Southern Africa

Citation:

Gengenbach, Heidi, Rachel Schurman, Thomas Bassett, William Munro, and William Moseley. 2018. “Limits of the New Green Revolution for Africa: Reconceptualising Gendered Agricultural Value Chains.” The Geographical Journal 184 (2): 208–14.

Authors: Heidi Gengenbach, Rachel Schurman, Thomas Bassett, William Munro, William Moseley

Abstract:

In order to address food insecurity, the New Green Revolution for Africa (GR4A) promotes tighter integration of African smallholder farmers, especially women, into formal markets via value chains to improve farmers’ input access and to encourage the sale of crop surpluses. This commentary offers a theoretical and practical critique of the GR4A model, drawing on early findings from a five‐year study of value chain initiatives in Burkina Faso, Côte d'Ivoire, and Mozambique. It highlights the limitations of a model that views heightened market interactions as uniformly beneficial for smallholder farmers. We challenge the notion that there is a broadly similar and replicable process for the construction of markets and the development of gender‐sensitive value chains in all recipient countries. Instead we build upon the feminist network political ecology and coproduction literatures to conceptualise value chains as complex assemblages co‐produced by a broad set of actors, including socially differentiated farmers.

Topics: Agriculture, Environment, Climate Change, Feminisms, Feminist Political Ecology, Gender, Security, Food Security Regions: Africa, Southern Africa, West Africa Countries: Burkina Faso, Côte D'Ivoire, Mozambique

Year: 2018

Citation:

Hart, Tim GB, Margaret Chandia, and Peter T. Jacobs. 2018. “Land Reform and Changing Gender Patterns in Rural Farmland Ownership.” Agenda 32 (4): 111–20.

Authors: Tim GB Hart, Margaret Chandia, Peter T. Jacobs

Abstract:

The implementation of land reform in South Africa intends to bring about equity and equality but has encountered unanticipated or unplanned outcomes that have unforeseen effects for the various actors involved, particularly women. In this paper, we focus on the emerging patterns in gender ownership of farmland made available through the farmland redistribution programme. Analysing data from a mixed methods approach that used a household survey instrument and was followed up with individual and group interviews, we examine the outcomes and consequences of land redistribution with respect to the gender ownership of redistributed land. The findings provisionally indicate that the farmland redistribution programme has influenced ownership patterns that tend to include women into joint land ownership agreements alongside men in far greater numbers than women-only headed households. A review of policy interventions indicates that this joint-ownership outcome was never proposed. It has its own consequences with regard to de jure and de facto ownership of and access to farmland. Furthermore, it is in stark contrast to the policy idea of increasing redistributed land ownership exclusively for women in order to address gender imbalances within land ownership by black farmers. Despite differences across provinces, men as individual owners are the main beneficiaries of land redistribution. Women tend to enter into arrangements with men to acquire land so that they can meet the own-contribution requirements of the redistribution applications. In doing so they now have legal rights, as opposed to customary and common law rights, to this land. The effect of these changing land ownership relationships and patterns requires deeper research across these and other areas of South Africa especially with regard to gender ownership and gender livelihoods at household level.

Keywords: land distribution, gender of landowners, unplanned outcomes, household gender relations, South Africa

Topics: Gender, Women, Gendered Power Relations, Gender Equality/Inequality, Households, Land Tenure, Rights, Land Rights, Women's Rights Regions: Africa, Southern Africa Countries: South Africa

Year: 2018

Citation:

Songca, Rushiella. 2018. “Land, Violence and Womxn’s Bodies: An Overview of Implications of Land Reform and Customary Law on the Rights of Women in South Africa.” Agenda 32 (4): 3-9.

Author: Rushiella Songca

Abstract:

This focus on Land, Violence and Womxn’s bodies seeks to re-centre the debate on land as it relates to womxn’s bodies. It highlights the dynamics engendered by womxn’s struggles for land, it explores the interface between womxn’s rights and customary practices and demonstrates how womxn’s bodies, like land, have been shamed and celebrated. This issue commemorates (un)celebrated womxn who continue to fight for their rights to land. It incorporates themes on gender discrimination and land allocation, and it problematises the extent to which land reform and other interventions have attempted to address gender inequalities which relate to the rights of womxn to communal and commercial land.

