A Woman Works Alone

Trends in a landscapes agricultural transformation can be viewed in single moment when themes collide in a photo. This image captures such an instance: In the foreground a woman leaves a wake behind her as she performs the tedious work of hand weeding her carefully shaped cropping area, while directly behind her an abandoned terraced agricultural system looms to remind us that as male labor has disappeared from Nepal to take part in the more profitable remittance economy abroad, women are left to manage the farm and home, often by themselves. In the absence of the traditional availability of labor, the Nepali woman bears more hardship as much of her family's food comes from the land she tends. My research seeks to identify farming technologies that provide her, and male farmers alike, the highest yield per area possible. Using multivariate statistics on data from thousands of farmers allows me to investigate how technologies such as zero-till, early planting and advanced genotypes perform across different production zones. By understanding a technology's potential success in certain environments, I can offer policy makers credible recommendations for implementing an informed agronomic solution for farmers, thereby improving food security for the rural-poor in Nepal.Ope