Effective reform pathways for addressing women’s access to land and tenure security in Africa are yet to be found despite their role in feeding the population.
In Zambia, security of tenure for communities residing under customary land tenure settings has in recent years increasingly come under threat owing to the pressures of high rate of urbanization, speculation, subdivision and conversion to state land, which effectively excludes marginal populations from accessing resources for their land.
Rural women’s livelihoods in Africa are dependent on their rights and entitlement to land as well as security of tenure. Equally important is how land laws and land governance systems shape and reshape women’s access to land and tenure security.
Forced evictions violate a number of internationally and nationally recognized human rights. However, it directly translates to a denial of the right to adequate housing which forms the very foundational basis for the realization of other rights. In the long run, it affects people’s social and economic livelihoods.
