Enset (Ensete ventricosum) production is declining, and it faces genetic erosion due to drought, diseases and population pressure. Participatory Rural Appraisal (PRA) and additional formal survey studies on 315 households were conducted over three consecutive years (1998–2000) in the Sidama, Wolaita and Hadiya ethnic regions of southern Ethiopia to assess traditional cultivation methods, analyse the production systems, and evaluate farm-based enset biodiversity. The regions differ in terms of cultural background, resources, farming systems, population density, and agro-ecology.

An analysis of the World Bank’s Policy Research Report (PRR) from a gender perspective and a contribution to an e-mail discussion on it. Looks at whether the latest draft has addressed the failings of an earlier version. Focuses on the notion of non-contractable labour; the household as a unit of analysis; motivated family labour; the consequences of default; equity and poverty reduction strategies; bringing women’s rights onto the agenda.

Property conflicts have an enormous impact on relations between the members of farm households and their families. Given the long duration, frequency and intensity of these conflicts an investigation of how they arise and how they affect the daily lives of, and relationships between, landholders is certainly warranted. Conflicts over land visibly manifest themselves in destroyed fences, stolen crops, poisoned dogs, horses that are set free, bloody machetazos, hails of stones between children and murder.

O estudo demonstra claramente as deficiências dos modelos lineares que separam os processos de elaboração de políticas da sua implementação. Ambos os estudos de caso mostram que a legislação e os regulamentos podem ser modificados, reinterpretados ou simplesmente ignorados quando se trata de implementá-los, quando as relações de poder a nível local se tornam críticas. Esta constatação tem duas implicações directas.

Rights and reality are women's equal rights to land, housing and property implemented in East Africa ?

Analyses the World Bank’s Policy Research Report (PRR) from a gender perspective and is critical of the consultation process on it thus far. It has important implications for women in Africa. The Bank believes land should be viewed not as a source of subsistence but of capital. It ignores women’s unpaid labour as a factor in agricultural productivity. It treats the household as an undifferentiated unit and ignores that the family often functions as a site of oppression. The Bank stresses ‘motivated’ family labour but ignores that much of women’s labour is far from voluntary.

Highly condensed paper on gendered land rights, written principally for Oxfam staff and partners, and summarising some of the literature on Africa and elsewhere.