Women’s Tenure Rights and Land Reform in Angola

Citation:

Cain, Allan. 2019. "Women’s Tenure Rights and Land Reform in Angola." Paper prepared for 2019 World Bank Conference on Land and Poverty, Washington D.C., March 25-29. 

Author: Allan Cain

Abstract:

Current Angolan municipalisation reforms present a unique opportunity to affect local practice on how community and individual land-holder tenure is administered and to protect women's equitable rights to land. Angola is a post-war country, with weak land tenure legislation and limited local government management capacity. Customary traditions are practiced in the various regions a of the country do not respect women’s rights of ownership and inheritance. More than 62 percent of the population live in informal settlements with insecure land tenure under the threat of forced evictions. Families living in poor communities affected by the expansion of cities and towns are particularly vulnerable. Of these, families lead by women are the most at risk. Securing rights to land and housing assets are important to livelihoods of women headed households by permitting access to financing that they require to grow their enterprises as well as for incrementally upgrading their housing.

Keywords: women, gender, tenure, land reform, customary, human rights

Topics: Economies, Poverty, Gender, Women, Land Tenure, Households, Post-Conflict, Rights, Land Rights Regions: Africa, Southern Africa Countries: Angola

Year: 2019