Keywords: gender, inequality, land, communal land, land redistribution, womxn's bodies

Topics: Gender, Women, Gendered Power Relations, Gender Equality/Inequality, Rights, Land Rights, Women's Rights Regions: Africa, Southern Africa Countries: South Africa

Year: 2018

Citation:

Eniola, Bolanle, and Adeoye O. Akinola. 2019. “Cultural Practices and Women’s Land Rights in Africa: South Africa and Nigeria in Comparison.” In Trajectory of Land Reform in Post-Colonial African States. Advances in African Economic, Social and Political Development, edited by Adeoye O. Akinola, and Henry Wissink, 109-123. Cham, Switzerland: Springer. 

Authors: Bolanle Eniola, Adeoye O. Akinola

Abstract:

Over the years, Africa has been characterised by poverty, gender inequalities and socioeconomic underdevelopment. It was soon discovered that cultural and traditional belief system constitutes one of the drivers of gender inequality, which is reflected in the skewed land arrangement in the continent. This chapter examines women’s land rights (access and control) in Africa, focusing on the Nigeria and South Africa’s experience. It assesses African traditional practices and norms that limit women’s property rights and explores how gender inequalities in terms of land ownership and rights have jeopardized attempts at sustainable development in Africa. It notes that the continental challenges of land utility, food security and enduring development have a direct correlation with the denial of women’s right to land ownership and use. The chapter concludes by reiterating the urgent need to promote gender equality in the resource sector, this is an essential corollary for African survival and sustainable development. 

Keywords: cultural practices, gender inequalities, land rights, Nigeria, South Africa

Topics: Development, Gender, Women, Gendered Power Relations, Gender Equality/Inequality, Rights, Land Rights, Women's Rights, Security, Food Security Regions: Africa, Southern Africa, West Africa Countries: Nigeria, South Africa

Year: 2019

Citation:

Mmbengwa, V. M., C. Nyambe, T. Madzivhandila, C. Kambanje, and K. Rambau. 2020. "Evaluation of Access to Climate-Smart Technologies for Women Empowerment in Small-Holder Farming Sector in South Africa." Gender & Behavior 18 (2): 15436-46.

Authors: V. M. Mmbengwa, C. Nyambe, T. Madzivhandila, C. Kambanje, K. Rambau

Abstract:

The study aimed to investigate the CSA technologies that could enhance women's empowerment in smallholder farming of South Africa. The study was carried out in two high profile agricultural provinces in South Africa (n=384) using both qualitative and quantitative methodologies. The simple randomized sampling design was used to select the respondents of the study. Qualitative data were collected through a combination of literature reviews, interviews, focus group workshops, and observations. The results revealed that five CSA technologies could be used to enhance the climate-smart agriculture for the women farmers in South Africa. The impact of the use of the CSA technologies was presented in the study. The study recommends that for women farmers to access CSA technologies, they should be supported by the government and private sector since the women farmers are from a fragile educational and financial background.

Topics: Agriculture, Environment, Climate Change, Gender, Women Regions: Africa, Southern Africa Countries: South Africa

Year: 2020

Citation:

Keahey, Jennifer. 2018. “Gendered Livelihoods and Social Change in Post-Apartheid South Africa.” Gender, Place & Culture 25 (4): 525–46.

Author: Jennifer Keahey

Abstract:

This article employs gendered livelihoods analysis and participatory methods to examine the politics of development among small-scale rooibos tea farmers in a rural coloured area of southwestern South Africa. Differentiating between sources of conflict and cohesion, I discuss how communities navigated resource scarcity, unstable markets, and shifting relations. While patriarchal dynamics informed livelihoods, with males and elders enjoying greater access than females and young adults, women took advantage of relatively fluid female roles to enter into agriculture and commerce. In contrast, rigid male roles and unattainable expectations of manhood isolated men, engendering destructive behaviors among young men in particular. Communities maintained social cohesion through democratic arrangements, and a politics of identification enabled research participants to relate to differential interests. In addition to providing situated and relational insight into the identitarian aspects of rural development, participatory gendered livelihoods analysis offers a critical means for deconstructing power and decolonizing knowledge.

