• Contact: ​Sserwanga Hadijah
  • Address: ​​P.O BOX 121, KYOTERA UGANDA​
  • Phone: ​​+256758585008​
  • Email: cowebuganda@gmail.com
  • Members:
    COWEB

COWEB

​​COALITION OF WOMEN ECONOMIC EMPOWERMENT beyond BORDERS​

Member since: 2024

Working towards these commitments

Respect, protect and strengthen the land rights of women and men living in poverty, ensuring that no one is deprived of the use and control of the land on which their well-being and human dignity depend, including through eviction, expulsion or exclusion, and with compulsory changes to tenure undertaken only in line with international law and standards on human rights.
1

Secure Tenure Rights

Ensure equitable land distribution and public investment that supports small-scale farming systems, including through redistributive agrarian reforms that counter excessive land concentration, provide for secure and equitable use and control of land, and allocate appropriate land to landless rural producers and urban residents, whilst supporting smallholders as investors and producers, such as through cooperative and partnership business models.
2

Strong Small-Scale Farming Systems

Recognize and protect the diverse tenure and production systems upon which people’s livelihoods depend, including the communal and customary tenure systems of smallholders, indigenous peoples, pastoralists, fisher folks, and holders of overlapping, shifting and periodic rights to land and other natural resources, even when these are not recognized by law, and whilst also acknowledging that the well-being of resource-users may be affected by changes beyond the boundaries of the land to which they have tenure rights.
3

Diverse Tenure Systems

Ensure gender justice in relation to land, taking all necessary measures to pursue both de jure and de facto equality, enhancing the ability of women to defend their land rights and take equal part in decision-making, and ensuring that control over land and the benefits that are derived thereof are equal between women and men, including the right to inherit and bequeath tenure rights.
4

Equal land rights for women

Respect and protect the inherent land and territorial rights of indigenous peoples, as set out in ILO Convention 169 and the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, including by recognizing that respect for indigenous knowledge and cultures contributes to sustainable and equitable development and proper management of the environment".
5

Secure territorial rights for Indigenous Peoples

Enable the role of local land users in territorial and ecosystem management, recognizing that sustainable development and the stewardship of ecosystems are best achieved through participatory decision-making and management at the territorial-level, empowering local land users and their communities with the authority, means and incentives to carry out this responsibility.
6

Locally-managed ecosystems

Ensure that processes of decision-making over land are inclusive, so that policies, laws, procedures and decisions concerning land adequately reflect the rights, needs and aspirations of individuals and communities who will be affected by them. This requires the empowerment of those who otherwise would face limitations in representing their interests, particularly through support to land users' and other civil society organizations that are best able to inform, mobilize and legitimately represent marginalized land users, and their participation in multi-stakeholder platforms for policy dialogue.
7

Inclusive decision-making

Ensure transparency and accountability, through unhindered and timely public access to all information that may contribute to informed public debate and decision-making on land issues at all stages, and through decentralization to the lowest effective level, to facilitate participation, accountability and the identification of locally appropriate solutions
8

Transparent and accessible information

Prevent and remedy land grabbing, respecting traditional land use rights and local livelihoods, and ensuring that all large-scale initiatives that involve the use of land, water and other natural resources comply with human rights and environmental obligations and are based on: the free, prior and informed consent of existing land users; a thorough assessment of economic, social, cultural and environmental impacts with respect to both women and men; democratic planning and independent oversight; and transparent contracts that respect labour rights, comply with social and fiscal obligations and are specific and binding on the sharing of responsibilities and benefits. Where adverse impacts on human rights and legitimate tenure rights have occurred, concerned actors should provide for, and cooperate in, impartial and competent mechanisms to provide remedy, including through land restitution and compensation.
9

Effective actions against land grabbing

Respect and protect the civil and political rights of human rights defenders working on land issues, combat the stigmatization and criminalisation of peaceful protest and land rights activism, and end impunity for human rights violations, including harassment, threats, violence and political imprisonment
10

Protected land rights defenders

Mission

​​To promote, enhance the active participation of women, youth and vulnerable groups in community based initiatives that result in improved human well- being and social equity while significantly reducing on environmental risks and ecological scarcities

Objectives

​​To promote climate smart agro-ecological practices and innovations for strengthening community climate change adaptation and mitigation among small holder farmers and agro-pastoralists.

​Promote value addition of local materials and products of comparative advantages and create market linkages regionally.

​To influence decision making for mainstreaming climate change adaptation strategies and land use in development plans at local, district and national levels

Constituencies

​​Coalition of Women Economic Empowerment beyond Borders (COWEB Uganda) is an umbrella organization of small holder farmers and producer cooperatives mainly dealing in agribusiness and climate smart agriculture. It operates as a social enterprise, innovating in business solutions to rural poverty and cross border livelihood challenges. Its mandate is on empowerment of women and youth groups to increase their real power over socio-economic decisions that influence their lives and priorities in society.

  • Contact: ​Sserwanga Hadijah
  • Address: ​​P.O BOX 121, KYOTERA UGANDA​
  • Phone: ​​+256758585008​
  • Email: cowebuganda@gmail.com
  • Members:
    COWEB