Questions on gender and technology in the construction of agroecology

Abstract

The purpose of this article is to discuss the role of women in the development of agroecological thought in Brazil, which has been discussed as a proposal that combines science, technology and social movement guided by ethical and epistemological premises in which the environmental features, cultural plurality, respect for diff erent peoples, as well as non-exploitation in labor and commercial relations are central. Although agroecological thought is progressive, it has been maintained in various discussions among peasants themselves and within militant and Brazilian academic environments that it still reproduces gender inequality. Agroecology is, broadly speaking, a form of family farming that has always had widespread participation of women. However, it has only been in a little more than the past two decades that female labor in family farming, and also in agroecology, has been considered in a way that takes into account its real contribution. We will discuss that there is no agroecology without feminism, in the sense that there are women, who occupy central positions and maintain various types of resistance to the conventional model of agricultural production within the organization of agroecological social movements, and in their associative productive practices. This seemingly paradoxical relationship between relevant contributions of women to agroecology and the denial of gender issues in it will be discussed, seeking to establish dialogues between women’s contribution to agroecological thought and the feminist perspective