Poor rural women are among the most vulnerable people in El Salvador, where the Reconstruction and Rural Modernization Programme was launched in 2003 to aid areas stricken by earthquakes two years earlier. Women’s land tenure was not initially a central theme of the programme. The issue had to be addressed, however, when women – a large segment of the target population – were unable to benefit from an investment fund for rural economic development because they had no access to land.

[From UN-Women] During this 56th session of the Commission on the Status of Women, we have witnessed passionate and dynamic discussion with a very high level of participation from governments and civil society.

I invite you to read this blog post by Amanda Richardson, Landesa. The post also mentions the issue brief, recently published by Landesa, collating some evidence on the relation between secure land rights, women, and improved household food security and nutrition. Women's land rights are the point of intersection between empowerment and nutrition.

Por la presente Resolución se crea el Programa de Inclusión y Desarrollo Rural, cuyo objetivo general consiste en promover el desarrollo productivo con inclusión económica, social, política y cultural de los agricultores familiares, pequeños y medianos productores y comunidades de pueblos originarios del territorio nacional, con equidad de género y generacional.

This paper was commissioned by ActionAid and serves as a think-piece to build our understanding of the gendered implications of the recent wave of large-scale land acquisitions and investments, particularly in Africa. It aims to provide a basis for further development of policy proposals and recommendations that address the issue from a developmental and gender equality perspective.

[From allAfrica] Freetown — Shortly after her father died, Sia Bona's husband's family took over her father's oil-palm plantation and rice paddies, and drove her and her mother from their home. "I came from riches, but now I am poor," said the 45-year-old teacher from Koidu town in eastern Sierra Leone.

[from UNWomen]  When Thabita Mukamusana’s partner died shortly after the birth of their child, she raised their son without hope of connecting him to his paternal family, or his inheritance, in her village in south-west Rwanda. Because the boy had been born outside of marriage, she believed that any claim would be impossible. Yet things recently turned around when she was able to access free legal aid for herself and her son, now 19.

The majority of the world live in rural areas and are dependent on land and land based resources. The increasing pressure on land, particularly that used for food production, by countries and private investors poses a huge risks to millions of these rural communities. One of the major causes is weak and poor governance in land tenure systems, as most Governments have so far failed to provide adequate safeguards to protect poor people from eviction or dispossession leaving them without compensation and remedy. 

The report discusses: How to Support Women’s Land Rights in Mozambique? – by drawing upon the experiences, approaches used, and lessons learnt through Norwegian support to four main organizations: Norwegian People’s Aid, FAO with the Mozambican Centre for Juridical and Judicial Training (CFJJ), CLUSA (Cooperative League of the United States), and the Mozambican feminist civil-society organisation Forum Mulher.

The new baseline report on ActionAid's Women's Land Rights Project highlights the need for indigenous women in Guatemala, Dalit women in India, and rural women affected by HIV and AIDS in Sierra Leone to gain actual realisation of their land rights. The report suggests that through the implementation of land-related laws and policies that are progressive; the review or reform of retrogressive ones; and the enactment of missing gender-sensitive laws and/or policies, the tide could be turned on the enjoyment of women’s land rights.

[...] In our understanding of the green economy, one thing is clear: rural women have already faced eviction or exclusion from land ‘grabbed’ for powerful green agendas that are not their own. This is because the current political/economic paradigm ensures that the interests of corporate actors and powerful vested interests in the global and export economies in the productive capacity of land and water are protected while small farming communities producing for domestic markets are not.