Women’s land rights in Uganda, including Karamoja

Oxfam commissioned a study on “Women’s land rights in northern Uganda (West Nile, Acholi, Lango, Teso and Karamoja)” (2014, 105pp) which was carried out by Christopher Burke & Doreen Nancy Kobusingye. They looked at how women in northern Uganda acquire, own, access, control and manage land, by interviewing about 1200 people, including pastoralist women in various ethnic groups. They found that customary land accounts for almost 99% of the land used by pastoralists, agropastoralists and crop farmers in northern Uganda, and most land in Karamoja is held communally. Both men and women have access rights to grazing land. Women also have access to gardens or cultivated areas allocated by patriarchs to married women. Strengthening customary institutions in relation to women’s land ownership and access rights appears to be the most effective way forward in the short and medium term. One recommendation is to help establish Communal Land Associations and communal land management schemes among pastoralist communities in cooperation with relevant government institutions as stipulated in the National Land Policy.

 

This and similar studies can be found on Oxfam’s website on Land Rights, in the section on the Horn, East & Central Africa.

Posted on 25 November 2018 in Pastoralism & Natural Resources, Pastoralism, Gender & Youth