Keywords: development, gender, identity, postcolonial feminism, social change, South Africa

Topics: Agriculture, Development, Gender, Gender Roles, Gendered Power Relations, Patriarchy, Livelihoods Regions: Africa, Southern Africa Countries: South Africa

Year: 2018

Citation:

Manyonganise, Molly. 2017. "Invisibilising the Victimised: Churches in Manicaland and Women’s Experiences of Political Violence in National Healing and Reconciliation in Zimbabwe." Journal for the Study of Religion 30 (1): 110-36.

Author: Molly Manyonganise

Abstract:

Zimbabwe’s political history from 2000 to the present epoch has been characterized by violence. This violence reached its peak in 2008 when ZANU PF was defeated at the polls by the opposition party, MDC-T. The violence resulted in hundreds of people losing their lives while many more were maimed, displaced and/or sexually abused. In this context of political violence, various church groups emerged as the church in Zimbabwe broke its culture of silence and sought to condemn the deployment of divisive politics and the use of political violence as a means to political gain. One such group that emerged in 2000 is a forum of churches in the province of Manicaland called Churches in Manicaland (CiM). From the onset, CiM sought to bring healing to victims of political violence as well as reconciliation of communities in Manicaland through a number of activities. The 2008 political violence resulted in the signing of the Global Political Agreement in which the issue of national healing and reconciliation became officialised and critical national institutions (the church included) were implored to play their roles meaningfully. However, scholars on national healing and reconciliation have noted how gender is often not part of reconstruction processes in post-conflict nations. What this paper seeks to do is to evaluate CiM’s approach to gender in its participation in the national healing and reconciliation process in Zimbabwe, both at an unofficial level from 2000 and at the official level from 2008. Drawing on original empirical research (focus groups and interviews), the paper shows how CiM has adopted a general approach to the national healing and reconciliation process, which has made women’s experiences of political violence invisible. It is envisaged that this is one way of informing the church to bring to the ‘centre’ women’s experiences of political violence.

Keywords: women, womanist perspective, Churches in Manicaland, invisible, political violence, national healing, reconciliation, Churches in Manicaland

Topics: Gender, Women, Justice, TRCs, Post-Conflict, Post-Conflict Reconstruction, Religion, Sexual Violence, Violence Regions: Africa, Southern Africa Countries: Zimbabwe

Year: 2017

Citation:

Cairns, Maryann R., Cassandra L. Workman, and Indrakshi Tandon. 2017. "Gender Mainstreaming and Water Development Projects: Analyzing Unexpected Enviro-Social Impacts in Bolivia, India, and Lesotho." Gender, Place & Culture 24 (3): 325-42.

Authors: Maryann R. Cairns, Cassandra L. Workman, Indrakshi Tandon

Abstract:

Keywords: women, water supply, equity and inclusion, NGOs, development, Mujeres, provisión de agua, equidad e inclusión, ONG, desarrollo, 女性, 水资源供给, 平等与包容, 非政府组织, 发展

Topics: Development, Environment, Gender, Women, Gender Mainstreaming, Gendered Power Relations, Gender Equity, Governance, Infrastructure, Water & Sanitation, Livelihoods, NGOs Regions: Africa, Southern Africa, Americas, South America, Asia, South Asia Countries: Bolivia, India, Lesotho

Year: 2017

Citation:

Mendoza, Joel M. F. Ramírez. 2017. "Aproximación al derecho de la mujer a la tierra en el caso sudafricano como una medida reparativo." En De género y guerra. Nuevos enfoques en los conflictos armados actuales, editado por Carlos Mauricio López Cárdenas, Rocío Yudith Canchari Canchari, y Emilio Sánchez de Rojas Díaz.

