The Role Of Presbyterian Farmers’ Training And Child Development Programme In Rural Women’s Economic Empowerment In The East Gonja District Of Northern Region

ABSTRACT 

Rural women face several constraints as they seek economic empowerment for themselves and their families.  Around the globe, countless NGOs and institutions have supported rural women’s economic empowerment. Development projects take place amidst a context of structural constraints but the same structure also allows women to assert their agency, whether overly or covertly. As a result, this thesis examines the role of PFT/CDP in the economic empowerment of rural women in the East Gonja District of Northern Region. The methodology used for the study was mixed methods and some of the research tools used were focus group discussions, observation, interview guide, and questionnaire. The key concepts in this study are; Economic, Empowerment, Rural women. The study leads to the findings that PFT/CDP has been doing a lot of activities in the study District but with the exception of the child education sponsorship, the rural women have received very little credit support for their farming activities. It is also clear from the study that, the credit support was on some selected crops such as sorghum, soya and groundnuts. The study also reveals that the rural women, even though have received some basic training on agronomic practices and group formation, they have actually not received any entrepreneurial skills training to economically enhance their activities to generate income for the family. Besides, the study also observed that the rural women are interested in indigenous economic activities such as livestock rearing, shea butter processing and groundnut oil processing. The study thus concluded that PFT/CDP projects at the study communities have been concentrated on small credit for rural women, child sponsorship, basic agronomic training and FBO development. However, PFT/CDP projects are not designed to economically empower the rural women through entrepreneurial skills training on their indigenous economic activities. It is therefore recommended that PFT/CDP should consider including entrepreneurial skills training of the rural women on their indigenous economic activities with the already existing projects in the study communities. The study also recommends that further research should be carried out on the types of entrepreneurial skills needs of the rural women and the prospects on the rural women in the district.