An international project aimed at supporting and empowering ethnic minority women working in Vietnam’s Arabica coffee industry is being led by Murdoch University researchers.

Dr Rochelle Spencer (Centre for Responsible Citizenship and Sustainability) and Associate Professor Jane Hutchison (Asia Research Centre) have received almost $240,000 in Federal funding to investigate how and why gender relations change and women are empowered in these communities.

Remote ethnic minority women often experience high levels of poverty, excessively high workloads and limited opportunity to earn their own income. The research project will build on the gender work that CARE undertakes in the region.

CARE works with women from ethnic minority groups in the most remote areas of Vietnam to support them to have equal opportunity to participate in and benefit from the country’s overall economic growth.

CARE has demonstrated that when agricultural systems are more inclusive, women farmers possess enormous potential to contribute to long-term food security for their families and impact sustainable nutritional outcomes.

“Research from around the world shows empowered women lead to improved outcomes for households,” Dr Spencer said.

“This project aims to ensure ethnic minority women working on smallholder farms are visible, respected and productive in the Arabica coffee industry.

“This research is an important step in the journey towards understanding the ‘how’ and ‘why’ of gender equity approaches being implemented in rural, ethnic minority communities in northern Vietnam that we hope will inform gender transformative approaches in other countries.”

Dr Spencer said that smallholder farms represent 80 per cent of agricultural production worldwide with almost half of the agricultural labour force in developing countries being women.

Murdoch researchers will speak to ethnic minority communities in the Dien Bien and Son La provinces to identify challenges and limitations in northern upland minority groups.

They will also guide critical discussions on social norms and activities in producer households, groups and communities to achieve progress in gender equity over time.

“It is important to work with both women and men to help transformation in these rural communities,” Dr Spencer said.

“CARE works closely and carefully with couples, the household, boys and men to bring about small changes in deeply entrenched cultural attitudes.”

Through their work on the ground, the researchers will recruit 10 local junior social scientists from Thai Nguyen University and the Association for Hmong Development. They will be trained in advanced research technologies to help identify and interrogate emerging patterns and themes linked to gender equity and women’s empowerment in the Vietnamese ethnic minority context.

The funding for the project forms part of more than AUD$3 million dedicated by the Australian Government as part of the Technologically Enhanced Agricultural Livelihoods (TEAL) project.