As the fight for gender equality intensifies and makes headlines every day, the struggle for the security of women's land rights declines.
This right does not only promote gender equality, but it serves as a necessity in the fight to combat land degradation, drought, and desertification.
The Global Land Outlook 2 of the United Nations Council to Combat Desertification (UNCCD) reports that 40% of the world's land has been degraded by human activities. This means that 40% of the world's land has lost its resource value and is incapable of production, and in effect, poses severe threats like food security, climate change, and other environmental hazards.
It doesn't end there. This figure will increase massively by 2050 if the problem is not taken seriously.
How then can women's right to land contribute to achieving land degradation neutrality?
The World Bank estimates the population of women to be about 49.52% as of 2021, and according to the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), 43% of this population are agricultural workers. Despite the reality of these statistics, women's access to land is not secured. This goes a long way to show the significance of gender inequality in the world.
Although various nations and International bodies have put in place the right of women to equality in the enjoyment of all their rights including the right to access, use, inherit, control, and own land, the struggle remains the same.
In Africa, only about 4% of women hold land titles. Proper measures should therefore be taken to ensure that social norms in societies preventing women from land ownership are abolished. Adequate implementation should be ensured by states to see that this inequality is addressed.
If women's land rights are guaranteed, not only would it improve life, generation of food, and economic growth, but it would equally ensure land degradation neutrality as well as building gender equality. With women's ability to nurture and produce, and their significant number in the agricultural sector, the connected global goals of gender equality and land degradation neutrality by 2030 will be achieved.
Today's celebration of World Day to Combat Desertification and Drought, with the theme, "Her land. Her right", equally invites us to reflect on the rights of women and her role in combating these issues.
Let's all join hands to ensure the rights of women to land while preventing the degradation of the world's land.
— Chukwudalu Abugu
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