Source: The New Dawn
In commemoration of International Women’s Day, 8 March, the third regional workshop on gender, climate change, and land and forest tenures in Africa will take place in Monrovia under the auspices of REFACOF or African Women's Network for Community Management of Forests, the Foundation for Community Initiatives and the Rights and Resources Initiative.

According to a dispatch, the regional workshop will bring together more than 50 participants from 16 African countries along with donors, development partners, and issue experts.

Following the conference, a rally and parade involving over 150 women from across the Liberian countryside will be greeted by President Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf, who will also receive the outcomes of the conference.

In Liberia, as in most Central and West African countries, indigenous peoples and local communities do not own the land and forests on which they have lived and cultivated for generations. Instead, government claims ownership instead.

As Liberia moves towards adopting a new policy on land ownership, a according to the dispatch, many customary traditions do not yet respect the rights and abilities of women in land governance and, as currently written, Liberia’s proposed land reform policy has no safeguards for women.

Last year,  the dispatch said, Liberian President Sirleaf made an unprecedented promise to Liberian women, stating: “Women will have the full right to own their land like anyone else.”

The regional women's group expressed hope that if the president’s promise came to pass, it could propel equality across the region, as Cameroon, Cote D’Ivoire, Democratic Republic of the Congo and Senegal are just beginning their land reform processes.

Officials expected at the conference include Liberia’s Gender Minister Julia Duncan-Cassell; REFACOF President Cecile Ndjebet of Cameroon, Julie T. B. Weah, Executive Director, Foundation for Community Initiatives or FCI, Liberia; and Solange Bandiaky-Badji, Africa Regional Director, Rights and Resources Initiative.

The release noted that the majority of Liberia’s agricultural labor force, producing approximately 60 percent of the nation’s agricultural products, conduct 80 percent of trading activity in rural areas, and play a vital role in linking rural and urban markets through their informal networks.

But it said the legal protections for women provided by Liberia’s current laws lack teeth, and women also have an unequal say in the decisions made by customary governments in managing land and forest resources.

“Any efforts to alleviate poverty and address land rights reform in Liberia must include special protections for women so that true equality and economic progress can take root and prosper,” the release said.

Following the official program at the Krystal Ocean View Hotel in Mamba Point, Monrovia, the rally will begin on Ashmun Street and would end at the Antoinette Tubman Sport Stadium or ATS on United Nations Drive.

The Rights and Resources Initiative or RRI is a global coalition of 13 Partners and over 140 international, regional and community organizations advancing forest tenure, policy and market reforms. RRI is coordinated by the Rights and Resources Group, a non-profit organization based in Washington, DC.

It leverages the strategic collaboration and investment of its partners and collaborators around the world. Formally established in 2010, the Network of African Women for Community Forest Management or REFACOF is a network created by 45 women from eight countries in West and Central Africa.

On a regional scale, the REFACOF is devoted to collective action by African women to cope with the social, political, legislative and economic issues related to forest management in Africa.

The Foundation for Community Initiatives or FCI, founded in Liberia in 2004, works with women groups in rural forest communities to help them gain a voice in how natural resources in their communities are managed.

• Liberia