that all represent an improvement in comparison to the existing status quo. We must both
ensure that family farming focused on satisfying the needs of the household and the local
community is possible and adequately supported, and that those seeking to switch to
producing for the markets have the possibility to do so -- and whomever is the producer,
woman or or man, should be able to make that choice. Nor should women be denied the
possibility to be employed as waged workers on larger production units, in conditions that
provide decent work -- free from discrimination and abuse, and with the guarantee of living
wages equal to those of men. The struggle of many collectives of women to be allowed to
practice a form of farming that is agroecological, based on a limited use of external inputs, and
that primarily aims at feeding their families and communities, is entirely respectable, and
indeed it deserves far more support than it has received hitherto from governments and
international agencies. But that choice should not be made by default. It should not be the
result of the lack of any viable alternative: it should be free and voluntary, rather than a flight
away from markets that are shaped by men and for men, and away from a world of farm labour
that has built its recent "successes" on the subordination and exploitation of women.