How securing land rights is building women's resilience in Kenya

In pastoralist communities, women are responsible for finding and collecting water, managing the household and taking care of small livestock. They are hardest hit by the increasingly frequent droughts; often they have to walk long distances in the heat across unsafe areas to gather the water their families need.

Now women face a double crisis: climate change is making droughts more frequent, while large-scale land-based investments are taking over the land that is crucial to the grazing patterns that sustain their communities.

How drought and conflict are leaving families destitute

Across Kenya’s semi-arid regions, droughts are increasing herds’ vulnerability to disease and reducing meat and milk production. With animals in poor condition, livestock prices fall, and families are forced to sell at a loss. During extreme droughts, thousands of animals die, leaving families destitute.

Shrinking resources are intensifying conflicts as herders increasingly cross into neighbouring territories in search of water and pastures. Cattle raiding - a long-standing issue – has become more frequent and deadly. Armed cattle raiders steal livestock and injure and kill herders, often leaving women widowed and families without protection or income.

Land-based investments eroding community rights

Added to this is increasing pressure on land for development. In Baringo, much of the community's land is unregistered. It is "held in trust" by the county government; in practice, this has enabled large-scale investment projects to proceed with minimal consultation.

For example, Chinese investors are initiating ventures ranging from mining to making glue from donkey bones. A 2019 study found that often these investments bypass official scrutiny, operating "under the radar" of both the Kenyan and Chinese authorities. Local leaders are often implicated in backroom land deals, leaving communities confused and powerless.

For local residents, the consequences are stark. Moses Katewon, from Chemolingot in Baringo County, described how his family's ancestral land was taken for a sand factory:

The Community Land Act recognises communal land, but is it working?

Kenya's pastoralist communities are particularly vulnerable to land dispossession because for decades, they didn't have formal recognition of their customary land rights and their territories remained unregistered. In 2016, the government introduced the Community Land Act, formally recognising community land rights.

The act provides a legal framework for communities to register their land under communal tenure. It mandates Community Land Management Committees (CLMCs) to oversee land use and governance.

The act offers important safeguards against exploitation:

• Any lease, sale, or use of community land by outsiders requires free, prior and informed consent from the full community.
• Decisions about land must be made through the community assembly – a forum of all adult members – rather than just committee elites.
• Crucially, the law says at least one-third of CLMC members must be women.

Weak implementation undermines impact

But in counties like Baringo, implementation of the act has been slow, underfunded and politically contested. There is a lack of political will at both the national and county levels: until the communal territories are registered, governments remain custodians of community lands. County officials often resist registration so that they can strike deals with outside investors.

A decade after the act became law, the majority of land in Baringo remains unregistered, and communities continue to face an uphill battle to secure their rights.

In a worrying development, there are current proposals which seek to ease mechanisms for the compulsory land acquisition for large infrastructure projects.

Pastoralist women remain excluded

For women, the disconnect between the law's progressive provisions and on-the-ground realities is especially stark.

Despite their central role in managing household economies, women are shut out of land ownership and decision making, leaving them without legal recognition or ways to protect their livelihoods.

Even when community land is registered, women's names aren’t on community membership lists and they have no say in decisions about how the land is used.

Language barriers, low literacy and lack of information hinder women from claiming their rights, compounding their exclusion in a system that was meant to protect them.

A more positive story in Laikipia

Two hundred km to the north, in Laikipia North sub-county, a more positive story is emerging. There, 115 pastoralist communities have successfully completed the process of mapping and registering their communal ancestral lands.

GROOTS Kenya worked with Laikipia women to get them involved in the registration process. As a result, the registers that accompany each title deed list both women and men, women were supported to join and participate in CLMCs and annual updates to the registers ensure that women's names are retained and added over time.

Training for both women and men focused on the importance of including women in land governance, and local champions advocated for inclusive practices.

Secure land rights improve resource management

With secure land rights, Laikipia communities have established community bylaws to share natural resources. New water management bylaws help regulate access to river water, specifying how and when each group can draw water, reducing tensions and, crucially, improving access for women.

Laikipia North shows what is possible. When land registration is supported, inclusive and gender-responsive, it not only secures tenure, it also strengthens community cohesion, reduces conflict and enhances resilience to climate stress.

Kenya's Community Land Act offers a powerful legal framework to address these injustices. But without political will, investment and sustained support for communities, the Act risks being an unfulfilled promise. Kenya must move to real implementation and women must be supported to claim their rights and participate fully in the decisions that shape their futures.