This press release from Penn State on Feb. 23, 2015, highlights the grant awarded to support the project "Empowering women through horticulture in Honduras," led by Janelle Larson at Penn State. Excerpts:

"Impoverished families in western Honduras stand to benefit from a new project aimed at improving access to that country's markets for high-value horticultural crops.

Researchers in Penn State's College of Agricultural Sciences have received a nearly $1.4 million grant to perform a gender-based analysis of the Honduran horticultural value chain, with an eye toward reducing barriers to participation for women and other marginalized groups, while enhancing family income and nutrition. 

The funding was awarded by the Feed the Future Innovation Lab for Collaborative Research on Horticulture, which is based at the University of California, Davis. The program is supported by the U.S. Agency for International Development as part of Feed the Future, the U.S. government's global hunger and food security initiative.

'Honduras is one of the poorest countries in Latin America, and the western highlands area is among the poorest regions of the country,' said principal investigator Janelle Larson, associate professor of agricultural economics.

'It's a remote area with limited roads and infrastructure,' she said. 'Many people there are subsistence farmers who work on very small parcels of land. There are high levels of malnutrition and low levels of education and literacy.'

Larson noted that the market for horticultural crops is seen as one avenue for reducing poverty in developing countries because these products have greater potential for added value, require more labor and often bring higher prices. ..."

Read the rest of the press release: Project looks to horticulture value chain to improve outlook for Honduran women, Feb. 23, 2015 in Penn State News.