Gender mainstreaming the Rural Development Programme Presentation to the Audience Impact Panel (IAP) Friday April 27 th 2012 Dr. Sally Shortall and Roisin Kelly Queen’s University Belfast

Overview Background to this research Rationale for this research Some critical questions Why set up the Impact Assessment Panel?

Background to this research Shortall, S. (1999) Equality proofing CAP reform. Report for Fermanagh Women’s Network and the RCN Shortall, S. and Kelly, R. (2001) Gender Proofing CAP Reform. Report for the RCN Shortall, S. (2010) Women working on the farm: how to promote their contribution to the development of agriculture and rural areas in Europe. Brussels, European Parliament

Rationale for this research: Gender Mainstreaming the RDP The European Parliament and The European Commission commissioned reports to make recommendations on how to improve gender equality in the RDP post 2013 NISRA (2010) Mid-term evaluation of the RDP highlighted gender inequality as a problem for the programme However the mid-term evaluation does not suggest how this problem might be solved

Rationale for this research: Gender mainstreaming the RDP Why is gender inequality still an issue? Will the changed environment/ landscape of Northern Ireland make a difference for the implementation of the RDP and the question of gender? 1.Political 2.Legislative 3.Economic 4.Management of the programme – policy/ delivery

Some critical questions What does the EU mean by ‘gender mainstreaming’ the Rural Development Regulation? What are the targets and the means to reach these targets? Rolls down to Member States/ regions: NI targets? How do you gender mainstream the RDP? Potential implications for agriculture? Complexities of farm family activities and sources of income

Some critical questions In terms of LAGs/ JCCs/ Monitoring Committee - what does equality look like? Are we understanding equality as 50:50 representation in everything? If we look beyond 50: 50, then is gender inequality an issue that rural women/ agricultural women are exercised about? How will increasing the number of women participating across the axes improve the Rural Development Programme?

Why set up the Impact Assessment Panel ESRC funded research – emphasis on use-value and useable research Key players: civil servants, elected officials, rural community and voluntary sector, farming organisations, academics We would like to provide useful recommendations for the remainder of this RDP and the design of the next We are seeking guidance from you on how to ensure research outputs are relevant and useful to our key audiences

Efforts to ensure impact Project website E-group Research Briefing Notes (we think this is key and we are open for requests) Press releases End of project event QUB/ RAISE Knowledge Exchange Seminar Series 2013 Presentations to Assembly Committees Talks/ workshops as requested

IAP OPEN DISCUSSION MANY THANKS!

Document Links Shortall, S. (1999) Equality proofing CAP reform. Report for Fermanagh Women’s Network and the RCN (available on request from Sally Shortall on Shortall, S. and Kelly, R. (2001) Gender Proofing CAP Reform. Report for the RCN (Available on request from the RCN. Telephone or ) Shortall, S. (2010) Women working on the farm: how to promote their contribution to the development of agriculture and rural areas in Europe. Brussels, European Parliament (available on ) Bock, B (2010) Personal and Social Development of Women in Rural Areas. Brussels, European Parliament (available on )