IMCS Pax Romana Solidarity Statement On 2020 International Day of Rural Women.

IMCS Pax Romana In Solidarity With Rural Women at their 2020 International Day With the theme: “Building rural women’s resilience in the wake of COVID-19”  for “building back better” by strengthening rural women’s sustainable livelihoods and wellbeing.

Rural women play a crucial role in agriculture, food security and nutrition, land and natural resource management, and rural enterprises. They have been at the front lines of responding to the pandemic even as their unpaid care and domestic work increased under lockdowns, mobility is restricted, supply chains are disrupted, and climate and conflict crises compound COVID-19 impacts.

Over the years, as a catholic student action movement, we have collaborated with rural women in our global actions in rural communities globally and by this solidarity statement, we do not only wish to identify with our partners in progress but most importantly to reaffirm our community in continuous collaborations and partnership with the rural women even at a time like this that Covid-19 have left our work not the same. 

The pandemic has greatly heightened the vulnerability of rural women’s rights to land and resources. Discriminatory gender norms and practices impede women’s exercise of land and property rights in most countries. Since women’s land rights are often dependent on their husbands, COVID-19 widows risk disinheritance. Women’s land tenure security is also threatened as unemployed migrants return to rural communities, increasing pressure on land and resources and exacerbating gender gaps in agriculture and food security.

Gender-responsive investments to expand basic infrastructure, healthcare and care services in rural areas have never been more critical that now. Bolstering women’s land rights in law and practice can help protect women from displacement and losing their sources of livelihood. This International Day of Rural Women is a key moment to galvanize action by all stakeholders to support rural women and girls to not only rebuild their lives after COVID-19 but increase their resilience to be better prepared to face future crises.