This book analyzes the sustainability of community seed production under a rice-wheat farming system from microeconomic perspectives, considering how seed producers benefit from community seed production and how those benefits continue into the future. Seed producers' performance in resource management, governance and marketing strategies indicates current benefits, whereas soil conservation and risk-management practices provide the basis for future benefits. Community seed production is a local-level seed management system owned by farmers. This system provides the institutional mechanism to supply diversified seed demands of open-pollinated varieties of food crops in a cost-effective way in rural regions. Being able to address the concerns of food insecurity, poverty, climate stress and biodiversity loss in programs and policies of development agencies, community seed production is gaining popularity among the farmers and the policy makers in developing countries. This book discusses the issues of organizational governance of the community seed producers' groups and links them with household-level benefits to understand the organizational dynamism and the probable development paths of such organizations in the future. It also highlights the necessity to institutionalize lessons learned in community seed production in the stakeholders' programs and policies. These understandings provide a basis for formulating policies for strengthening the system in developing countries. Students, researchers, policy makers and donor agencies working with CSP in the developing world will find this book useful in broadening their understanding of CSP in general and its sustainability in particular.

This book introduces readers to the concept and theories of decent work and provides a framework for measuring it at the micro, meso and macro level in a given country. Further, it addresses the importance of measuring decent work in today's world and in connection with the different challenges countries face depending on their respective stage of development. The essence of the book lies in highlighting the practical applications of decent work in terms of its ability to deliver empirical measurements of qualitative and subjective phenomena with a mixed-methods approach combining tools and techniques from economics and statistics. Moreover, as the applicability of decent work is not confined to the IT industry and formal sectors of the economy, the book also provides useful guidelines on how further empirical studies can be undertaken to measure decent work in non-IT industries. As such, the book offers a rich compilation of empirical and theoretical contributions on decent work designed to not only enrich readers' understanding, but also promote awareness of the practical relevance and technical aspects of the subject matter.

This book introduces readers to the concept and theories of decent work and provides a framework for measuring it at the micro, meso and macro level in a given country. Further, it addresses the importance of measuring decent work in today's world and in connection with the different challenges countries face depending on their respective stage of development. The essence of the book lies in highlighting the practical applications of decent work in terms of its ability to deliver empirical measurements of qualitative and subjective phenomena with a mixed-methods approach combining tools and techniques from economics and statistics. Moreover, as the applicability of decent work is not confined to the IT industry and formal sectors of the economy, the book also provides useful guidelines on how further empirical studies can be undertaken to measure decent work in non-IT industries. As such, the book offers a rich compilation of empirical and theoretical contributions on decent work designed to not only enrich readers' understanding, but also promote awareness of the practical relevance and technical aspects of the subject matter.

This book offers a wide, in-depth study of the gender-climate change-agriculture nexus. The crux of understanding these connections comprises gender equality and tools to measure gender discrimination, the evolution of the concept of gender inclusiveness and its concerns; and the need to address the same by formulating gender-inclusive policymaking. Despite the fact that more than 50 years have elapsed since gender concerns were included in explorations of this nexus, there is still ambiguity around the foundations, connections, and approaches for planning gender-inclusive climate policies. This book aims to clear that ambiguity by: * Being the first to explore exclusively this issue in detail. * Revealing how and why consideration of gender is so important for understanding how climate change impacts rural communities and agricultural systems globally. * Exploring every dimension of climate change (including belief systems and perceptions, knowledge, experience, coping strategies, adaptation, and mitigation strategies) and linking it to gender. It includes new theoretical and methodological approaches that go far beyond the household as the unit of analysis (using various approaches, including intersectional analysis). The book not only throws light on major themes of research, but also covers different methodologies ranging from review methods to mathematical models, conceptual frameworks and empirical analysis. It will be of wide interest to students, scholars, and researchers in gender studies, agriculture, climate change and rural development research, and also to practitioners, extension workers, and planners designing new climate-resilient practices.