On January 24, 2020, a quiet revolution happened in South Africa. In a landmark ruling in the Durban High Court, 72-year old Agnes Sithole scored a legal victory that not only provided her a share of her husband’s estate but may also help to protect an estimated 400,000 black elderly women in South Africa. Facing impoverishment when her marriage ended, Ms.

Yesterday, on International Human Rights Day, the Embassy of the Kingdom of the Netherlands announced that Saw Eh Say, the coordinator from the Kayah Earthrights Action Network (KEAN), received the 2020 Human Rights Tulip Myanmar Award for his great efforts to promote the right to land in Myanmar. The Human Rights Tulip is an annual award of the Dutch government for outstanding and courageous human rights defenders.

The impact of COVID-19 has been devastating around the world. In response, countries have put in place emergency measures to help their citizens and private firms weather the pandemic and recovery programs to boost the economy once the lockdown restrictions can ease.

Most developing economies do not have the fiscal space to implement broad recovery programs, as the revenues from key economic sectors have collapsed, expenditures to respond to the pandemic have escalated rapidly, and capital outflows have increased.

Supporting women’s ability to own, manage and control land will help accelerate gender equality globally

It is depressing, discouraging, infuriating – pick your word – to see the scale and scope of abuse and discrimination aimed at women and girls worldwide.

Many Latin American countries recognize the property rights of indigenous and Afro-descendant people, but those laws do little to protect women’s access to land

Latin America’s indigenous and Afro-descendant communities are facing not just one pandemic, but three. Women bear the brunt of them all, which threatens communities’ very survival.

It’s time we break down the barriers to women’s access to land and protect women’s rights while the pandemic places them in a precarious situation

Not only is the coronavirus pandemic (COVID-19) having serious health impacts around the world, it also has the potential to significantly affect the housing, land, and property (HLP) of women and girls, particularly in low and middle-income countries. 

Women at a disadvantage

Governments all over are asking people to stay at home, and The Gambia is no exception. Whilst this is to curb movements to limit the transmission of COVID-19, these steps can have unintended consequences for the poorest & most vulnerable.

As a Swahili speaker from Tanzania, I have not often had the opportunity to meet or work with people from remote Maasai communities. However, I recently visited the villages of Naisinyai and Mundarara in the north of the country as part of a global research project on women’s land rights in pastoral communities affected by mining (the WOLTS project).

The National Council of Applied Economic Research (NCAER) recently released India’s first Land Records and Services Index.

Today we are pleased to mark the official launch of PlaceFund, an independent US nonprofit organization focused on addressing issues of insecure property rights, unsustainable land use, and climate change. Built off a decade as the Property Rights initiative at Omidyar Network, PlaceFund will operate under the leadership of Peter Rabley and Amy Regas, who will be leaving Omidyar Network to run this venture, and they will take our shared commitment to property rights and geospatial technology into the new decade.