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Kenya: Gender and Land Tenure Specialist

Oct 17, 2024 | Landesa
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Grounded in the knowledge that having legal rights to land is a foundation for prosperity and opportunity, Landesa partners with governments and local organizations to ensure that those experiencing the most extreme forms of poverty have secure rights over the land they depend on. Founded as the Rural Development Institute in 1967, Landesa has helped more than 100 million families living in poverty gain legal control over their land.  With secure land rights, these families can eat better, earn more, educate their children, practice conservation, and achieve dignity for generations. For additional information, visit the Landesa website at www.landesa.org. 

About Stand for Her Land

Stand for Her Land (S4HL) is a global advocacy initiative for the accelerated implementation of women’s rights to land in practice. Women’s land rights are foundational to gender and climate justice, but women are frequently denied equal rights to land with men. Collective advocacy, led by grassroots women at local, national, and global levels, is a core solution to the challenges of women’s land rights, driving political will and supporting equitable, participatory transformation of land rights and governance. Landesa serves as the Secretariat of the S4HL Global Steering Committee, working in collaboration with 6 other global institutions to facilitate resourcing, coordination, and strategic direction for national S4HL Coalitions of grassroots and civil society actors in 9 countries.

About the Equal Stake in the Spoil Project

In 2021, Landesa was awarded a cooperative agreement by the United States Department of State to implement a four year project to strengthen and sustain the capacity of networked, women-driven civil society organizations (CSOs) in Bangladesh and Colombia, to create the enabling environment needed to recognize and promote women’s land rights (WLR) and improve sustainable land management (SLM), to further women’s economic empowerment (WEE) and climate justice. In 2024, the project was expanded to include Kenya until 2026.

Job Summary

The Gender and Land Tenure Specialist provides project leadership and gender expertise in the design, implementation, and learning related of S4HL in Kenya. This includes applying intersectional gender analysis to technical areas: legal and policy advocacy, communications and public advocacy, monitoring, evaluation, and learning, and social norms and behavior change interventions. The GLTS will manage S4HL’s work with government, grassroots, and civil society actors in Kenya to achieve increased implementation of women’s land rights in practice, including: access to and control of land in the context of communal property and natural resource settings; supporting stronger and more equitable inheritance rights for women and girls; gender-equitable rural land tenure security on customary land; a range of land rights formalization approaches that include a gender justice and intersectional approach; increased and equitable access to land markets for rural land rights holders; land administration and management that prioritizes equal representation and treatment for women and girls; equitable access to government extension programs; access to justice; gender-based violence prevention and mitigation; gender-just resolution of land and related natural resource disputes; and climate change impacts and mitigation and adaptation approaches that integrate gender-equitable tenure.  The S4HL model builds on existing initiatives and efforts to drive WLR implementation while ensuring that the voice, agency and leadership of grassroots women is surfaced, enhanced and prioritized to achieve the goal. The Gender and Land Tenure Specialist will provide project management leadership for the S4HL Coalition in Kenya, working with the Landesa Kenya team, the Global S4HL Secretariat, and the S4HL Coalition members. The Gender Specialist can also conduct gender analyses, drafts research and briefing papers, advisory memos, training modules, presentations, advocacy materials, and other products and participate in regional and global advocacy efforts focused on women’s land rights as a foundation for gender equality and climate justice. Reporting and relationships: The GLTS reports to the Kenya Program Director, with a dotted line relationship to the Center for Women’s Land Rights Director, who also serves as the Global Lead for S4HL. The GLTS is expected to work closely with Landesa regional and global teams for the success of the project.

Availability

The GLTS is expected to work a standard workweek of 40 hours, plus additional hours as necessary. The position may require domestic and international travel.

