The Invisible Hands That Feed a Nation: Why India’s Future Depends on Its Women Farmers 

Indian agriculture is fundamentally sustained by women, who constitute the majority of the workforce and are the primary caregivers in the crucial livestock sector, yet their labor remains largely invisible. Official policies consistently overlook them due to a entrenched focus on controlling consumer inflation rather than ensuring farmer profitability. This blind spot persists because women’s work is often unpaid and unvalued, artificially suppressing the true cost of food. However, a quiet revolution is growing as women across India are organizing into collectives to assert their identity and demand recognition.

Recognizing their role is not merely a social justice issue but an economic imperative. Valuing women’s contributions would lead to a more sustainable agricultural paradigm, shifting focus toward diverse, nutritious crops and better resource management. Ultimately, empowering these women farmers is essential for building a truly resilient and productive food system that can nourish the nation.

The Invisible Hands That Feed a Nation: Why India’s Future Depends on Its Women Farmers 

Picture an Indian farmer. What do you see? For most, it’s the image of a man, weathered by the sun, standing in a field of gold. This iconic image is a myth—one that obscures the true face of Indian agriculture. 

The reality is that the backbone of India’s food system is not made of stone and steel, but of the resilience and tireless labour of its women. From the terraced hills of the northeast to the vast plains of the Punjab, it is women who are sowing, weeding, harvesting, and tending to livestock. They constitute over 73% of all women workers in the country and nearly 40% of the entire agricultural workforce. Yet, their work remains largely invisible, their knowledge overlooked, and their leadership unrecognized by policy. 

This isn’t just a social injustice; it’s a monumental strategic blind spot. To ignore women farmers is to ignore the very engine of Indian agriculture. 

The Unseen Majority: Labour, Livestock, and Leadership 

The narrative that farming is a man’s domain crumbles under the slightest scrutiny. As activist Kavitha Kuruganti points out, aside from a few culturally assigned tasks, the bulk of farm work—transplanting, weeding, harvesting, and sowing—is performed by women. Their contribution is not peripheral; it is fundamental. Indian agriculture, as it exists today, would simply not function without them. 

The oversight extends beyond crop cultivation. As expert Ireena Vittal highlights, approximately 38% of India’s agricultural economy is livestock—a sector almost entirely managed by women. From dairy and poultry to fish farming, women are the primary caregivers and decision-makers for the animals. The success of movements like Amul is a testament to this, built on the foundation of women-led dairy cooperatives. This leadership often has a ripple effect, improving not just herd hygiene but family and community health as well. 

Why Policy Perpetuates the Blind Spot 

Despite their central role, women are an afterthought in agricultural policy. This stems from three deep-seated government mindsets, as outlined by Vittal: 

• Inflation Over Income: Policy is heavily biased towards keeping consumer food prices low, often at the direct expense of the farmer’s profit margin. Since women’s labour is frequently unpaid and unvalued, its cost is never factored in, artificially suppressing the true price of food. 

• Security Over Business: Agriculture is still viewed through the archaic lens of food security, a relic of past famines. We fail to see it for what it is: the country’s largest private enterprise, a high-risk business that demands investment and innovation, not just subsistence-level support. 

• Subsidy Over Investment: While subsidies are crucial for managing risk in a sector vulnerable to monsoons and pests, they have eclipsed essential investment in research, supply chains, and capital. This lack of forward-thinking investment disproportionately hurts smallholders, a category that includes most women farmers. 

Kuruganti adds that this myopic view ignores the larger solutions women-led farming can offer, from addressing the nation’s malnutrition crisis through diverse cropping to leading the charge in climate-resilient and natural farming practices. 

A Quiet Revolution: Women Organizing for Power 

Change, however, is brewing from the ground up. Across the country, women are organizing, finding their collective voice, and pushing back against their invisibility. 

Vittal recounts the powerful story of women poultry farmers associated with PRADAN who, years ago, would save up to charter buses for an annual trip to the state capital. Their march was a calculated display of strength—a signal to local administrators that they were a force to be reckoned with. This difficult work of building economic capability and political capital is slowly shifting power dynamics. 

From the state-wide transformation underway through women’s collectives in Andhra Pradesh’s Community Managed Natural Farming program to the long-standing advocacy of groups like the Deccan Development Society, there are “glimpses of great hope.” Women are not waiting for permission; they are asserting their identity as farmers and reshaping the landscape. 

A Future Reimagined: What If We Valued Women’s Work? 

Recognizing and valuing the contribution of women farmers wouldn’t just be a moral victory; it would structurally transform Indian agriculture for the better. 

• True Cost Accounting: If the labour of women was accounted for, the real price of food would be reflected. While this might lead to a short-term price adjustment, it would create a more honest and sustainable market. 

• Economic Empowerment & Agency: When women’s work is valued and remunerated, it translates into agency. Women with economic power invest in their families’ health, education, and well-being, breaking cycles of poverty and starting a process of intergenerational wealth building. 

• A Paradigm Shift in Farming: As Kurugantic notes, if policies were designed for women, the farming paradigm itself would change. There would be a natural shift back to diverse food crops and polycropping (growing multiple crops together) instead of water-intensive monocultures, as women prioritize household nutrition and easier management. Studies even suggest that women-led collective farming can be more profitable than traditional family farming, bringing a more collaborative and sustainable ethos to the field. 

The conclusion is inescapable. The annadata, the food provider, is not a solitary man with a sickle. She is the woman bending over the rice paddy, milking the predawn herd, and organizing her community for a better future. Recognizing her is the first step toward building a food system that is not only productive but also equitable, resilient, and truly nourishing for all of India.