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Access to land and the right to food 2010, para. 17
- Paragraph text
- The effort to transplant the Western concept of property rights has created a number of problems, however. Unless it is transparent and carefully monitored, the titling process itself may be appropriated by local elites or foreign investors, with the complicity of corrupt officials. In addition, if it is based on the recognition of formal ownership, rather than on land users' rights, the titling process may confirm the unequal distribution of land, resulting in practice in a counter-agrarian reform. In particular, this will be the case in countries in which a small landed elite owns most of the available land, having benefited from the unequal agrarian structure of the colonial era. There is also a risk that titling will favour men. Any measures aimed at improving security of tenure should instead seek to correct existing imbalances, as the Land Management and Administration Project in Cambodia does.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on the right to food
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Governance & Rule of Law
- Social & Cultural Rights
- Person(s) affected
- Men
- Women
- Year
- 2010
Paragraph
Access to land and the right to food 2010, para. 22
- Paragraph text
- A number of countries, particularly in Africa, have extended formal legal recognition to existing customary rights, including collective rights, as an alternative to individual titling. Typically, neither individual members of households nor communities, through their representatives, can dispose of their land, for example, by selling it. Yet, the formal legal recognition of customary rights provides effective security. It favours long-term investments in the land. It may also facilitate access to credit, since creditors (although they will not be able to take possession of the land in the event of default) can be assured of the long-term viability of the investments that they help to finance. And it allows for the emergence of rental markets, which can improve access to land, particularly for land-scarce and labour-abundant households with little education. At the same time, there is a high risk that traditional, patriarchal forms of land distribution will be further legitimized through the recognition of customary forms of tenure, in violation of women's rights. Such risks should be addressed through the inclusion of strict safeguards in the process of such recognition.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on the right to food
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Governance & Rule of Law
- Social & Cultural Rights
- Person(s) affected
- Women
- Year
- 2010
Paragraph
Access to land and the right to food 2010, para. 31
- Paragraph text
- Finally, land reform may be seen as an opportunity to strengthen access to land for women, particularly single women and widows. Article 14, paragraph 2 (g), of the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women guarantees the right of women to equal treatment in land and agrarian reform as well as in land resettlement schemes. However, there remain laws and social customs such as those ensuring that the land of a deceased husband belongs to his sons, not to his widow, despite the flagrant violation of women's rights to which this leads. As a result, women still represent a significant minority of the total number of title-holders, as illustrated by the statistics set out in figure II.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on the right to food
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Equality & Inclusion
- Gender
- Social & Cultural Rights
- Person(s) affected
- Women
- Year
- 2010
Paragraph
Access to land and the right to food 2010, para. 32
- Paragraph text
- Land reform may be seen as an opportunity to remedy this imbalance, either by prioritizing the needs of households headed by single women or widows, or by ensuring systematic joint titling in the reform process.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on the right to food
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Governance & Rule of Law
- Person(s) affected
- Women
- Year
- 2010
Paragraph
Acroecology and the right to food 2011, para. 41
- Paragraph text
- Specific, targeted schemes should ensure that women are empowered and encouraged to participate in this construction of knowledge. Culturally-sensitive participatory initiatives with female project staff and all-female working groups, and an increase in locally-recruited female agricultural extension staff and village motivators facing fewer cultural and language barriers, should counterbalance the greater access that men have to formal sources of agricultural knowledge. It is a source of concern to the Special Rapporteur that, while women face a number of specific obstacles (poor access to capital and land, the double burden of work in their productive and family roles, and low participation in decision-making), gender issues are incorporated into less than 10 per cent of development assistance in agriculture, and women farmers receive only 5 per cent of agricultural extension services worldwide. In principle, agroecology can benefit women most, because it is they who encounter most difficulties in accessing external inputs or subsidies. But their ability to benefit should not be treated as automatic; it requires that affirmative action directed specifically towards women be taken.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on the right to food
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Equality & Inclusion
- Food & Nutrition
- Gender
- Person(s) affected
- Men
- Women
- Year
- 2011
Paragraph
Assessing a decade of progress on the right to food 2013, para. 21
- Paragraph text
- This transforms the relationship between the authorities in charge of delivering the benefits and the beneficiaries into a relationship between duty-bearers and rights-holders. The institutionalization of social protection schemes facilitates decentralized monitoring of their implementation and broader accountability. It acts as a safeguard against elite capture, corruption, political clientelism or discrimination. Various studies also show that, in the absence of such safeguards, farm inputs as well as extension services may benefit primarily the elites or the best-connected households, leaving aside the poorest producers or those living in remote areas, as well as women.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on the right to food
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Equality & Inclusion
