Land reform in Rwanda catalyzed a major increase in women’s ownership of land. And while gendered land rights are enshrined in law, public acceptance of those rights is uneven. Here’s a look at recent research.
This document is based on three research reports produced by the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) Rwanda Land Project together with partners including the Institute of Legal Practice and Development and Radio Ishingiro.
Over the last decade, Rwanda has reformed governance of its land sector. This fact sheet, based on a survey of nearly 2,000
citizens and interviews with leaders in and outside government, provides a snapshot of how land tenure administration is working.
This document is based on the report Access to the Land Tenure Administration System in Rwanda and Outcomes of the System on Ordinary Citizens, produced by the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) Rwanda Land Project with INES Ruhengeri.
In Rwanda, the strategic use of land is critical to economic and social growth. To support effective land use planning, recent research recommends: 1) strengthening the legal/policy framework and coordination mechanisms, 2) improving the development and implementation of land use plans, and 3) increasing the capacity of institutions, officials and citizens to manage the process.
This document is based on 1) An Assessment of Land Use Planning in Rwanda (August 2015), produced by the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) Rwanda Land Project, and 2) Land Market Values, Urban Land Policies, and their Impacts in Urban Centers of Rwanda, by Land Project and Institut d’Enseignement Supérieur (INES) – Ruhengeri.
To promote economic development and reduce poverty, the Government of Rwanda has used expropriation as a tool to implement land use master plans and build roads, dams, and other infrastructure. Since 2007, some 30,050 proprieties have been expropriated.
This document is based on: 1) Implementation of Rwanda’s Expropriation Law and Outcomes on the Population, a research report released August 2015 by the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) Rwanda Land Project with the Legal Aid Forum, and 2) Implementation of Expropriation Law in Rwanda: Challenges and Ways Forward, a research brief released April 2015 by USAID Rwanda Land Project.
Under the 2004 national land policy, the government introduced a system for generating revenues to sustain land administration and support Rwanda’s development. Revenues have been rising, but as with any new process, challenges are inevitable.
We have a lot of opportunities to strengthen the system and improve results.
This document summarizes Land Tenure Reform and Local Government Revenues in Rwanda, a research brief produced by the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) Rwanda Land Project. The content is based a review of existing studies, the legal framework and key informant interviews.
Climate change is likely to have significant economic and health effects on the people of Rwanda.
By 2030, climate change impacts may cost up to 1% of Rwanda’s GDP annually.
Sustainable wetlands management offers an opportunity for climate action.
This document is based on two briefs, Climate Change Adaptation within Land Use and Tenure Reforms in Rwanda and Balancing Wetland Sustainable Use and Protection through Policy in Rwanda, both produced by the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) Rwanda Land Project.
Download the BriefOn May 9, 2012, the Committee on World Food Security (CFS) adopted a landmark document laying out principles and internationally accepted standards on land governance and tenure security – the Voluntary Guidelines on the Responsible Governance of Tenure of Land, Fisheries and Forests in the Context of National Food Security (VGGT). Members of the Global Donor Working Group on Land (GDWGL) actively supported both technically and financially the inception of the VGGT and their formulation. Since that time, the global land tenure community, including the CFS, has worked to put the VGGT into practice.
With a global portfolio of 714 projects in 134 countries, the GDWGL aims to strengthen land governance worldwide and drive implementation of the VGGT through selected initiatives that foster transparency, responsibility and accountability by all stakeholders at international, regional, national and local levels. We think that exchange of information, lesson learning, coordination among donors and cooperation on joint actions wherever suitable is key to contributing to the implementation of the VGGT, linking VGGT with other high level processes such as the Sustainable Development Goals and the Principles for Responsible Investment in Agriculture and Food Systems (RAI), and improving global land governance.
To achieve this objective, members of the GDWGL have adopted a three-year road map (2014-2017). Download the policy brief to learn more about the contribution of our group to the implementation of the VGGT.
Members of the Group
ADA, AFD, BMEL, BMZ, DFID, EC, GIZ, MoFA-Austria, MoFA Denmark, MoFA-Finland, MoFA France, MoFA-Netherlands, SDC, Sida, FAO, JICA, IFAD, MCC, USAID, DFATD-Canada, UNHABITAT, WB and IFC.
