Gender disparities in expenditure of income from tobacco in Urambo District, Tanzania
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Date
2013
Authors
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
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Publisher
IISTE
Abstract
In Tanzania, gender education has been being provided through various mass media. Therefore, it was expected
that family resources would be equitably, if not equally, utilized. However, incidents of men squandering income
from tobacco and denying their wives of benefiting from the income are common in Urambo District where the
most important cash crop is tobacco. The reasons for this problem are not clear. Thus, the research from which this
paper has emanated was conducted in the district during the agricultural season 2009/10 to determine gender-based
factors for equitable and inequitable expenditure of income from tobacco. It was found that men’s proportion of
expenditures (35.2%) and that of women (12.1%) of the household income were significantly different at the 0.1%
level of significance (p = 0.000). Ten percent (10.0%) was spent by children, and 42.7% was spent by whole
households, i.e. family-wide expenditures. This implies great disparity in expenditure of tobacco income as men
spend disproportionately higher than women and children. Patriarchy, women’s humility and fear of being
divorced appeared to be among the main factors for the disproportional expenditures. The results substantiate the
need for more efforts in provision of gender education through mass media and training on financial management
among tobacco farmers.
Description
Developing Country Studies Article. Vol.3, No.4,
Keywords
Gender, Expenditure-income-tobacco, Equity, Equality