Testimonials

'The City & Guilds Centre for Skills Development’s report, Training for Rural Development, provides some excellent examples of good work by projects in rural Ghana . CSD has explained the critical importance of understanding women’s needs, and how agriculture and enterprise training must be combined with access to technology. We believe the report provides project leaders throughout Ghana – and, indeed, in other countries – with practical and clear solutions to some of the big challenges that women smallholders are struggling with. It is an excellent contribution to the effort to help women smallholders, and we are very pleased to have been involved in it.'

Justice Amoah, Director, Directorate of Agriculture, Central Region

'The Africa 2000 Network is hard at work in countries across Africa to help improve people’s lives, and women smallholders are a major target group for us. We have been happy to play a part in CSD’s vital research into how projects can help women smallholders to improve their lives, and those of their families and communities. The report, which contains excellent, practical suggestions for projects on how to approach the serious challenges faced by women in rural Africa, will, we are sure, play a significant role in helping projects to share knowledge and meet those challenges.'

Adisa Yakubu, Executive Director, Africa 2000 Network 

“In India, like many developing nations, agriculture is one of the keys to reducing poverty. The challenge of providing effective training for rural development is critical. A large proportion of India's agricultural producers are women and yet their training needs are often overlooked. This report brings out lessons demonstrating that training can make a difference to the livelihoods of rural women and its findings have real implications for the priorities and policies of international and national donors and policy makers as far as skills development in the unorganised sector is concerned.’

Dr. Nalin Jena, Operations Officer (Education), World Bank

‘Training is at the heart of everything we do, and in today’s increasingly tough agricultural conditions it is critically important for women to be able to diversify what they produce, and also to diversify their livelihoods.  Many of the women working with Kudumbashree have now started small enterprises, and can also now sell their produce for a fair price at market, ensuring a better income for them and their families.  We therefore welcome the City & Guilds Centre for Skills Development’s report, which will enable other projects to learn from our experiences, highlighting the benefits of training for women smallholders and also improving the effectiveness of projects in ensuring women can access and use the training they receive.’

Sarada Muraleedharan, Executive Director, Kudumbashree