Author: Joel M. F. Ramírez Mendoza

Annotation:

"En un mundo cada vez más global y sistemáticamente fragmentado la guerra sigue generando víctimas. En esa realidad, hombres, mujeres y personas con identidades sexuales diversas han padecido los horrores de la lucha entre los seres humanos. Sin embargo, el sufrimiento de cada uno es diferente, precisamente, porque la mujer o las personas con una identidad diversa viven y sienten los conflictos de una forma distinta.

En este sentido, el propósito es divulgar una serie de estudios y reflexiones sobre la guerra a partir de una perspectiva de género. Esta obra explora desde una visión interdisciplinar una serie de conflictos que han ocurrido en Sudáfrica, Palestina, El Salvador, la antigua ex Yugoslavia y Perú, con lo cual pretende nutrir las problemáticas y soluciones que se han desarrollado en otras latitudes." (Summary from Amazon)

Topics: Gender, Women, Justice, Reparations, Rights, Land Rights, Women's Rights Regions: Africa, Southern Africa Countries: South Africa

Year: 2017

Citation:

Sulle, Emmanuel, Sue Mbaya, Barbara Codispoti, Josephine Atananga, Bernard Moseti, and Leah Mugehera. 2019. “Women’s Land Rights in Africa: Does Implementation Match Policy?” Paper presented at Conference on Land Policy in Africa, 2019: Winning the fight against Corruption in the Land Sector: Sustainable Pathway for Africa’s Transformation, Abidjan, November 25-29.

Authors: Emmanuel Sulle, Sue Mbaya, Barbara Codispoti, Josephine Atananga, Bernard Moseti, Leah Mugehera

Abstract:

This paper assesses the performance of selected countries in implementing the provisions of women’s land rights instruments such as African Union Framework and Guidelines on Land Policy in Africa and the Voluntary Guidelines on Responsible Governance of Tenure among others. Field research was carried out in seven African countries whereby, in each country a national researcher in collaboration with the collaborating nongovernmental organisation selected three heterogeneous locations which capture the range of situations under which rural women use land. Based on field research results complemented with desk review, the study finds that while statutory laws to protect women land rights are in place in all studied countries, with some differences and, in some cases with existing loopholes, adherence to these laws at the community level remain inadequate. This is particularly evident in terms of equality of rights to inherit land among men and women. Women experience constant threat from clansmen and relatives of their husbands. As also documented elsewhere, in many African communities (although not all), most land-holding systems are male lineage based, with men playing an important decision-making role. Malawi represents a specific case in this regard, as most land-holdings are based on matrilineal systems, but this still is not an automatic guarantee of women having more decision-making power on land. Based on these findings the paper confirms that while impressive steps to address women’s land rights issues have been taken in recent African policies, law enforceability is yet to receive sufficient political backing, due to widespread patriarchal values, limited financial and human resources and last but not least informal rules of the games that are the same drivers of widespread corruption. Patronage, ‘clientage’, illegality and opacity of land transactions find fertile ground in a patriarchal system. Understanding the status, causes and consequences of the de facto ‘unenforceability’ of constitutional and legal provisions in favour of women might shed a light on much broader challenges like those addressed in this conference. Holistic implementation and reforms that 1) address existing loopholes in land laws and regulation, 2) align other sectoral policies, laws and regulations, and 3) use transformative actions to revert patriarchal values in order to bridge the gender gap in property rights, but also to help creating a fairer environment to contribute combating corruption.

Topics: Corruption, Gender, Gendered Power Relations, Patriarchy, Gender Hierarchies, Land Tenure, Governance, Constitutions, NGOs, Rights, Land Rights, Property Rights Regions: Africa, Central Africa, East Africa, Southern Africa, West Africa Countries: Cameroon, Ethiopia, Kenya, Malawi, Mozambique, South Africa, Togo

Year: 2019