June 2001

Rural women’s access to land in Latin America

Gender and development fact sheets

Also available in French and Spanish

Rural women have limited access to and control of land.

Most agrarian reforms and legislation that directly or indirectly regulate access to land discriminate against women.

The establishment of legal frameworks with a gender perspective and the elimination of cultural and institutional factors that prevent the recognition of women as producers are essential to safeguard rural women’s access to land.

General profile

In Latin America, there are approximately 60 million rural women who work more than 12 hours per day to ensure the subsistence of their families. Some statistics show that they generate approximately 48 percent of the family income in the region.

In the course of a day, numerous and varied activities are carried out by women in rural economies. Although socially only their role in the reproductive sphere is recognized, they play a decisive part in agricultural production and food security. For example, women tend to the kitchen garden and the animals, they sow, harvest, process food, market produce, cook, look after and educate their children, etc. In addition, many participate in the seasonal or permanent wage-earning labour force of commercial agriculture or are occupied as merchants or artisans in the informal sector.

Notwithstanding the importance of the role played by women, actual changes that improve women’s access to resources and production-related services in Latin American countries, and the world in general, are limited. It is widely recognized that, although the land problem affects practically the entire rural population, women face additional difficulties. There are no reliable statistics disaggregated by sex regarding land tenure. However, various surveys and studies carried out at different times in the region show that men and women do not have equal access to the land resource.

Women and agrarian reform

In Latin America, peasants’ access to land is closely related to agrarian reform. Although most countries of the region have carried out some kind of agrarian reform, radical changes in the structure of land tenure were only effective in Bolivia, Cuba, Chile, Mexico, Nicaragua and Peru.

In general, the family is considered the point of reference for the productive unit and the head of the household the direct beneficiary of measures and strategies. In Latin American countries, stereotypes and prejudices concerning gender have assigned women to the role of reproduction and, therefore, their role as producers has been consistently undermined and undervalued. The belief that it is always the man who is the head of the household persists. Only in Cuba and Nicaragua was an alternative model presented where rural women were recognized as a priority in reform programmes.

The result of this division of work, which is recognized and accepted socially, is that rural women face numerous obstacles in carrying out productive activities to assure the subsistence of their families. In fact, legal, socio-cultural and institutional barriers affect their access to, as well as control of, land.

Legal limitations

In general, laws or programmes that are directly or indirectly associated with the redistribution of land tenure in the region have explicitly or implicitly excluded women or, at least, have not taken steps to guarantee their access to land. Even though all the national constitutions proclaim equal rights for men and women, most agrarian laws and/or civil legislation contain some discriminatory dispositions against women.

The right to property ownership is tied to norms related to an individual’s civil status. Where access to land is concerned, if a rural woman lacks the required civil status, she will not be able to buy, sell, or obtain credit. In countries such as Chile, Guatemala, the Dominican Republic, Nicaragua and some Mexican states, the husband is the administrator and representative of the joint ownership (some differences exist according to the terms of the marriage contract chosen).

The norms governing land inheritance vary from one country to another. In most cases, in the event of death of or desertion by the husband or companion, agrarian laws and/or civil codes do not fully and unconditionally recognize the right of a married woman or common-law wife to inherit land.

Even where legal reforms are essential to guarantee equal rights for men and women, they are not necessarily sufficient to facilitate women’s access to landownership. In fact, there are other barriers which may impose conditions on such access.

Example:
Legal aspects limiting women’s access to land in Cuba, Honduras, Nicaragua and the Dominican Republic

Women and agrarian laws

Agrarian laws in Nicaragua and Honduras recognize women’s rights to become direct beneficiaries of agrarian reforms. However, discriminatory norms in the civil and family codes which condition their access to land persist. Although both countries allow individual or collective deeds for land, in practice there are not many women who own them. Deeds are registered in the name of the person who files the claim (or in the name of the couple, if explicitly requested) and it is usually the man who presents himself to the relevant institutions, for cultural reasons and because, according to the civil code, it is he who represents the household. In Cuba, agrarian laws and norms contained in the codes state absolutely equal rights for both sexes. Although the Cuban female population represents the main beneficiary of agrarian reform in countries of the whole region, many more men own land (it is estimated that only 26 percent of beneficiaries of agrarian reform are women) and participate or hold managerial positions in the farming cooperatives. At the other end of the scale is the case of the Dominican Republic, whose agrarian reform law establishes that men are the beneficiaries and whose civil code limits women’s capacity by determining that the male is the head of the household and administrator of the entire estate.

Women, land and civil status

In these countries, the majority of couples in the rural sector live together without a formal marriage; although in Cuba, Honduras and Nicaragua, a woman who lives with her “companion” may benefit from the reform, as long as her relationship is recognized by a competent authority. Unfortunately, few couples go through such a formality. In the case of the Dominican Republic, the civil code does not recognize a consensual union.

