Millions of Women Are Still Landless Despite Global Push for Gender Equality

Apr 26, 2019 | Zoe Tabary
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Millions of women worldwide are still unable to access and own land despite laws recognizing their rights, researchers and campaigners said on Monday as they urged countries to bridge the gap between policy and practice.

Patriarchal attitudes toward women and girls and a lack of knowledge of their own rights "prevent millions of women from owning land," said Victoria Stanley, senior rural development specialist at the World Bank.

"Only 30% of the world's population own land titles, and women are often the least likely to have any land registered," she told the Thomson Reuters Foundation on the sidelines of a World Bank conference in Washington, DC.