Essential Job Functions

  • Lead the “Equal Stake in the Soil” project team in Kenya, including overseeing annual workplan development and monitoring and oversight of subgrantee partners.
  • Facilitate development of a coalition of civil society actors in Kenya, in collaboration with the Landesa Kenya team, the Stand for Her Land (S4HL) team, and key land sector partners.
  • Facilitate collective development of a Coalition strategy; assess progress and results, identify problem areas, and take corrective steps to achieve S4HL and project objectives.
  • Rally CSO actors in Kenya to promote and strengthen the leadership, voice, and agency of grassroots women as central to all activities implemented by S4HL Kenya.
  • Perform research, analysis, and synthesis of topics and issues related to Landesa’s work in the country and region from a gender equality and intersectional perspective as needed, and collaborate with S4HL team to identify needs for research and analysis, and identify staff, consultants, or partners who can conduct it
  • Working with the Monitoring, Evaluation, and Learning (MEL) team, oversee fieldwork (key informant interviews, public meetings, workshops, surveys) to gather information about current land tenure conditions and prospects for gender transformational reform.
  • Work with the Coalition to develop gender-transformative policy, program and project recommendations that are useful and realistic.
  • Contribute to plans for implementing recommendations, including advocating for gender transformative approaches to be adequately integrated and resourced.
  • Orally present policy recommendations to government officials and other partners, answer questions and defend recommendations; progressively support grassroots women leaders within the Coalition to engage in policy advocacy as well.
  • Collaborate with foreign government officials, other counterpart country nationals, and international aid agencies, and corporations as needed to achieve S4HL objectives.
  • Support gender and women land rights mainstreaming across government programmes, strategies, policies and institutional processes.
  • Lead coalition partners and members in movement building and managing partners' relationships for the project's successful implementation.
  • Support key partners (Landesa sub grantees) to develop and implement local, regional, and international strategies to secure land and property rights for women particularly from a cultural and religious perspective.
  • Collaborate with the S4HL Global team to support engagement with regional and global advocacy arenas on gender and climate action.

Required Knowledge, Skills, and Abilities

  • A deep commitment to the mission of a better, safer future for the world’s poorest people through secure access to land.
  • Strong problem-solving skills.
  • Strong oral presentation skills and an ability to think on one's feet when defending policy recommendations.
  • Strong appreciation, understanding and commitment towards delivering initiatives that center grassroots women’s leadership as primary partners.
  • Familiarity with concepts that can be applied to rural development.
  • Knowledge of international and regional standards on women’s rights and gender equality and demonstrated experience identifying gender-based and intersectional constraints to accessing and claiming rights, particularly as relevant to land, property, and inheritance; ability to analyze gender impact of gender-neutral laws and to craft legal arguments for gender equality.
  • Familiarity with legal, economic, sociological, agricultural, political, institutional, geographic, and anthropological concepts and information to an extent sufficient to permit the Specialist to initiate, participate in and manage Landesa projects.
  • Ability to develop concrete work plans and manage elements so that work is performed according to agreed budgets and plans.
  • Ability to manage documents and correspondence, track, and report on project labor, and carry out other administrative tasks efficiently, routinely, and in conformance to Landesa standards and procedures.
  • Ability to work collaboratively with a range of people at all levels, including those from host country governmental and non-governmental organizations, and other counterparts, clients, and funders.
  • Ability to demonstrate cross-cultural sensitivity, tact, and poise.
  • Ability to lead and work collaboratively as a member of teams, regardless of role within the team, through consensus building, communication, and leadership.
  • Exceptional ability to communicate in writing and orally in English.
  • Ability to make and use distinctions as to types, frequency, tenor, and levels of communication, depending upon the circumstances and audience.
  • Legal right to work in the country of assignment.

Required Education and Experience

  • A master’s degree or advanced degree equivalent in a related field is required, i.e. law, agricultural economics, gender studies, [feminist] economics, sociology, geography, anthropology, or related field.
  • At least 5 years of experience of relevant international development work experience working at the intersection of gender and land tenure, engaging in policy research and in the design and implementation of projects, including significant focus on the types of thematic and geographic areas mentioned above; experience with climate change programming preferred.
  • Proven experience and understanding of working with local communities in implementation of past project/initiatives.
  • Priority will be given to professionals with strong communications skills and a demonstrated ability to work at a distance and take on a variety of assignments with a quick learning curve.
  • Experience in women’s land rights and application of gender in all aspects of project design and implementation.
  • Experience working in Latin America, Sub-Saharan Africa, Francophone Africa, and/or South Asia.
  • Experience working with land tenure issues, field experience in the Global South, and work experience with multilateral or bi-lateral international.

Physical and Environmental Conditions

Work is primarily performed indoors with some potential for exposure to safety and health hazards related to electronics work. This position does not require unusual demands for physical effort.  The noise level in the work environment is usually moderate.  Work environment involves everyday risks or discomforts that require normal safety precautions typical of places such as offices, meeting or training rooms, residences, or commercial vehicles, e.g., use of safe workplace practices with office equipment, and/or avoidance of trips and falls, and observance of fire regulations and traffic signals.

Work Environment and Working Conditions

While performing the duties of this job, the employee may be exposed to working conditions and hazards which are prevalent for the location and/or country of assignment.  The noise level in the work environment is usually moderate.  Work is primarily performed indoors with some potential for exposure to safety and health hazards related to electronics work.  The employee may be required to travel overseas and domestically.