Market system analysis rarely complete without exploring issues of gender, inclusion, environmental impact and climate.
You may want to understand how a market system affects women, young people or pastoralists, or explore climate adaptation and opportunities to improve resilience. The guidance below presents a high-level overview of some of these considerations, with links to resources that cover them in much further detail.
Environmental considerations and climate change
When applied with an environmental lens, your MSA needs to go beyond traditional economic considerations to incorporate the impacts of market activities on natural resources, biodiversity and climate change. This integrated approach helps identify opportunities to promote environmentally sustainable practices alongside economic development goals.
When undertaking an MSA with an environmental lens in mind, it is important to look at the following:
- Relevance to environmental goals: evaluate how the market intersects with your environmental objectives. Does it contribute to climate change? What are the ecological impacts involved in production, processing or delivery of a service?
- Economic outlook: consider the economic viability and potential for the market. Is there demand for environmentally sustainable products or services? Are there economic incentives for businesses to adopt greener practices?
- Feasibility of interventions: assess how realistic it is to bring about lasting change. Is the right technology available? What policies and regulations can have an influence?
Mapping the market system is critical to understanding the relationships between actors and the environmental impacts. Along with the core aspects of your market mapping, you will also need to consider the following :
- Environmental conditions:
Illustrate the natural factors on which the market system relies, such as soil quality, water availability, rainfall and pollination. Highlight these might be impacted negatively. - Climate and nature impacts:
Include annotations to show areas that impact the environment. Highlight actors along the value chain who are either supporting or blocking environmental progress. What external drivers, such as government policies, consumer preferences or technological advancements, are influencing the environmental impacts of the market system? - Trade-offs:
Acknowledge that there may be trade-offs between economic development and environmental sustainability. Strive for solutions that balance these competing objectives.
Green MSD provides overarching guidance on how to incorporate environmental considerations in market systems programme design, including suggestions for incorporating environmental concerns in your MSA.
Market systems development for a just transition explores how MSD programmes can intentionally support a just transition, including how to incorporate this lens into programme analysis and design.
The importance of social inclusion
It is essential to integrate inclusion considerations throughout the MSA process. Inclusion analysis helps to identify the barriers and opportunities faced by marginalised groups in accessing and participating in market systems. Social inclusion in your programme may involve a focus on increasing access and participation in markets for women, youth, other groups, or some combination of multiple groups, recognising the intersectionality of identities.
Gender
Market systems serve women and men differently. Understanding how and why is crucial for rigorous market systems analysis. In many contexts women face unique barriers, such as lower ownership of assets, and are disproportionately responsible for unpaid household work. They also make decisions based on a different set of motivations and priorities. These factors need to be understood so that your programme can work towards achieving a sustainable vision of an inclusive market system.
Gendered market analysis is about making explicit the different priorities, needs and constraints facing women and men, so that gender differences are addressed in your programme strategy, intervention design and organisational practice. It looks at how women’s access and agency are affected by formal and informal gendered rules that reinforce and perpetuate gender inequality. This includes an in-depth understanding of how these rules interact at all levels, including household, community, workplace, supporting institutions and enabling environments, and how these rules have changed over time.
Incorporating gender throughout your analysis may entail:
- Gender-disaggregated data: collecting gender-disaggregated data to understand the different roles, responsibilities and constraints faced by men and women in the market system.
- Inclusive stakeholder engagement: ensuring that women are represented in stakeholder consultations and that their voices are heard.
Conducting a gender analysis provides an overview of undertaking a gender analysis. It is designed for private business partners but much of the guidance is highly relevant for conducting a MSA.
Youth
When focused on young people, a MSA can help understand the relationships, rules and constraints that shape their abilityto find decent work or start successful businesses. When applying a youth lens to your MSA , some key principles to keep in mind are:
- Being youth-centric: placing young people’s experiences, perspectives and aspirations at the heart of the analysis by conducting interviews and focus groups directly with them. What are their key problems as they see them? Ask about skills gaps, discrimination, lack of networks, access to capital etc.
- Speaking to relevant players: interview businesses and employers to understand their needs and challenges related to hiring and working with young people. What skills are they looking for? What are their perceptions of young workers? Interview training providers, government officials, investors and other stakeholders to get their perspectives on the market.
- Intersectionality: consider the diverse needs of young people, including those who are marginalised due to gender, ethnicity, disability, location or other factors.
A rough guide to the MSD approach for youth employment in sub-Saharan Africa is a comprehensive resource for anyone looking to promote youth employment using an MSD approach. It covers elements of programme analysis and design.
All work and no play outlines the various ways in which the systemic approach to decent work can help child labour projects effectively determine and evaluate the economic root causes for the existence of poverty-induced child labour.