Human Rights

Report of the Human Rights Council Advisory Committee - Study on discrimination in the context of the right to food, including identification of good practices of anti-discriminatory policies and strategies

Gender Excerpts:

II Discrimination in the Context of the Right to Food

D. Discrimination Against Women

31. The intersection between women's rights and the right to food provides a rich overview of a number of interrelated dimensions of discrimination against women related to access to land, property and markets, which are inextricably linked to access to education, employment, health care, and political participation. On a global scale, women cultivate more than 50% of all food grown. Women nonetheless account for 70 per cent of the world's hungry and are dispro- portionately affected by malnutrition, poverty and food insecurity. Governments are not living up to their international commitments to protect women from discrimination, as the gap between de jure equality and de facto discrimination continues to persist and resist change.

1.Rural women, access to land, production and markets

32. Women's access to control and ownership of land or property are crucial for the purpose of strengthening their security and livelihood. It is important to understand the multiple factors - laws, inheritance, marital status and agrarian reform policies - that impede women's equal access to land and the way these affect women by virtue of their gender at the level of individual, community and nation. Despite representing the majority of the agricultural workforce and production, women are estimated to have access to/control 5% of land globally. The World Food Program estimates that de facto female- headed households form a estimated 25 per cent of total rural households signaling the multiplicity of women from single parents, widows, wives of migrant workers to women migrant workers.

33. Rural households continue to acquire land through inheritance laws that emanate from customary legal regimes currently premised on reaffirming women's unequal access to and control over land. Because land is mediated through husbands, fathers, brothers or sons, women's land rights are negotiated within unequal power relationships and are not assumed to be general entitlements. This underscores the importance of legal and cultural reform to restore the balance of power relationships within the family.

2. Women and Access to Education, Employment and Health Care

34. Rural women have the world's lowest levels of schooling and the highest rates of illiteracy in all developing regions. Twice as many women suffer from malnutrition as men, and girls are twice as likely to die from malnutrition as boys. Numerous studies underscore the social costs of rural women's lack of education and assets, linking them directly to high rates of malnutrition, infant mortality, and in some countries, HIV/AIDS infection. There are also high economic costs: wasted human capital and low labour productivity that stifle rural development and progress in agriculture, and ultimately threaten food security. Discrimination against women in the context of the right to adequate food is a culmination of all other aspects of discrimination that stifle women's rights to equality and empowerment.

III. Anti-Discriminator Strategies and Policies

D. Legal and Social Protection of Rural Women

55. Because the sustainability of food supplies and income-generation are limited by lack of credit services and market access, rural areas particularly carry the burden of high levels of physical activity to ensure food availability. Women improve the food security of their household through (a) their access to income-generating activity and (b) through ensuring food availability. Technologies designed to meet women's needs have proven particularly useful in increasing productivity and shortening physically demanding labour to relieve women in their heavy burdens. Alternative sources of cooking fuels have proven to shorten preparation and storage of foods and decrease the need for daily firewood collection, for example. Equitable rights to land for women in both developed and developing countries point to the success of rural (and urban) small businesses run by women (compared to male counterparts) so much that banks and service industries actively support women's entrepreneurial initiatives.

56. The right to control, access, and manage land is tied to a woman's right to exercise financial independence, earn a livelihood, and subsequently provide a livelihood for herself and her household. Agrarian reform policies which are 'gender-blind' continue to exclude women from entitlements to land. States undergoing agrarian reform or land redistribution schemes must uphold the equal rights of women to land, regardless of marital status. Women usually do not have their names on land-use certificates (whether jointly with their husbands or individually), which decreases their ability to apply for mortgage or credit. Many rural women, as documented systematically in Sub-Saharan Africa, envisage the legal difficulty that they cannot hold title to land, although they are given the right to till the land and erect a home on a piece of land allocated to the household head. Countries that have adopted CEDAW have strengthened the legal framework of equality with respect of the human rights of women by repealing laws deemed discriminatory to women. However, elimination of discrimination against women requires not only changes in institutions, laws and regulations, but more importantly cultural practices that are part of the process that creates and perpetuates such discrimination. Governments must show political will to enforce the rule of law and bridge the gap between de jure equality and de facto discrimination, including affirmative action.

58. According to the World Health Organization, the health of women and girls is of particular concern because, in many societies, they are disadvantaged by discrimination rooted in socio-cultural factors. For example, women and girls face increased vulnerability to HIV/AIDS. Since women plan an essential role in food security, it is widely known that the health of women is important for the health of their societies. Underweight and malnourished mothers are more likely to give birth to underweight babies who end up having mental or physical disorders. To enhance women's right to food and right to health in order to break the vicious circle, all barriers depriving women from proper health care, housing, potable water, sanitation and healthy food must be removed. Studies also show that income earned and managed by women is positively correlated to economic and nutritional well-being for the entire household. Women are more likely to spend their incomes on food and children's needs. Research has shown that a child's chance of survival increase by 20 per cent when the mother controls the household budget.

E. Legal and Social Protection of Other Vulnerable Groups Exposed to the Risk of

Hunger and Its Other Human Rights Implications

60. More than one third of child deaths worldwide are attributed to malnutrition.......

IV. Good Practices

E. Microfinance for Poor Women

Annex - Declaration of Rights of Peasants - Women and Men

I.Introduction

Almost half of the people in the world are peasants..........

II.Violation of Peasants' Rights

Millions of peasants have been forced to leave their farmland because of land grabs facilitated by national policies and/or the military...... Women's and children's rights are the most affected. Women are victims of psychological, physical, and economic violence. They are discriminated in their

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When: 7/2/2014