- Food & Nutrition
- Governance & Rule of Law
- Person(s) affected
- Women
- Year
- 2013
Paragraph
Fisheries and the right to food 2012, para. 6
- Paragraph text
- The fisheries sector can contribute to the realization of the right to food by providing employment and income and sustaining local economies. Globally, 54.8 million people are engaged in capture fisheries and aquaculture and approximately three times as many are involved in upstream and downstream activities (e.g. fish processing, selling, net-making and boatbuilding). Small-scale fisheries predominate in developing countries, where most fishing-related employment resides. Industrial boats employ some 200 people for every 1,000 tons of fish caught, while small-scale fishing methods (used by 90 to 95 per cent of people in the fisheries sector) employ some 2,400 people for the same amount of fish. This greater intensity of labour has led experts to conclude that the small-scale fisheries sector is particularly pro-poor. Women comprise about half of the global fisheries workforce, typically concentrated in the pre-harvest and post-harvest sector. While employment is stagnating in wild-capture fisheries in most regions, it is increasing in aquaculture, especially in Asia, where employment rose from some 3.7 million people in 1990 to well in excess of 10 million people by the late 2000s (see table 1).
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on the right to food
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Environment
- Food & Nutrition
- Governance & Rule of Law
- Person(s) affected
- Women
- Year
- 2012
Paragraph
Fisheries and the right to food 2012, para. 50d
- Paragraph text
- [The Special Rapporteur has previously described the role that human rights impact assessments of trade and investment agreements can play in allowing countries to discharge their human rights obligations (see A/HRC/19/59/Add.5). Trade and access agreements in fisheries provide another such illustration. The above assessment of the potential opportunities and risks of such agreements (see paras. 29-32) may serve to identify the questions that should be asked in any impact assessment before the conclusion of an agreement by the coastal State. These are, for example:] Are measures in place to ensure that export-oriented fishing creates decent work opportunities to ensure an adequate standard of living? Overall, will the agreement increase the incomes of the poorest and most marginalized groups within the coastal communities, especially women?
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on the right to food
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Environment
- Food & Nutrition
- Governance & Rule of Law
- Person(s) affected
- Women
- Year
- 2012
Paragraph
Human rights criteria for making contract farming and other business models inclusive of small-scale farmers 2011, para. 13
- Paragraph text
- A human rights-based approach requires a focus on the most vulnerable, those who are most often excluded from progress. Contract farming schemes often exclude the poorest farmers, who have limited and marginal land and fewer resources to invest and live in remote areas. Researchers note that the transaction costs associated with providing inputs, credit and extension services and carrying out product collection and grading are disincentives for firms to contract with smallholders, so firms often prefer to engage with medium- or large-scale farmers. Unless vulnerable and marginalized groups are considered specifically, they may be excluded from the opportunities that these business models seek to create. Moreover, small-scale farmers are usually in weaker bargaining positions. They may be illiterate or lack the skills to effectively defend their rights and interests in contract negotiations. Women often are marginalized, particularly where decisions are made at the community level through decision-making processes from which they are de facto excluded.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on the right to food
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Food & Nutrition
- Person(s) affected
- Women
- Year
- 2011
Paragraph
Human rights criteria for making contract farming and other business models inclusive of small-scale farmers 2011, para. 21
- Paragraph text
- Women have less access to contract farming than men. A study found that in the Kenyan horticulture export industry, women comprised fewer than 10 per cent of contracted farmers, and in a sample of 59 contract farmers for French beans exported from Senegal, only one was a woman. The ability of women to benefit from contract farming is determined by their rights over land and by the power relationships both within households or, when the contract is negotiated through representatives of the community or the farmers' organizations, within those groups. Indeed, even where most of the work is in fact performed by the wife and other family members, it is not unusual for the contract to be signed by the husband, as head of the household, as is seen in sugar contract farming in South Africa or in vegetable contract farming in the Indian Punjab. In addition, studies suggest that women lose control over decision-making when crops are produced for cash rather than for local consumption. While women decide about the use of food produced for self-consumption, they do not decide how the income of the household is spent. Therefore, unless the framework for contract farming respects women's rights and is gender sensitive, it will undermine gender equality. Research done on bean contract farming in Kenya shows, for instance, that while women performed most of the work, they received a limited portion of the revenues from the contract. In addition, where they did receive cash, they were expected to contribute to household expenditures even when this would have been the husband's responsibility. Strengthening the position of women is not only a matter of guaranteeing the right to equality of treatment, but also a means of improving productivity, since women receiving a greater proportion of the crop income will have a greater incentive to increase production. Moreover, household food security and children's health, nutrition and education all gain from improved income for women, in comparison to the gains that result from improved income for men. The more women decide on how to spend household income, the more it is usually spent on children's needs; a child's chance of survival increases by 20 per cent when the mother controls the household budget (see A/HRC/13/32, para. 58).
