[adapted from ActionAid] October, 2012- The report states that the importance of land to rural women goes beyond growing food. Having secure access to, and independent control over, land can mean the difference between, on the one hand, enjoying rights such as education and freedom from violence or, on the other, continual subjugation in society. ActionAid view security of land tenure for impoverished rural communities as a fundamental component of dignified, sustainable development and a crucial step towards reducing poverty and reducing inequality.

Through case studies from Asia, Africa, eastern Europe and Latin America, this book by Manchester Metropolitan University’s Susie Jacobs presents an overview of global gender and agrarian reform experiences.  Recognising the widespread marginalisation of gender issues from policy and theoretical discussions of agrarian reform,  Jacobs attempts to highlight the profound implications that redistribution of land has for women and for gender relations.  The book compares land and agrarian reforms in which land has been redistributed collectively and to individual households.

[September 2008]

Within this report, the FAO outlines its efforts to reinforce local institutions and promote policies and legislation that aim for fairer access for both women and men to natural resources (particularly land, water, fishing and forestry) and to the relevant economic and social resources.

It goes on to approach the reasons why land tenure should be taken into account in project design, highlighting ecological issues, questions of gender, conflict and migrations, and the relationships between them.

[via UN-HABITAT] How can we judge if a land tool is responsive to both women and men’s needs?

Despite progress on women’s rights, rights to land and security of tenure are not enjoyed equally by women and men in many parts of the world. This goes against international human rights, and also impacts negatively on households and the economy.

[via UN-HABITAT] GLTN considers gender as a critical cross-cutting theme in the work on promoting pro-poor, large-scale land tools (for more information on GLTN see www.gltn.net). This short report summarises an analysis undertaken by the GLTN Secretariat to assess how women’s rights, and specific needs, are being addressed by selected projects in the GLTN land tool inventory—a database consisting of numerous international development projects in the land sector is available on the website.

[via UNDP, 2008] These 4 Policy Briefs from UNDP show how increasing knowledge about gender relations and empowerment has highlighted the importance of access to and control over land within intra-household gender relations, and what this implies for broader concerns about empowerment of the poor.  Moreover, significant knowledge gaps are also found in discussions on the link between land policies and cultural, territorial and gender empowerment issues.

[via UN-HABITAT] Women’s equal rights to adequate housing, land and property are well elaborated under international human rights law but are often elusive in practice. This document is a reference guide to international human rights standards identifying both the substance of women’s rights as well as the commitments made by States with regard to improving women’s rights to adequate housing, land and property.

[via FAO] This report is based on the proceedings of the Technical Consultation on Gender, Property Rights and Livelihoods in the Era of AIDS, organized by FAO in November 2008. It takes stock of where FAO and its partners are in terms of addressing property rights insecurity and provides a proposed framework through which future action can take place.

This background briefing reports on a study of land access for returnees in Rwanda, and the impacts of land access policies in the post-conflict period. It also seeks to understand better the roles international humanitarian agencies and NGOs have played, and how their performance can be improved. It is not suggested that Rwanda is typical, but rather that the centrality of land issues there has thrown up a revealing set of broader questions.

The briefing ends with the following lessons;

This report is part of a broader comparative effort by the Overseas Development Institute’s Humanitarian Policy Group on Land Tenure in Conflict and Post-Conflict Situations, which aims to inform and improve the policy and practice of humanitarian action and to inform related areas of international policy. It seeks to understand how land issues affect and are affected by violence and conflict resolution, what responses are appropriate and what lessons can be learned from specific contexts of land tenure interventions, both during and after conflict.

The report of the discussion that took place online in September 2012 is now online!!! (Special thanks to Andrea...) Check it in the attachement below. Do not hesitate to contact us for more information, we would be glad to recveive more feed back from you. Jai jagat!

Report attached, published in 2008