Women, land and inheritance

The usual way for peasant women in the region to acquire access to land, apart from appropriation authorized by redistribution programmes or land deeds, is by inheritance caused by death. In Cuban and Honduran legislation, inheritance of land parcels which have been awarded by agrarian reforms, falls to the surviving companion at the time of death. However, in Nicaragua and the Dominican Republic, agrarian laws lack precise norms and, therefore, dispositions in the civil codes which do not recognize hereditary rights to the survivor apply. In the case of the Dominican Republic, the only reference contained in agrarian reform laws in this respect relates to a situation where the beneficiary dies before obtaining ownership deeds or abandons the home. Even when the wife has the possibility of accession to land with control over it as a result of these circumstances, the Dominican Institute for Agrarian Reform holds discretionary power in granting the inheritance. In fact, if there should be dispute among the heirs or if it were considered that the son was more able to comply with the contract, the woman may find herself deprived of the land.

Cultural limitations

Notwithstanding the historical, cultural, socio-economic, legal and institutional differences among the countries of the region, they all have a patriarchal culture which discriminates against women. Frequently, customs, traditions and attitudes that are deep-rooted in society influence laws and institutions towards not recognizing women as producers and preventing their access, on equal terms with men, to land and to services associated with production-related activities, such as credit, technical assistance and training.

Institutional limitations

The lack of tools designed with a gender perspective to strengthen women’s role as producers, the lack of updated surveys disaggregated by gender, the relative lack of personnel in the agrarian sector who are aware of the gender perspective and the unavailability of precise statistics reflecting the true contribution of women to the agricultural sector are some of the institutional barriers hindering women’s access to land.

Because of these and other limitations, those in charge of formulating and implementing development strategies cannot design programmes ensuring men’s and women’s equal participation in the production process and access to productive resources.

The Plan of Action for Women in Development (1996-2001) and the Beijing Platform for Action clearly reflect FAO’s interest in the subjects relating to women’s access to productive resources, including land. FAO has undertaken various actions in this context. For example, in the last few years the Women in Development Service (SDWW) has: provided technical assistance to improve the process of land registration (Honduras and Nicaragua); carried out studies on the legal status of rural women concerning land (Cuba, Honduras, Nicaragua and the Dominican Republic); and organized events to promote awareness, both with personnel in institutions and with members of the community in order to strengthen women’s productive role (Brazil and Panama). In addition, the Legal Office has assisted member countries in updating their legal knowledge on the position of rural women and in modifying laws on access to land ownership.

Recommendations

Merely introducing principles of equality into constitutions and in certain norms is not sufficient. It is necessary to establish a coherent legal framework and to create the basis and conditions for a legalized gender culture, among both the beneficiaries of the law and the institutions.

Likewise, it is essential to make fundamental changes in the cultural patterns and institutional mechanisms. so as to anticipate and ensure the access of rural women to land, aiming for a sustained increase in agricultural productivity, ensuring a more efficient land use and contributing to food security.

The modification of beliefs and customs is a long and complicated task. Therefore, it is necessary to invest resources and efforts to design ongoing, integral and long-term programmes that are geared to make community members, NGO personnel and institutional officials aware of the productive role played by women and the importance of their participation in rural development. At the same time, it is essential to dedicate human and financial resources to develop, promote and use all necessary means for the enforcement of programmes and development strategies that have a gender perspective.

Bibliography

Campillo, F. & Kleysen, B. 1996a. Productoras de alimentos en 18 países de América Latina y el Caribe: síntesis hemisférica. In Kleysen, B., ed. Productoras agropecuarias en América del Sur. San José, Costa Rica, IICA, Inter-American Development Bank.
FAO. 1987a. Situación de la mujer campesina frente a la legislación – estudio comparativo de Chile, Guatemala, Perú y República Dominicana en Mujeres campesinas en América Latina, by M.S. Alvear. Santiago, Chile.
FAO. 1987b. Acceso de la mujer a la tierra en América Latina. Panorama general y estudios de caso de Honduras y Colombia en mujeres campesinas en América Latina, by M. León, P. Prieto and M.C. Salazar. Santiago, Chile.
FAO. 1992. Situación jurídica de la mujer rural en diecinueve países en América Latina. Rome.
Fundación Arias para la Paz y el Progreso Humano. 1992. El acceso de la mujer a la tierra en Nicaragua. San José, Costa Rica.
Fundación Arias para la Paz y el Progreso Humano. 1996. El acceso de las mujeres a la tierra en Centroamérica. Centroamerican Workshop memorandum. San José, Costa Rica.
Galán, B. 1998. Aspectos jurídicos en el acceso de la mujer rural a la tierra en Cuba, Honduras, Nicaragua y la República Dominicana. Rome. (Preliminary draft)

For further information please contact:

Women in Development Service,
Women and Population Division
and Land Tenure Service,
Rural Development Division
Sustainable Development Department
Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations
Viale delle Terme di Caracalla, 00100 Rome, Italy
or visit the FAO Internet sites: www.fao.org/sd or www.fao.org/gender

I/ X2560E/ 1/ 9.99/ 2000