business skills
This year, we implemented 12 projects, which supported smallholder producers to increase their entrepreneurial and business skills.
You can read more about these projects on page 50 of our full Social Accounts click here.
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