“The document attached on “Rural Women’s Right to Food & Nutrition” was drafted as a Submission for CSW 62. BUT, it is a powerful sustainable statement on the realities of women and food issues, and indeed, applies to all women, well beyond rural. It is intersectional with multiple rights of women and girls. It links to the economic, social, and cultural rights, civil and political rights, that are inclusive in gender equality and social justice.
the document has different parts:
I. The global food economy has been both gender-blind and male-biased.
II. The livelihoods of rural women producers are particularly under threat.
III. Rural women workers are employed in all sector of the rural economy, yet lack access to decent work.
IV. Sexual and reproductive health and rights (SRHR) are central in women’s RTFN
V. Indigenous women and girls are most vulnerable and marginalized in many countries of the world, where they make up an important part of the rural population.
VI. Women’s rights have been historically isolated from the human RTFN within legally-binding language of key international human rights treaties.
below are the main demands for achieving women’s right to food and nutrition:
VII. Demands for achieving rural women’s RTFN.
1. Guarantee rural women producers’ access, control, management and ownership of all natural and productive resources on which they depend.
2. Recognize and support rural women’s knowledge, culture, traditions and practices (in relation to agriculture, fisheries, forestry, livestock rearing and other food producing sectors) and their ecological understanding and sustainable practices should inform the management and conservation of resources.
3. Guarantee and implement decent work for rural women workers based on existing international instruments in a non-discriminatory manner.
4. Guarantee that systems are put in place to ensure that rural women who engage in domestic work are seen as significantly contributing to the economy and receive social security benefits.
5. Recognize the “intertwined subjectivities” of woman and child during pregnancy, childbirth, and breastfeeding framed through the lens of women’s rights throughout their lifespan – especially women’s and girls’ rights to SRHR.
6. Introduce policies and laws that enable States to regulate and avoid any undue interference of for-profit or commercially-motivated non-state actors in rural women’s RTFN.
7. Guarantee the full implementation of the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.
8. Guarantee an adequate legal framework for the realization of rural women’s fundamental rights and freedoms based on the principles of equality and non-discrimination.
9. Ensure the independence and transparency of monitoring mechanisms in the context of the 2030 Agenda: these must be based on human rights, be free of any commercial or corporate undue influence and conflicts of interest, and ensure the full participation of the most affected by hunger and malnutrition, especially rural women.
10. Ensure the full realization of the RTFN of rural women within the framework of food sovereignty. ”
to read the full document, press the link below
CSW Written Submission _20171020
Rita Chemaly
Ritachemaly's Blog 