Without decisive and sustainable land policy reform, there is little hope for women in the developing world. Within countries where anti-discrimination laws and high economic development minimize the role of gender in relation to land rights, our instinct is to associate global gender inequality with poverty. Which, in fairness, is a relatively accurate conclusion. Poverty, however, cannot be understood without acknowledging the factors that cause it. For rural communities spanning each continent, abject poverty and misogyny are bolstered principally by the failure of governments to ensure equal access to property ownership.
In scarcely populated areas with limited markets, land is a critical resource that shapes inhabitants’ social status and determines their economic opportunity. On an even simpler level, it is the most essential requisite for agriculture. Despite that women contribute their labor to more than 43 percent of all agriculture production in the world, they are increasingly vulnerable to losing legal rights to the very lands they cultivate. The Landesa Rural Development Institute, an acclaimed non-profit, released a report in 2015 estimating that women on average comprise between less than 5 percent to less than 20 percent of agricultural landholders in the major developing regions. This suggests that while women are a well-known source of labor, they are systematically disenfranchised from owning the capital they need to live in financial independence.
And as further data demonstrates, this inequality is consistent with gender oppression and dearth living conditions. Research in Nepal determined that in homes where mothers own land, children are 33 percent less likely to be severely underweight. A study in Kerala, India found that 49 percent of women without property experienced long-term physical violence, while only 7 percent of land owning women could report the same experience. Whether the issue is the spread of HIV, environmental sustainability or child nutrition, women’s land ownership positively corresponds with improvements in society.
So why not simply change the laws? Like in all matters, ensuring land rights is a complicated task. Formal laws exist in 115 (of over 190) countries that regard women’s property rights as equal to men’s. The most notable problem is the lack of implementation, particularly in communities that informally undermine existing laws. Niger is a shining example of a nation that has historically protected women’s legal rights, but has failed to ensure equal access because of issues relating to patrilineal inheritance and limited financial means of purchasing land. The People Republic of China offers another example of how cultural biases hinder gender equality in a system where state planned land allocation is centered on ensuring land tenure.
For many well-informed and compassionate people, the state of rural women’s land rights is an unknown horror. All the same, awareness and advocacy can promote further investment in countries where women are especially vulnerable. The past century alone has engendered great progress in developing a fairer global reality, but in order to achieve true gender equality on an international level, public policy must take more steps towards ensuring protection to land rights in all regions of the world.
