Modernisation et masculinisation du réseau semencier. Le cas de la filière haricot à Idjwi, en RD Congo

Abstract

Agriculture, like many occupations, is a gendered activity. In the DR Congo, productive agriculture is generally the attribution of men and food-producing agriculture of women. Seed selection and conservation is subject to the same gendered distribution, whereby women select, sow, harvest, and save seeds for food crops. However, faced with numerous contextual shocks, more and more women farmers are no longer able to save their seeds from one season to the next. Therefore, they turn to external actors to obtain seed, that are generally produced according to Congolese seed regulations. These are based on international standards, inherited from colonisation and modern science. However, the logic of this regulation is productivist, favouring the development of a seed sector driven by the male gender. Moreover, its exogenous dynamics ignore the ancestral knowledge of peasants, and more specifically, of women peasants.

Keywords

• Seed legislation
• Formalisation of seed networks
• Masculinization of seed networks
• Small-scale agriculture
• DR Congo