Open Access

Are there differences in men’s and women’s access to and use of fertilizer and hybrid maize seed in eastern and southern Africa? This article explores the issue through a systematic review of the extant literature on gender and fertilizer use in maize production and on gender and hybrid maize adoption. Moreover, if differences exist, what will be the best strategy to deploy nitrogen use efficient (NUE) maize hybrid technology/seed in the region. The findings show that indeed a gender gap in fertilizer use exists. We find that there is strong evidence of a significant gender gap in the use of chemical fertilizer in SSA, with men adopting the technology more than women. Studies on the adoption of improved maize varieties (hybrids) show unclear gender-related trends, possibly because most studies use the sex of the household head or farmer to represent gender. For the deployment of NUE maize hybrids to be gender-intentional, stakeholders such as breeders, extension agents, seed companies, agro-dealers and governments need to take into account factors that hinder women from taking up the technologies, which include economic factors, knowledge and information, access and social norms and culture.

Text in English