Always put on your gender lenses

Before engaging in this course facilitated by Mr. Yogesh Ghore and Mr Gord Cunningham .I thought that whenever we talk about economy, it should be related to the macroscopic aspect of the government problems and responsibilities .However, the first day we came to understand that economy starts from the local community where assets and resources are awaiting to be exploited to uplift the life standard in general. Also, given the knowledge that there are some concepts and economic systems which should be understood to better choose the preferable one that suits our community. Here are what we have learnt during our daily classes in Two weeks:

     

• The Traditional Economic System: Related to using traditional aspects of community to generate revenues, for instance in Tunisia: we have a religious and socio-cultural festival where local farmers and traders display their products so people can consume and have fun .Here, tradition is no longer seen as a restriction for looking for a newly modern life style but rather a way of making profits while  preserving    our own culture and habits. However ,it is based on farming substance and cannot generate so much economic growth.

•    Communist or “Central Command” System: where a central apparatus defines who owns what and manage the flows of investment and profits by defining the quotas system for example to restrict the monopolies at large.

• Capitalist or “Market” System:                       

It does not require the interference of the government but rather it is defined by the sets of the force of supply and demands.

•        Pure Capitalist or Market System: Here we start to talk about losses and profits. Therefore, the more people buy your products, the more you will get more profits so this profitability will determine what to produce more to satisfy people demands for it.

• ·         State Capitalism: Usually described as an economic system in which the state is responsible for managing the commercial economic activity, with management and organization of the means of production in a capitalist manner, including the system of capital accumulation, wage labor, and centralized management. Even though, the socialist state can implement such system because what counts here is more the benefits regardless of the political doctrine. Herby, so many criticism targeted the socialists for upholding such system, for instance the Soviet Union was labeled as state capital more than social.
• Alternative Capitalism :It is related to social entrepreneurship, creating values like sustainability, environmentally friendly and all the revolutionary that advocates for social ,ecological and financial benefits .Currently,entrepreneurs opt  for it,  for its impact in preserving the ecosystem while getting profits.

•     A Post-Capitalist Economic System: It includes a number of proposals for a new economic system to replace capitalism which was judged to be non-beneficial and quite obsolete.

At this level, It was beneficial to learn that inside our economy there is a flowing input from money which needs to stay there if we really want to see the surrounding actors and assets develop. by investing in their money and just making it circulate like in the exercise that we done (buyers and sellers inside and outside the community .This is how we create the value addition to what we are doing .

Putting this in my context ,I would consider that kasserine (my community) has so much natural resources ,strong culture ,and social mechanisms considered the backbone of any change .Such wealth multipliers are ignored because people there do not realize that  human capital counts .Nonetheless ,this resulted in losing the political and the economic power even that my community was a focal factor during the revolution .youth died because they wanted social justice, it was a unmeasured price but for a moment you expect as a citizen that the promises’ of the government will come alive as a compensation .All of these facts turned to be premises of blurry understanding for how we can invest in our “multiple forms of wealth”. The reasons are diverse from lack of social driven community to lack of initiative, to accumulate more into a neglecting of working on the assets and considering that sustainability starts locally

STUDY CASE:RK MACDONALD:

 

The R.K. MacDonald is a registered Eden Alternative Long-Term Care ,which means they have a holistic approach of how they should treat their residents in terms of affection and respect as our interviewee (manager) told us during  a site visit .Though ,from the first glimpse you smell the old pleasant and ancient architecture and often reflected on those lovely seniors .I was surprised to learn that this nursing home is not only a center where seniors and retired people live and enjoy the fresh air in their garden .Actually ,they are applying an innovative sustainable development alternative system.

This home is considerably: “one of three Eden Alternative designated Homes in Nova Scotia and One of nine in Canada. At present, one hundred and thirty seven Elders live in the community.Often inspired from Bill Thomas who is an American expert.The Rk Macdonald has been successful in integrating their work into this Eden Alternative Long-term Care system. Otherwise, the center is based on core values as it follows:

• Passion
• Respect
• Accountability
• commitment
• Excellence

They are including also the seniors in gardening activities which fits their skills in order to entertain them and make them feel at ease when being doers ,not passive, and Outdated .Also, this garden provides them with 2% of the whole needs along with 8 % coming from Local farmers .The manager told us that the rest comes from big corporations like CYSCO and Armstrong companies .The reasons are often related to lack of marketing and inability to provide the whole supply from small farmers to such nursing house .Also ,these companies often make operation of cleaning the products from dietary ,cheese ,pork ,meat ,chicken … easy because they have advanced machines and technologies .Added to that ,the prices are usually reasonable with big stocks and come at doors through delivery service which are merely absent in local farms. However, the Rk Macdonald tries to invest in the local community by supplying milk, some fruits, fish, and some meat and chicken when the farmers call and promote their products because the manager is not familiar with the district.

In the classroom, we raised some questions about the definition of what is local. Can we consider a Canadian company “Armstrong “local? Is local can be defined on the very small area we are living in or in terms of common shared cultural, religious and ,socio-economic aspects ?

                                                       

It is very important to put women in the process whenever we try to analyze the mapping of the value chain for example within a given market because women are not the only actors in this context. Men are considered as well to engage women especially that some of them can be very market-oriented in the informal sector: craftsmanship, beauty products (Aloe Vera plant in Ethiopia case was used to produce soap).

However, women cannot stay stuck in this informal stage ,they need to show more their skills to help promote the Active Based Community development and shared key values of business management .This existential question of whether we should analyze gender from a perspective of women is incomplete _in my opinion as women and men are the ones to decide on how to share
 roles because both of them create of what we call a community .

Simply put, any exclusion of any of these two parties will create a gender based violence from domestic to an unbalanced dynamic of powers .”Women should push themselves “like Mm.Eileen says ,they need to move from audience level to doers level .Business is not mainly about making profits on the interest of social impact or vice versa .we need to make sure the compromise
 is achieved in everything we do. Mainly, those two dichotomies go hands in hands to empower both women and men. Local needs to be open to the global and all aspects of the process from socio-cultural, to gender ,to political .Otherwise, it results in a blurry understanding if we exclude one component.

Women need to be empowered economically as well because if she does not have a stable income .She might accept any kind of abuse .Simply ,she has nowhere to go .However ,she is not In need to go only for the upper decision- making posts to be an empowered agent of change .In fact ,we have seen that savings group or cooperatives are doing amazing job by sustaining each other ,borrowing from each other ,and even providing loans in case of health problems .Such models are the heart of a positively active community which bumps life inside its veins .We may live all our lives around multiple forms of wealth from human to natural and so on … Despite that ,we do not realize that such assets can give us a respectful standard of life for both sexes .Economy starts local and Local can go global while preserving our culture and our identity and even gaining a
 political influence to put things on the right truck.

 

Always put on your gender lenses...

References :
This report was realized thanks to these Resources:

 : http://www.rkmacdonald.ca/ 

Coady International institute