Across the globe, and particularly in tropical regions rich in biodiversity, in villages, on farms, in homesteads, forests, common pastures, fields and borders, it is women who manage the majority of all plant resources that are used by humans. This means that they also hold the majority of all local plant knowledge and are those who are mainly responsible for the in situ conservation and management of useful plants, whether they are domesticated or wild. The simple explanation for this is that, throughout history, women’s daily work has required more of this knowledge. Across the globe, it is women who predominate as wild plant gatherers, homegardeners and plant domesticators, herbalists, and seed custodians. In several world regions and among many cultural groups, they also predominate as plant breeders and farmers.
In spite of this, world-wide, biodiversity conservation policies, programmes and guidelines usually omit reference to women or to gender relations. The majority of plant biodiversity research is also not gender sensitive, which can lead to incomplete or erroneous scientific results with respect to the diversity, characteristics and uses of plants, the nature of people-plant relationships in culturally-specific contexts, and the causes and potential responses to genetic erosion. In many regions, biological resources constitute the greatest part of women’s wealth, providing them with food, medicine, clothing, shelter, utensils and income. Continued access to these resources is vital to women’s status and welfare and therefore women’s motivations represent a principle driving force to counter processes of biological erosion. Only by giving serious attention to women’s knowledge, use, rights and needs with respect to plant biodiversity can two of the major goals of the Convention on Biological Diversity be met: the sustainable use of its components and fair and equitable sharing of the benefits from its use.
