International Women's Day 2025 - Accelerating Action for Change - Part Two

At Sahara, our commitment to environmental and cultural preservation has long been intertwined with the work of The Gaia Foundation. Through our enduring partnership, we have supported Earth’s best custodians to restore social and ecological justice. Gaia are members of the African Earth Jurisprudence Collective along with the Earthlore Foundation: a movement restoring ancestral knowledge for land and community stewardship. Together, we continue to uplift the voices of women who are leading the way in restoring balance between humanity and nature.

Mashudu Takalani is an Earth Jurisprudence Practitioner from South Africa. After completing The Gaia Foundation’s Trainings for Transformation, she joined the African Earth Jurisprudence Collective, a movement committed to restoring ecological and cultural diversity. Her journey is one of resilience - returning to her ancestral home in Mazwimba village as a young widow with her son, she embraced her roots and took on the challenge of revitalising local food sovereignty and community unity.

Since 2017, Mashudu has been at the forefront of initiatives that not only safeguard indigenous knowledge but also empower her community to thrive in harmony with nature. Her work embodies the spirit of EarthLore, an organisation dedicated to accompanying rural communities in reclaiming their traditions and strengthening their resilience in the face of climate change.

As we honour the contributions of women like Mashudu, we recognise their role as guardians of the land, culture, and future generations. Their stories remind us that true sustainability is deeply rooted in traditional wisdom and collective strength.

Part Two – Accelerating Action for Change

In this part, we highlight the initiatives and projects that the EarthLore Foundation is leading to make positive, lasting change in local communities, accelerating action toward sustainability, and promoting ecological resilience.

Across the world, women play a crucial yet often unrecognised role in agriculture, food security, and ecological stewardship. As climate change intensifies, it is more important than ever to support their leadership, knowledge, and contributions to sustainable farming practices. In Part Two, we explore the initiatives and projects that EarthLore is leading to create lasting change in local communities - reviving traditional knowledge, strengthening food sovereignty, and accelerating action toward sustainability and ecological resilience.

Why is it crucial to involve women and girls in sustainable agriculture and food security, especially in the face of climate change?

Through my dialogues with women elders, they recall that, traditionally, women and girls understood the importance of diversifying their crops for both nutritional and spiritual reasons. This deep connection with the land enables them to cultivate a variety of crops that not only sustain their physical health but also align with their cultural practices and beliefs. By observing natural indicators, elders can make informed decisions about planting and harvesting, ensuring a bountiful yield. This knowledge has traditionally been passed down through generations, reinforcing their role as stewards of their wider ecosystems. However, colonisation and modernisation have severely eroded this practice, and our work together focuses on restoring it.

Women and girls also play a crucial role in preserving and promoting agricultural biodiversity. Their involvement ensures the safeguarding of diverse ecosystems for future generations while fostering community resilience and food sovereignty in the face of changing climate conditions.

What are the biggest barriers women farmers face today, particularly in Africa, when it comes to preserving seed diversity and practicing agroecology?

Loss of intergenerational knowledge transfer is leading to a disconnection from traditional practices that are essential for preserving traditional seed diversity and sustainable farming, based on traditional farming practices augmented by agroecology. Without understanding the customary laws and cycles celebrated in rituals and ceremonies, communities are at risk of losing valuable interventions that contribute to environmental balance and climate resilience. Reconnecting and reviving these traditions is crucial for preserving biodiversity and ensuring food sovereignty for future generations of all species, especially in the context of climate change.

It is essential to acknowledge and support the vital role women also play in maintaining the fabric of society. Currently, many women in Africa are overburdened with too much responsibility. There is a large proportion of domestic work done by women, such as caring for the children, the sick and the elderly, providing the food and cooking for the family, cleaning, fetching water, collecting firewood, etc that is invisible and not valued in any way, including economically. The absence of support networks exacerbated by climate change and community fragmentation makes it challenging, if not impossible, for women to balance these responsibilities. Many rural women do not have the time or energy to dedicate to sharing their knowledge and preserving seed diversity and farming. 

Balance can be restored and work can be more equally and equitably distributed when appropriate traditional governance systems are revived that build community cohesiveness, mutual respect and clarity on the roles and responsibilities of all members of the community. This encourages intergenerational learning and a deep appreciation of the value of robust traditional seed diversity and the practice of agroecology, as well as women’s role as custodians.

With the International Women’s Day 2025 theme being #AccelerateAction, what specific actions or policies do you believe must be prioritised to support women in agriculture and ensure food sovereignty?

