Rwanda has undertaken a land registration and titling program since 2008 with a registration of 10.3 million land parcels in 2013. The aim of this paper is to investigate the early effects of the program on tenure security and agricultural investments since few studies have been carried out in this research area. The study was undertaken in Musanze district in Northern Rwanda, with specific focus on Gataraga sector and it draws on a mix of qualitative and quantitative research methods. The findings indicate that the program led to reduced land conflicts and improved tenure security.

Effective reform pathways for addressing women’s access to land and tenure security in Africa are yet to be found despite their role in feeding the population. With the adoption of the AU Declaration on Land Issues and Challenges in Africa (2009) and the launch of the African Land Policy Centre (2017), hopes were high that existing precarious women’s access to land, tenure and food security might be transformed to opportunities. Prevailing discourses, however, still advocate for land reforms attuned to gender equality with a neo-classical chord.

In Zambia, security of tenure for communities residing under customary land tenure settings has in recent years increasingly come under threat owing to the pressures of high rate of urbanization, speculation, subdivision and conversion to state land, which effectively excludes marginal populations from accessing resources for their land. While customary land is a major resource for most Zambians, the inadequacy or total lack of documentation leads to tenure insecurity, making people susceptible to forced displacements, and frequent land disputes.

Rural women’s livelihoods in Africa are dependent on their rights and entitlement to land as well as security of tenure. Equally important is how land laws and land governance systems shape and reshape women’s access to land and tenure security. As such, this paper focuses on women’s access to land and tenure security after the adoption of a new Constitution in 2013 and Statutory Instrument 53 of 2014 in Zimbabwe. Whereas both legal instruments are progressive and guarantee women’s rights to property, their realization is shrouded in complexities and contradictions.