Women and livestock, fodder, and uncultivated land in Pakistan: A summary of role responsibilities

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Abstract
This article presents a model of the relationships in rural Pakistan between women and livestock, fodder, and uncultivated land, and their importance to farming households in rainfed and irrigated fanning areas. In rainfed areas, fodder gathered by women from public, uncultivated land is a key natural resource, making possible the manure production that is essential to agriculture. This resource is reduced in irrigated areas, where agriculture has encroached upon uncultivated land. Women in landed households in irrigated areas can harvest fodder from their own fields, but women in land‐poor households must contend with fodder and fuel shortages that compel them to burn dung. This key natural resource, the fodder gathered by women from wastelands, has not received the attention it deserves. As a result, it and the land whose fertility it helps replenish are vulnerable to development efforts that overlook its existence.

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