A gender analysis of vulnerability to climate-related food shortages in developing countries the case of cameroon

Climate change stimulates food shortages, especially in developing countries and sub Saharan Africa in particular, where agriculture is largely subsistence. That gender affects access to resources is a truism. However, how gender influences food shortages in climate-dependent, rain-fed agricultural systems is still largely unknown. We explore gender-related vulnerability to food shortages amongst 320 subsistence agricultural households in Cameroon, using both quantitative and qualitative methods. Results reveal a consistent pattern at the economic vulnerability sphere, as male headed households were less economically vulnerable to food shortages than female ones (p<0.000). However, significant, inconsistencies between gender groups were observed when social vulnerability was assessed: 58.6% versus 52.8% in favor of men regarding short term vulnerability to food shortages respectively (p = 0.036); and 60.2% versus 52.5% for women regarding long term vulnerability respectively (p = 0.094)) The truncated pattern for vulnerability to food shortage by gender in climate-dependent, rain-fed agricultural systems in our developing country case study allows us to conclude with the need to include physiological and political components into the vulnerability equation, as prerequisite for establishing clear patterns for gender effects on food shortages in developing countries, and for proposing gender-sensitive policy prescriptions of relevance to climate-related food shortages.