Socio-economic and cultural realities limiting agricultural women’s access to land in the commune of Zakpota in the Republic of Benin

Abstract

Despite their strong presence in agricultural production, very few women inherit or own land despite the existence of laws that give them full rights to do so. This paper aims to fill the gap of understanding of the factors that hinder access to land for agricultural women in the Commune of Zakpota in the Republic of Benin. To achieve this goal, we used socio-anthropological strategies to interview forty-six (46) women farmers and sixteen (16) men, heads of agricultural households, for data collection. The tools used for data collection were participant observation grid, survey questionnaire and an interview guide. Content-based analysis, access to and control of resources analysis, and constraints prioritizing grid were the methods used for data analysis. Results highlight several factors that hinder women farmers' access to land in the study area. In descending order of importance, these are: traditional norms and considerations related to access to land, women's poor purchasing power, women's low level of education, poor access to information and women's psychological predispositions shaped over time by their social activities and environment. Thus, this study has demonstrated that women's rights to land remain almost a taboo in Benin like in many other Sub-Saharan African countries. Therefore, relevant actions need to be taken to remedy this discriminatory vice in order to achieve sustainable development.