HER+ collaboration with Voluntary Sustainability Standards (VSS) enhances their gender-responsiveness and reduces gender inequalities in market systems.
VSS are market-based mechanisms to address social and environmental challenges in value chains, but they have struggled to address gender inequalities in agrifood value chains. HER+ and the ISEAL Alliance (a global membership organization for sustainability systems) have developed open-access resources and strengthened VSS capacities to integrate gender equality considerations into standards and programming. These efforts support ISEAL members, active in 100+ countries worldwide, to advance gender equality.
Sustainability standards support women’s empowerment and leadership
VSS are standards that producers, traders, manufacturers and retailers are asked to meet, relating to a wide range of sustainability metrics. They address social and environmental challenges by defining responsible practices and measuring performance of actors in global agrifood supply chains. To date, however, gender equality impacts have been minimal because few VSS have taken a strategic approach to addressing gender inequality.
ISEAL Alliance, an international non-governmental organization based in the UK, is a global membership organization for VSS and their accreditation bodies. ISEAL supports scalable and effective solutions that make a lasting impact among its 48 members and their private sector partners, producer organizations and NGOs. Many ISEAL members, such as Fairtrade, Rainforest Alliance, and the Forestry Stewardship Council, are active in agrifood systems. Under HER+, the Alliance of Bioversity International and CIAT has been working with ISEAL and its members to identify ways that VSS can better support women’s agency and leadership, as well as progress in other aspects of gender equality. VSS are important scaling partners as they work with private sector actors in over 100 countries and across very diverse value chains. HER+ has developed many resources (a strategic evidence review, a scoping study, a guide for best practices, guidance on gender-responsive monitoring, a toolkit) to support VSS in their efforts to promote gender equality. These resources have been shared through webinars, workshops, and events to promote learning and exchange.
The strategic evidence review demonstrates that, despite some measurable impact, VSS can do more to significantly increase women’s participation, representation and leadership in decision-making. The scoping study with ISEAL members identified three steps to approaching gender equality in VSS: minimum prevention of harm within standards, proactively supporting gender equality within standards, and promoting gender equality and women’s rights beyond the standards. At each of these steps, ISEAL members, including international NGOs and their private sector partners in more than 100 countries, can contribute to gender equality. But much more needs to be done to achieve this, and the study identified a learning agenda for ISEAL members.
One of the biggest demands for support from ISEAL members was on how to improve the generation and use of gender disaggregated data. In response, HER+ developed guidance on Gender-responsive monitoring for agrifood stakeholders, featuring the Gender Equality in Agrifood Systems: Indicator List (GEASIL) to support VSS and private sector stakeholders to track progress and guide decision-making on gender equality in value chains. GEASIL is a consolidated list of nearly 400 illustrative indicators, selected and curated from over 1,500 original indicators, which can be used in combination with other searchable indicator databases.
The joint efforts of the partnership culminated in the toolkit Advancing gender equality through sustainability systems which provides tools and good practices for VSS stakeholders, including the private sector, to advance their thinking and action on gender equality. It includes curated resources and practical case studies, structured around three levels on which VSS can tackle gender equality: organizational level; within standards and certifications; and through programmatic work. The toolkit was launched nationally at the India and Sustainability Standards (ISS) conference in November 2024 and, internationally, at an Evidensia webinar in November 2024 that brought together over 50 VSS representatives and stakeholders from around the globe. Efforts have also been made to identify opportunities to integrate gender in other ISEAL activities, such as ISEAL’s communities of practice on monitoring and standards. Gender considerations were also included in ISEAL’s new Code of Good Practice, effective from March 2024, and into ISEAL’s living wage work through the Global Living Wage Coalition.
Working with HER+ as a gender research partner has made it possible to advance our evidence base and identify good practices for VSS to advance on gender equality. We notably co-developed a “starter” toolkit for sustainability systems to support the integration of gender considerations at organizational, standards, and programmatic levels.
Amandine Bressand, Manager, Business and Human Rights, ISEAL Alliance