In the prefecture of Forécariah, artisanal mining activities have generated significant enthusiasm among community members, who have depended traditionally on lowland farming and selling their produce locally. With the intensification of mining activities, lowland areas with alluvial diamond deposits have generated a lot of interest and have been diverted from agriculture to mining by customary landowners.
When the PRADD Project began, farmers’ organizations existed in some of the villages where alluvial diamond mining was occurring. These organizations, however, lacked appropriate structures, official recognition, and technical support. PRADD has conducted outreach sessions with some of these organizations, who have expressed the need to collaborate with and obtain support from PRADD in order to become more active and be able to invest in complementary livelihood activities.
Early in this collaboration, PRADD identified all of the existing farmers’ organizations and facilitated the creation of others in the six project sites in Forécariah. PRADD facilitated training sessions to assist these organizations to meet required conditions for their creation and operation consistent with the principles governing the cooperative structures in Guinea.
Additional training activities were designed to support the farmers’ organizations to identify, prioritize, plan, and implement economic activities. To date, nine of the organizations are fully operational and have invested in various activities, including seasonal farming (sweet potatoes, corn, rice, peanuts, watermelons, peppers, cucumbers, etc.) and palm oil retail. The results achieved by two of these organizations are noteworthy.
In Feindoumodouya, the organization named “Sobèfolemayo” (meaning in local dialect “the beginning of something big may look small”) is composed of 25 members (12 women and 13 men) with 7 board members (3 women) and 3 commissioners (2 women). Training and technical assistance were provided to this organization to cultivate approximately 1 hectare of sweet potatoes. Following the harvest, despite some constraints encountered during the planting and the marketing of their produce, the organization generated the equivalent of around $1,000 in cash and 700 liters of palm oil (worth $500).
At the end of the first planting season the organization independently negotiated with a customary landowner to borrow additional farmland and plant ½ hectare of sweet potatoes and a ½ hectare of peanuts. The group reached out to the District authorities to sign a long term lease of a parcel of communal land to develop a plantation of palm trees. As an expression of support to the local community, the organization donated the equivalent of $100 to the community to purchase materials and fix the roofs of the community policy station and the school teachers’ residence. The female President of the organization (Madame M’ma Cissé) noted that “thanks to the support received from the PRADD project, social cohesion between members of the organization on one hand and between the organization and the communities and the District office on the other hand, has been strengthened very much”. She also acknowledged that “after encountering some difficulties during our first season, which impacted our revenue, we’ve learned some lessons that were discussed during our extraordinary general assembly. Discussions in this meeting, with support from PRADD, enabled us to strengthen our operation and plant new crops (on our own) and contribute to community development”.
In Tafory, the organization named “Djigui” (meaning “hope” in the local dialect) is composed of 37 members (22 women) with 7 board members (2 women) and 2 male commissioners. PRADD provided training and technical support to this organization to plant 2 hectares of corn. “Members of the organization acquired technical skills on corn and watermelon production through the support from the project” confirmed the Secretary of the organization, Mr. Lamine Cissé). The group generated the equivalent of $500 in local currency. Some of the produce was consumed by members of the organization, which was not in compliance with the rules set up during the feasibility studies, but lessons were learned from this. “This revenue generated from corn farming was highly appreciated by our organization. This is the reason why, unanimously, we agreed to use the money to establish another farm on our own,” noted the Treasurer of the organization, Mr. Yaya Camara. On its own, the organization used a portion of its revenue to procure seeds and plant 2 hectares of watermelon for the dry season. Currently, the watermelons are growing very well. “Before the arrival of the project, we lacked courage because we did not have any support. But thanks to the training we received from the project to plant the corn, we also received training to a conduct feasibility study and plant watermelon” added the Treasurer. “We have noticed that the results of these economic activities have created a productive emulation among the communities of the three villages that form this organization,” concluded the President of the association, Mr. Alya Bangoura.
Working with these farmer’s organizations required patience and re-adjustments, and building trust throughout the process. Lessons have been learned, and more work need to be done during the seasons to come. The support from PRADD to promote income generating activities has built strong working relationships with miners and their communities. This solid foundation is encouraging miners and their communities to work with PRADD to improve the governance of the artisanal mining sector in Forécariah.
This policy brief aims to inform policy and current practices governing land expropriation in Rwanda drawing on recent research carried out by the LAND Project. The brief elaborates on the legal framework and procedures guiding expropriation and on reported practice based on information gathered from primary and secondary sources. It then proposes measures that would potentially strengthen implementation of expropriation exercises countrywide.