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on the right to food
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Food & Nutrition
- Gender
- Person(s) affected
- Women
- Year
- 2011
Paragraph
Human rights criteria for making contract farming and other business models inclusive of small-scale farmers 2011, para. 28
- Paragraph text
- Contracts should be put in the woman's name where it is expected that the woman would be the main person working on the farm, or, in the case of a couple, in the names of both parties. It should not automatically be in the name of the male head of household or the male holder of the title to the land cultivated
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on the right to food
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Social & Cultural Rights
- Person(s) affected
- Women
- Year
- 2011
Paragraph
Integrating a gender perspective in the right to food 2016, para. 5
- Paragraph text
- On the other hand, female farmers are responsible for cultivating, ploughing and harvesting more than 50% of the world's food. In sub Saharan Africa and the Caribbean, women produce up to 80% of basic foodstuffs and in Asia women constitute 50-90 percent of the labour force dedicated to rice production. Moreover, in many parts of the world majority of female farmers mainly engaged in subsistence farming.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on the right to food
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Food & Nutrition
- Gender
- Person(s) affected
- Women
- Year
- 2016
Paragraph
Integrating a gender perspective in the right to food 2016, para. 18
- Paragraph text
- Rather than enabling women to secure stable livelihoods, both formal and customary laws are often barriers to women's economic independence. As noted by the FAO, "credit markets are not gender-neutral", and women may find themselves prohibited from entering into contracts, opening bank accounts, or from entering into loan agreements.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on the right to food
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Gender
- Person(s) affected
- Women
- Year
- 2016
Paragraph
Integrating a gender perspective in the right to food 2016, para. 20
- Paragraph text
- Finally, legal barriers may force women to choose between domestic responsibilities and outside employment. As primary caretakers for children and households, women are not always permitted to engage in paid employment, and family and personal laws may prevent a woman from making employment decisions without her husband's permission. Meanwhile, some countries featured highly discriminatory family laws that gave husbands authority over their wives in marriage including rights over property, and divorce filings. Women also often struggle with maternity protection and child care as those carrying the primary responsibility for domestic work.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on the right to food
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Equality & Inclusion
- Gender
- Health
- Person(s) affected
- Children
- Families
- Women
- Year
- 2016
Paragraph
Integrating a gender perspective in the right to food 2016, para. 22
- Paragraph text
- The Philippines also demonstrates discriminatory land distribution. While the country legally allows women to own land, the "invisibility" of women within the food production system has created structural barriers that prevent them from accessing productive resources. There is a correlation between land ownership and access to productive resources including credit, inputs, varieties of seeds and inorganic fertilizers, farming equipment, and extension services including credit. As a result, less than 3 percent of women who work in the agriculture and fisheries sectors in the Philippines benefit from support services such as credit, seeds, training, and access to technology, therefore making it almost impossible to secure a sustainable income and livelihood.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on the right to food
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Equality & Inclusion
- Gender
- Person(s) affected
- Women
- Year
- 2016
Paragraph
Integrating a gender perspective in the right to food 2016, para. 29
- Paragraph text
- Formal laws could also prove ineffective if women do not realize or assume control over their rights. For example, in 2005, India amended the Hindu Succession Act (1956) to allow men and women equal inheritance to agricultural land. However, according to a 2013 study, challenges in the implementation of the Act had been observed, allegedly as a result of women not being aware of their legal rights and not wanting to upset their families and resistance from their brothers amongst other reasons.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on the right to food
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Equality & Inclusion
- Gender
- Person(s) affected
- Families
- Men
- Women
- Year
- 2016
Paragraph
Integrating a gender perspective in the right to food 2016, para. 30
- Paragraph text
- State action can also be a source of discriminatory land distribution. A state may engage in land redistribution through various measures, including land reform, large scale appropriation, and privatization programs. At times, land distribution intended to benefit marginalized groups only benefits male heads of household. Recent land reform programs have tried to address this inequity by specifically allocating land to women, or acknowledging joint property rights. However, many countries still come up short, even when gender equality is explicitly articulated as a policy objective in such programs. This has also been true for States' response to large-scale resettlements in the face of development projects.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on the right to food
