Working Title: Beyond fetching water for livestock: A gendered sustainable livelihood framework to assess livestock-water productivity in Legedini by Esther van Hoeve, Barbara van Koppen, Eline Boelee

Abstract: Livestock water productivity is defined as the amount of water depleted or diverted to produce livestock and livestock products and services (Sonder et al, in prep). However, different livestock species and their products vary in terms of their values and contributions for men and women in reaching livelihood objectives. Similarly, various livestock production systems generate different costs for men and women, resulting from gendered control and access.

In this paper we propose a Gendered Sustainable Livelihood Framework (GSLF), focusing on poor livestock keepers. The framework gives guidance on how to better include gender perspective in holistic assessments and subsequent use of livestock water productivity information and interventions. We use the five assets of the Sustainable Livelihood Framework (SLF) to allow an asset based assessment, taking into account access and control mechanisms which are important aspects of gender studies. The GSLF is best applied using participatory discussion tools in order to ensure a common understanding of the issues.