How would environmentally sustainable development look if it was gender-sensitive? This report argues that much mainstream literature on environmentally sustainable development has ignored the gender dimensions. Where women have been the target of programmes, they have been seen as natural managers of environmental resources. A gender analysis is important because gender relations affect the ways in which poor men and women manage natural resources.

What is the condition of women in Peru? This gender profile by the Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA) offers a statistical overview of the condition of urban and rural women with respect to unemployment, status in the workplace, life expectancy and working and living conditions. Poverty is an ongoing concern and half the population continues to subsist below the poverty line. Rural women suffer the most with lower rates of literacy and fewer employment opportunities than urban women and men in general.

Women do 70 per cent of the agricultural work in Senegal, but according to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), own only two percent of the land that may be cultivated. Although property laws in countries such as Senegal, Tunisia and Burkina Faso recognise women' s and men's equal rights, and Islam gives women the right to inherit half what men inherit, in practice men retain land ownership. Women are dependent on fathers or husbands for land.

Mainland Southeast Asia (MSA) has seen sweeping upland land use changes in the past decades, with transition from primarily subsistence shifting cultivation to annual commodity cropping. This transition holds implications for local upland communities and ecosystems. Due to its particular political regime, Myanmar is at the tail of this development.

This is the first issue of the Journal of Law and Rural Development, published by IFAD. IFAD’s mandate to address rural poverty and promote rural development is unique among international organizations. For many years IFAD limited its activities to financing projects and programmes implemented by its Member States, but over the last decade it has begun to transform itself into a knowledge centre and a key participant in the international policy dialogue around rural development issues. The launch of this journal is another step forward in this transformation.

In Sierra Leone, the well-being and livelihoods of many people, particularly the rural poor, are based on secure and equitable access to land, fisheries and forests. Increasing pressure on these resources in recent years has led to an escalation of conflict over access to natural resources.

Growing numbers of policies and programmes aim to integrate small-scale rural producers into agricultural value chains. But significant questions remain over how best to: recognise the possibly divergent visions, interests and constraints of various actors; address often substantial power imbalances; and ultimately promote agency among rural producers and their communities – that is, their ability to choose, act and influence realities around them.

De centrale doelstelling voor Midden-Delfland is het behouden en versterken van het agrarisch cultuurlandschap met behoud van koeien in de weide. De grondgebonden melkveehouderij is de drager van het kwalitatief hoogwaardige landschap in de regio. Om de rol van drager van het gebied goed te kunnen blijven vervullen, is het van belang dat deze sector economisch vitaal blijft. Een aandachtspunt daarbij is verbreding van de landbouw.

This thesis deals with the politicized struggles for land in South Africa’s Limpopo Province. With land having been an essential part of colonial and apartheid segregation policies and practice – with 87% of land appropriated by whites –, a land reform programme was imperative after the African National Congress came to power in 1994. One of the three branches of the land reform programme, land restitution, is a key focus of this thesis.

This thesis argues that incorporating pastoral land rights into the formal

system requires identifying and securing pastoralists’ rights on migration

corridors and dry season pastures in a manner that, first, reflects their

customary practices about ‘where’ and ‘when’ they require access to the

land, and second, aligning both the ‘when’ and the ‘where’ within the

legal framework for property rights and land administration. This

approach may facilitate the legal recognition of pastoralists’ seasonal

Bieden agroparken in Drenthe een haalbaar perspectief dat nadere uitwerking verdient? Conclusie is dat de perspectieven voor de ontwikkeling van agroparken in Drenthe zeer goed zijn. De ontwikkeling van agroparken past in de doelstellingen van de provincie (ontwikkeling van natuur, landschap en recreatie enerzijds, innovatie van de landbouw anderzijds). Cruciaal is het organiseren van een open innovatieproces met aandacht voor communicatie en betrokkenheid van verschillende belanghebbende partijen. De provincie is de aangewezen partij om het initiatief te nemen in dezen.

In 2007 is het onderzoek van het cluster VLG ondergebracht in zeven onderzoeksthema’s: Bodem, Water, Klimaat, Stad & Platteland, Landschap, Europees Plattelandsbeleid en Investeringsbudget Landelijk Gebied (ILG). Wat is het effect van de onderzoeksresultaten voor het beleid? Hoe komen we tot goede kennisvragen? Hoe kan het beste verbinding maken tussen het wetenschappelijk onderzoek, beleid en de praktijk? Deze veelgestelde vragen zetten kennisdoorstroming en kennisbenutting hoog op de agenda.