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Gender
- Social & Cultural Rights
- Person(s) affected
- Women
- Year
- 2016
Paragraph
Integrating a gender perspective in the right to food 2016, para. 32
- Paragraph text
- Unfortunately, the IPR regime disproportionately excludes women, particularly in the context of agriculture. For example, IPR tends to reward "high technology" but ignores the contributions that the female labour force makes to agricultural production. Meanwhile, the privatization of agricultural resources leads to increased monetization. Women are less likely than men to have discretionary income, and are therefore less able to afford expensive seeds that were once managed communally.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on the right to food
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Food & Nutrition
- Gender
- Person(s) affected
- Men
- Women
- Year
- 2016
Paragraph
Integrating a gender perspective in the right to food 2016, para. 38
- Paragraph text
- The fact that 73% of the world's seed supply is owned and patented by these corporations and are therefore non-renewable, presents women with a major dilemma being. They are accustomed to seed saving and sharing, and would have o chose between discontinuing the traditional practice of saving and exchanging seeds or risk punishment for an intellectual property crime.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on the right to food
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Food & Nutrition
- Gender
- Person(s) affected
- Women
- Year
- 2016
Paragraph
Integrating a gender perspective in the right to food 2016, para. 41
- Paragraph text
- Agricultural trade liberalization is generally premised on export-promotion policies that benefit men and larger-scale farmers. Liberalization has also opened smaller markets to subsidized imports, thus displacing the farmed products of local women, and encouraging the production of export crops over subsistence agriculture. Women are struggling to maintain household incomes due to increased competition with imported agricultural goods, reduced prices, and declining commodity prices in international markets.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on the right to food
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Food & Nutrition
- Gender
- Person(s) affected
- Men
- Women
- Year
- 2016
Paragraph
Integrating a gender perspective in the right to food 2016, para. 44
- Paragraph text
- Most of the world's poor who live and work in rural areas are employed in the agriculture sector. Globally, 20 - 30% of the 450 million waged agricultural workers are women, as are 30 % of those employed in the fishing sector and this number is increasing. Yet, women face difficulty in engaging in market behavior when cultural norms make it socially unacceptable for women to interact with men.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on the right to food
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Equality & Inclusion
- Poverty
- Person(s) affected
- Men
- Women
- Year
- 2016
Paragraph
Integrating a gender perspective in the right to food 2016, para. 47
- Paragraph text
- Much of the discrimination against women agricultural workers is partly due to the fact that women are absent from supervisory structures and unions. Women involved in unions can face retaliation from their employers. Migrant women workers with precarious immigration status are particularly vulnerable and may prefer not to engage in activities potentially challenging employer-authority, including joining unions and reporting sexual abuse.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on the right to food
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Equality & Inclusion
- Gender
- Person(s) affected
- Persons on the move
- Women
- Year
- 2016
Paragraph
Integrating a gender perspective in the right to food 2016, para. 50
- Paragraph text
- Similarly, fisherwomen contribute significantly to the work carried out at the different stages within the fishing industry the role they play is largely undervalued. Despite their direct contribution to fishing economy, women fishers are categorically excluded from state-sponsored benefits, facilities and services.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on the right to food
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Equality & Inclusion
- Gender
- Person(s) affected
- Women
- Year
- 2016
Paragraph
Integrating a gender perspective in the right to food 2016, para. 51
- Paragraph text
- However, the broad category of female-headed households should be differentiated further, as households face different socio-economic circumstances, resulting in different outcomes regarding their livelihoods and food and nutrition security. Research among South African farmworkers revealed that certain female-headed households, although having less access to earned income compared to male-headed households, achieved greater food and nutrition security than comparable households with male headship. This was due to women having better access to social grants, remittances, and income obtained through informal work. This highlights the crucial role of women's access to resources and power relations within households for greater food and nutrition security.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on the right to food