As in many West African countries, women in Côte d’Ivoire face discrimination, especially in regard to ownership of productive assets such as land. This is exacerbated in such places as the diamond mining area of Tortiya, a small town in the nation’s northern section.
Because diamond deposits have been mined out over the past fifteen years around this town, diamond miners are now turning to such alternatives as agriculture. Land once mined by companies—and then later by artisanal miners—is being converted into cashew tree orchards and utilized in other agricultural activities, but women often are excluded from these opportunities. Women generally lack access to fertile agricultural lands, unlike men.
“The land chief in Songholokaha [a neighboring village] gave us this big portion of land as our own to start whatever farming activities we wanted on it. He didn’t think that this land would be very useful since it is full of holes from mining activities, but it is perfect for rice and vegetable farming since we have year-round access to water.”
—Mrs. Silué Tiewa
President of Fotemowoban Women’s Group
The USAID Property Rights and Artisanal Diamond Development (PRADD) II project addresses these challenges through its support of livelihood activities for women’s groups. One notable example of the project’s work is Wobewognon (meaning “we are together”), an association of about 40 women farmers. Last year, Wobewognon started rehabilitating land for agricultural production on exhausted mining sites in the lowlands around Tortiya town. PRADD II helped the women strengthen tenure security by (1) obtaining permission from the customary owner to access the land; (2) completing the customary cultural practices to acquire the land; and (3) encouraging women to use available tools and labor to do the most challenging manual work. The women in Wobewognon succeeded, and PRADD II is now supporting other such women’s groups to copy this initiative in growing vegetables or rice on similar rehabilitated sites.
PRADD II reinforces women’s land rights in Tortiya by clarifying rights and encouraging the use of small lowland plots. This rights clarification process, one women’s group explained, has been successful, because Tortiya land chiefs now recognize their claims. Even more importantly, chiefs in the surrounding communities do as well. Women were granted ownership rights, be-cause village land chiefs perceived mined-out lands to be of low quality. Despite the elders’ thinking that women would never do much with that land, women gained the same owner-ship rights that men have.
Once the women had gained control over the land, two other women’s groups—Fotemowoban (meaning “there will be nothing to stop us from moving forward”) and Diguissèmè (meaning “land is our hope”)—hired young men to fill in abandoned diamond pits, leaving the deepest holes open as wells for dry-season irrigation. PRADD II provided the tools for this effort. PRADD II then contracted ANADER, the national rural development agency, to help these women’s groups increase crop production. ANADER is providing agricultural guidance to the women farming these rehabilitated lands. For the first time, the women are learning new agricultural techniques and practices.
“Tools provided by the PRADD II project allowed us to mobilize more group members to farm this area, and each of us can have as much surface as we are able to farm. There is still more than half of this surface available, but filling diamond holes take some efforts, and we’ve just started. This land is ours, we will farm it bit by bit until we have farmed it all, and we look forward to good techniques that ANADER will bring us to increase the fertility of the soil.”
—The Fotemowoban Women’s Group
The three groups—comprising nearly 120 women—rehabilitated almost 8 hectares of mined-out diamond pits in 2015. They farm all year long, focusing mainly on corn and rice during the rainy season and such vegetables as onions, lettuce, eggplants, and okra in the dry season. Fotemowoban harvested 600 kilograms of rice in November 2015. That harvest has inspired them to rehabilitate more land for vegetable farming and (for next year) more rice farming. Their success has also drawn much acclaim from local authorities.
“ANADER technicians are teaching us a lot, especially in transplanting rice and vegetables, so we can avoid drowning crops with rain which we can’t control”
—A member of the Diguisséme Women’s Group
Despite these achievements, women’s groups still face persistent challenges. Because such cash crops as cashews and cotton are the focus of regional economic development, local development policies don’t support the groups’ rehabilitation of mined-out sites. As women expand food production dramatically, they run the risk of saturating the local Tortiya market. New markets need to be found. Unfortunately, a recently allocated diamond mining concession may lead to interdictions against the groups’ farming in the lowlands.
PRADD II will continue to support these groups’ organizational growth, as new market outlets need to be found for the surplus produced each season in nearby urban centers. PRADD II also will help these women’s groups participate in the decision-making processes that affect the future of their land in Tortiya, more importantly.
Hopefully, the women’s hard-won gains will not be lost.