• The Legal Assistance Centre (LCA) is a public-interest law firm based in Windhoek. It is funded by national and international donor organizations and by individuals. Its work is supervised by the Legal Assistance Trust, whose trustees include legal practitioners, other professionals and community leaders.
• It has four major units or projects which focus on different areas of work:
  a) the Human Rights and Constitutional Unit;
  b) the Gender Research & Advocacy Project;
  c) the Land, Environment and Development Project;
  d) the AIDS Law Unit (16).
• Through its Gender Research and Advocacy Project, has addressed women’s land rights in both communal and commercial land and laws pertaining to marriage, divorce and inheritance that affect women’s ownership of and control over property. Members of the organization are involved in government committees investigating law reforms in areas of inheritance and divorce (5). In 2001–2002, LAC undertook a project to explore issues related to cohabitation and the different marital property regimes existing in the country and to determine people’s concerns that might be addressed through law reforms conducive to gender equality in property matters (5).
• The LAC’s Land, Environment and Development Project (LEAD) and the Gender Advocacy and Research Project (GR&AP), published a study which examined the situation of widows in the north-central regions. It called for an aggressive information campaign to educate land right holders about their rights and to end property grabbing which continues to affect widows in these regions (11) (http://www.lac.org.na/about/default.html).
• The Namibia Development Trust (NDT) works to educate and empower rural women to challenge discriminatory traditions and customary practices dealing with access to land (5). Its main activities include: promoting natural resource management in communities; supporting community and youth responses against HIV/AIDS, poverty and unemployment; promoting and advocating for gender equality, working mainly with rural women; and mentoring and building capacity for community-based organizations (http://www.ndt.org.na/).
• The Namibia Housing Action Group (NHAG) is an umbrella organization formed in 1992 to assist low-income housing groups. Among its main objectives, NHAG supports members, including women, in negotiations over evictions, land issues and loans (14).
• The NHAG later restructured to become the support non-governmental organization for the newly created Shack Dwellers Federation of Namibia (SDFN). Residents in informal settlements in the country have been organizing savings groups since 1987 and in 1998 the savings groups came together as a nationwide network to form SDFN.
• By 2005, SDFN boasted savings groups in all 13 regions of the country with a total of around 300 different saving schemes and 15 000 households actively saving. Between 1999 and 2002, more than 1 000 households obtained land to develop. More than 2 000 households have obtained secure tenure through land negotiations and settlement developments with local authorities.(http://www.homeless-international.org/standard_1.aspx?id=0:384&id=0:276&id=0:262).
  
  

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• Along with community organizations and activists, the Legal Assistance Centre (LAC) has implemented an extensive national training programme to train paralegals. In 2001, the LAC initiated the Community Paralegal Volunteer Project with the aim of establishing a paralegal resource base in most parts of the country (14). LAC has been working with the Ministry of Women’s Affairs and Child Welfare to implement a project to sensitize and train local leaders about asset stripping and related challenges to women’s property rights (14).
• The Namibia Development Trust (NDT) has been providing training on advocacy and lobbying skills for women and it conducted research on attitudes towards property ownership and inheritance in communities. The findings of the research were integrated into scripts for street theatre and radio plays on property rights to spark community discussions and initiatives (5).
• The Ministry of Agriculture, Water and Rural Development (MAWRD), in collaboration with the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations and non-governmental organizations, has embarked on several measures aimed at enhancing agricultural extension capacity and outreach to communal farmers. The main purpose of the programme is to develop and strengthen extension services in agriculture. These services address female-headed households since they are the majority of households in rural areas. They include information, communication and advisory services to change some cultural perceptions and attitudes. The MAWRD has conducted several training workshops to sensitize extension officers on gender equality by equipping them with gender analysis skills. In order to increase the efficiency of extension services, 12 agricultural and rural development centres have been established all over the country (18).
• The Association of Women in Business (NNAWIB) strives to empower women through the promotion of small businesses. It has a paid–up membership of about 2 500 women. It offers training in basic business management and offers loans to women in small businesses (18).