Economía Rural e Inequidad de Género en el cantón Chillanes, Provincia de Bolívar

Abstract

: This research seeks to know how gender inequalities are manifested in the field of rural economy that develops in the Chillanes town, province of Bolívar, Ecuador. Considering gender as a key factor to understand how production, consumption of goods and resources, access to knowledge, division of labor, land tenure and means of production obey structures of exclusion towards women. The Chillanes canton has high rates that denote structural problems, such as poverty, which affects a large sector of the population, which has experienced historical exclusion, sustained by the exploitation of peasant labor, the precariousness of agricultural production, the of basic access to knowledge, education and technologies, and a culture that countryside Rural women the of these but also a triple exclusion: class, gender and ethnicity. Although women to the family economy with their work (41% of adult women say that they take care of livestock species), many do not receive any direct economic remuneration and depend economically on their partners, which limits their development and In order to fulfill their rights, they also work an average of 18 hours a day and are the ones who dedicate the most hours to domestic and care activities, the land and means of production are mostly in the hands of men. The gender inequalities that manifest in the economic sector often go unnoticed, because they are assimilated as part of a culture that, historically, has empowered the father to be the one who controls the economic resources. To fulfill the proposed objectives, a field study was carried out, with a mixed, descriptive approach, using three instruments for collecting information: surveys, focus groups and in depth interviews.