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Food & Nutrition
- Person(s) affected
- Women
- Year
- 2016
Paragraph
Integrating a gender perspective in the right to food 2016, para. 52
- Paragraph text
- Disadvantages for women in both agricultural and non-agricultural sectors undermine their right to food. Women's income possibilities are more constrained than men's; the women's participation in the labour force is lower than men on a global scale - 70 percent of working age men are in the labour force compared to only 40 percent of working age women and the labour force participation rates have stagnated around the world in the past two decades.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on the right to food
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Food & Nutrition
- Gender
- Health
- Person(s) affected
- Men
- Women
- Year
- 2016
Paragraph
Integrating a gender perspective in the right to food 2016, para. 55
- Paragraph text
- In the absence of additional support for care work at home, women dependents - children and the elderly - may be further disadvantaged by women working outside the home to earn an income. Daughters, for example, may dropped off from school to fill the care gap. Clearly, this speaks to the discrimination of women in participation in the labour market, if care work remains the main or sole responsibility of women.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on the right to food
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Equality & Inclusion
- Gender
- Health
- Person(s) affected
- Children
- Women
- Year
- 2016
Paragraph
Integrating a gender perspective in the right to food 2016, para. 69
- Paragraph text
- Insecure land tenure reduces rural women's and men's incentives to make long-term investments in soil rehabilitation and conservation, which are crucial to agricultural land management in era of climate change and resource scarcity. A reduction of agricultural productivity and more competition for productive land leave women with the more marginal and fragile lands. Tools are often reserved for men's plots of land and women may not use technological adaptation techniques. In a Sub-Saharan African county, women, have limited access to irrigation or other farm technology, such as motorized tillers that would increase productivity and offset negative impacts of climatic shocks.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on the right to food
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Environment
- Person(s) affected
- Women
- Year
- 2016
Paragraph
Integrating a gender perspective in the right to food 2016, para. 73
- Paragraph text
- More needs to be done to improve opportunities for women to participate in the green economy, notably through ensuring that women benefit equally from employment opportunities arising from development projects focusing on clean technology and renewable energy.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on the right to food
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Environment
- Equality & Inclusion
- Gender
- Person(s) affected
- Women
- Year
- 2016
Paragraph
Vision of the mandate 2014, para. 29
- Paragraph text
- As farm labourers, vendors and unpaid care workers, women are responsible for food preparation and production in many countries and regions throughout the world and play a vital role in food security and nutrition. However, women and girls continue to be disproportionately affected by poverty and malnutrition. Women in rural areas are particularly affected, as female-headed households continue to grow, exceeding 30 per cent in some developing countries, with women owning only 2 per cent of agricultural land and with limited access to productive resources. In many low-income countries, women are the backbone of the rural economy and 79 per cent of economically active women in the least developed countries consider agriculture as their primary source of income. Agrarian land reform legislation often discriminates against women by entitling only men over a certain age to land ownership while women's entitlement only applies in cases where they are household heads. Such discriminatory practices prevent women in many countries from asserting their economic independence and being able to feed themselves and their families.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on the right to food
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Food & Nutrition
- Poverty
- Person(s) affected
- Girls
- Women
- Year
- 2014
Paragraph
Vision of the mandate 2014, para. 35
- Paragraph text
- States must recognize the need to accommodate the specific time and mobility constraints on women, given their role in the "care" economy, while at the same time reconstituting gender roles by adopting a transformative approach to employment and social protection (see A/HRC/22/50). The Special Rapporteur will endeavour to promote greater awareness of the guidance provided by general comments No. 16 (2005) on the equal right of men and women to the enjoyment of all economic, social and cultural rights and No. 20 (2009) on non-discrimination in economic, social and cultural rights of the Committee on Economic Social and Cultural Rights, which relate to discriminatory practices against women.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on the right to food
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Equality & Inclusion
- Gender
- Social & Cultural Rights
- Person(s) affected
- Men
- Women
- Year
- 2014
Paragraph