Global Project Women Empowerment for Resilient Rural Areas (WE4R)

Overview

Our goal under this project is to strengthen the institutional, individual capacities and technical expertise of gender change agents (duty bearers, grassroots non-state actors, academia, legal professionals, women leaders) to enhance women’s access to rights, resources and representation in the context of sustainable land resource management.

What the project addresses

Intact land resources are the foundation for livelihoods in rural areas. For women, the lack of rights, access to land resources and representation in land resource management increases their vulnerability to land degradation, biodiversity and climate change. Empowering women and gender change agents to strengthen land tenure and enhance women’s land rights has the high potential of increasing their resilience to these threats.

Interventions

Capcity build 25 gender change agents through a one week legal empowerment training to strengthen their legal knowledge and application skills to enhance women’s access to legal aid in relation to land rights, resources and representation
Provided legal aid services to 86 persons (55 women and 31 men) on land rights cases relating to inheritance, purchase of land, boundary disputes, carbon trading agreements.
Supported a deaf woman to understand the land purchase process and safely withdraw from a high-risk transaction that she had initiated without legal advice.
Supported 3 farmers from Baringo County to review and understand a proposed carbon credit agreement, identify high-risk clauses, and make informed decisions on whether to enter into the agreement.
Engaged 233 university legal aid clinic students from 8 universities on rural women’s and community land rights vis-à-vis climate justice through a mock trial (court simulation) of a case between a rural pastoralist community and a carbon trading company. These students are currently
Conducting a baseline study on the established evidence-based, rights-based gender transformative approaches to dispute prevention and resolution in sustainable access and use of land resources.
Integrated land rights education in our legal empowerment hub ‘Inua Waresh na Waless’ hosted on our website.
Conducted a comprehensive social media advocacy on women’s land rights.