These in-depth case studies from Latin America, Asia, Africa, Europe and North America provides a state-of-the-art overview of the gender dimensions of people-plant relations. The contributors reveal, among other things, the crucial role of women in plant biodiversity management.

These in-depth case studies from Latin America, Asia, Africa, Europe and North America provides a state-of-the-art overview of the gender dimensions of people-plant relations. The contributors reveal the crucial role of women in plant biodiversity management and conservation, the influence of gender relations on the ways in which local people understand, manage and conserve biodiversity, and the importance of continued access to biological resources for rural women's status and welfare. They highlight the gender biases evident in much contemporary scientific research, policy and development practice. And they seek to contribute to a number of important debates around gender-environment relations.

Foreword
1. Women and the Plant World: An Exploration - Patricia L. Howard
PART 1: CULTURE, KITCHEN AND CONSERVATION
2. Women in the Garden and Kitchen: The Role of Cuisine in the Conservation of Traditional House Lot Crops among Yucatec Mayan Immigrants - Laurie S. Z. Greenberg
3. Wild Food Plants and Arberesh Women in Lucania, Southern Italy - Andrea Pieroni
4. Women and 'Wild' Foods: Nutrition and Household Security among Rail and Sherpa Forager Famers in Eastern Nepal - Ephrosine Daniggelis
PART 2: GENDER RELATIONS, WOMEN'S RIGHTS, AND PLANT MANAGEMENT
5. Farm Women's Rights and Roles in Wild Plant Food Gathering and Management in Northeast Thailand -
Lisa Leimar Price
6. Gender and Entitlements in the Zimbabwean Woodlands: A Case Study of Resettlement - Allison Goebel
PART 3: GENDERED PLANT KNOWLEDGE IN SCIENCE AND SOCIETY
7. 'Passing on the News': Women's Work, Traditional Knowledge and Plant Resource Management in Indigenous Societies of Northwestern North America - Nancy Turner
8. The Invisible Queen in the Plant Kingdom: Gender Perspectives in Medical Ethnobotany - Brij Kothari
9. The Gender of Crops in the Papua New Guinea Highlands - Paul Sillitoe
PART 4: PLANTS, WOMEN'S STATUS AND WELFARE
10. Gendering the Tradition of Plant Gatherng in Central Anatolia (Turkey) - Fusun Ertu
11. The Basket-Makers of the Central California Interior - Linda Dick Bissonnette
12. Exchange, Patriarchy and Status: Women's Homegardens in Bangladesh - Margot Wilson
PART 5: GENDER, BIODIVERSITY LOSS AND CONSERVATION
13. Losing Ground: Gender Relations, Commerical Horticulture and Threats to Local Plant Diversity in Rural Mali - Stephen Wooten
14. Modernization and Gender Dynamics in the Loss of Agrobiodiversity in Swaziland's Food System - Millicent Malaza
15. Arawakan Women and the Erosian of Traditional Food Production in Amazonas Venezuela - Shirley Hoffmann
16. Women and Maize Breeding: The Development of New Seed Systems in a Marginal Area of Southwest China - Yiching Song and Janice Jiggins