It is my belief that supporting small scale farmers to produce their own food using resilient traditional seeds will ensure food sovereignty in the long term. The revival of staples, like the various millet varieties, sorghum and traditional maize to replace hybrid and GMO maize, changed their lives. It is crucial to assist farmers to diversify their crops. This is effectively done through seed and food fairs that promote the wider spread of traditional seeds to ensure sustainability and resilience against climate change. Farmers are enabled to improve their yields and adapt to changing environmental conditions, ultimately securing their livelihoods. EarthLore has witnessed this with all the farming communities we accompany in South Africa and Zimbabwe.

In addition to sourcing appropriate seed, soils that are damaged and degraded through decades of using chemicals, need to be rebuilt with homemade compost that puts back vital organic matter into the soil. This is combined with liquid fertilisers using animal manure.

Farmers soon realise that they need to take responsibility for healing the wider landscape that has been eroded over the years through overgrazing and poor stormwater management. To help to control and combat erosion, and to recharge the water table, farmers need to be shown how to dig contours and create swales to slow down the flow of water and store it in the ground,

Part of intergenerational knowledge sharing involves educating youth about traditional food and the value of eating a wide variety of fresh home grown produce. It has become common for shops to only sell food. Women and youth start losing the connection to how food is produced and the knowledge of diversifying and preparing traditional food. Elders and traditional healers also know about medicinal plants used to treat many ailments. This takes communities beyond food sovereignty to become increasingly sovereign over their health and well-being.

It is important to remember that traditional seeds are not only food but are widely used in many African traditions to perform important rituals and ceremonies linked to seasonal cycles associated with agricultural practices.

How can land rights policies be reformed to better support women’s access to land and resources?

 In many African communities, access to land and resources is controlled by the chief and village headmen and exclude women. Land rights policies need to be reformed to ensure that women access/own the traditional family land they are farming and living on, usually with their children. This right should apply even after the death of a husband or a father. Single, unmarried women should also have a right to access/own land. 

Fortunately, in the communities EarthLore accompanies, men and women have the same rights to land. Village headmen, with the permission of their chiefs, are traditionally the ones to allocate land. There are many farmers who specialise in crop farming and also farm with livestock. Initially, households are allowed to buy one hectare of land for their crops. After some time of observing the way the land is farmed, they can increase the hectare to two hectares. A small contribution can be made towards traditional ceremonies that happen in these rural communities. There are different amounts of hectares for grazing that are leased to several households for a particular period of time, after which, they can pass it on to others. This type of  grazing area is available to both men and women.

For those looking to support women in agriculture this International Women’s Day, what tangible steps can they take to help accelerate action and drive real change?

EarthLore’s work is focussed on farming communities we accompany in South Africa and Zimbabwe. It is difficult for EarthLore to suggest tangible steps to accelerate and drive real change at an international level but we believe the local action we are engaged in has a global impact through our networks.

The action we would like to suggest is to hold a celebration for nine decades of women on Women’s Day in South Africa, which is celebrated on 9th August. The day commemorates an important historic event, in 1956, when over 20,000 women marched to the Union Buildings in Pretoria, the seat of the apartheid government, to protest against legislation aimed at tightening the apartheid government's control over the movement of black women in urban areas. This march from Soweto, the main township where most Black people lived, took over 18 hours one way. It demonstrated the courage, determination and strength of the women and had a major impact. Women took on this challenge and men looked on in awe and admiration.

EarthLore works with mainly women farmers who range from teenagers to 90 years old. As these women become empowered and more confident, they manage to organise local seed and food fairs and invite other farming communities and government officials to attend. These gatherings encourage the women farmers to share their work in agroecology and their traditional knowledge, as well as exchange and share seeds. They also use fresh produce from their gardens and fields to prepare traditional food to serve at the event. These are important opportunities for young farmers to understand the value of traditional seed and inspire them to continue the tradition of farming.

For the next Women’s Day celebration in South Africa, on 9 August 2025, EarthLore would like to organise a gathering, similar to a seed and food fair, where 9 passionate women farmers from each farming community we accompany, would be invited to send a representative of each of the decades, e.g.. One teenager, one woman in her 20s, one woman in her 30s, all the way to one woman in her 90s. They would be invited to share what it means to be a woman farmer at each of their respective ages, focussing on challenges as well as benefits, and what advice they would give to other women farmers. We see this as a way to celebrate women and girls of all ages in agriculture and to inspire and empower them to become leaders in their communities and beyond. We anticipate that this could become an annual event on EarthLore’s calendar.

By addressing systemic barriers, empowering women farmers, and advocating for policies that recognise their rights to land and resources, we can drive meaningful transformation in agriculture. As we move forward, let us commit to amplifying the voices of women in agriculture, protecting their invaluable traditional knowledge, and taking tangible steps to support their efforts. Together, we can accelerate action for change and build a future where women farmers thrive, biodiversity is safeguarded, and food sovereignty is secured for many generations to come.

For further information about the organisations referenced, see links below:

EarthLore Foundation

African Earth Jurisprudence Collective

Gaia Foundation