This story was submitted as part of the Land Portal Data Stories Contest and was the recipient of the second prize.

Across the globe, indigenous and rural women make invaluable contributions to their communities and toward global sustainable development and climate goals. They use, manage, and conserve the community territories that comprise over 50 percent of the world’s land and support up to 2.5 billion people. 

Over the last 2 years, a bottom-up SDGs monitoring process has been developing in the municipalities of Caruaru and Bonito to give women tenure security. 

Caruaru and Bonito are located in the semi-arid region of Pernambuco state in northeast Brazil, where grassroots women have been supported by Espaço Feminista,a civil society organization dedicated to women’s economic and political empowerment through public policies. 

By Chris Hufstader

After an audacious land grab by a foreign company, indigenous women in a remote Cambodian village struggle to regain their farms and sacred sites.

On March 27, 2019, the Research Consortium hosted a happy hour at the 2019 World Bank Land and Poverty Conference. The event attracted a mix of attendees from the conference, including leaders in the field of land rights and land tenure security.

This week, more than 1,500 development professionals from around the world are gathering at the World Bank’s annual Land and Poverty Conference, discussing the latest research and innovations in policies and good practice on land governance. 

By Deborah Espinosa and Patrick Gallagher, USAID’s Land Technology Solutions Program

Persistent and pervasive gender inequality is a global development challenge that constrains economic growth, educational opportunities, and health outcomes. It jeopardizes food security and undermines poverty reduction strategies. The world over, some formal and many informal laws and customs operate to hinder women’s empowerment and thus their full potential as agents of economic and social change.

I recently traveled to the highlands of Peru. Every woman I met there seemed to be doing something with wool: spinning it, or knitting or crocheting skirts, sweaters, and scarves. I was fascinated by the activity, as a sometimes knitter myself, but when I asked to take pictures of them they reacted with confusion at my interest. In their minds, they were not doing anything remarkable or picture worthy, just the daily work they needed to get done.

Next week is the annual World Bank Land and Poverty Conference. This is one of the most important events of the year in the land rights sector. It’s a chance for a wide range of practitioners, researchers, and funders to connect and to learn more about each others’ work.

The data ecosystem is an extremely vast and cluttered space. What data exist? What data is up to date? What data is reliable? Who owns the data? Can I use the data without inflicting harm? Who are the data subjects? Many people across numerous sectors struggle with such questions and more on a daily basis. The land governance sector in India is no different. But somehow, it seems the land data ecosystem in India is more complex and controversial.

Conservation, said Aldo Leopold, is harmony between (wo)men and land. Land should justifiably figure not only into the conservation, but also in development debates, policy and discourses. Missing land rights and land tenure security can be costly for states, communities as well as local and global development.

Improving how we work for – and with – indigenous and local women in their communities

As a human rights organisation, gender justice is a fundamental principle of our work, and we have long been conscious of, and sought to address, the barriers to effective participation in decision-making by women, as well as the other human rights violations they may face on account of their gender.