Organization: NRMABCDS

Project title: Enhancing Women’s capacity to contribute to the Constitutional Review process on the Rights of women to own and control land and Natural resources management good governance Organization: NRMABCDS

Thematic Areas Natural Resources Management (NRM) good governance Women Rights to own and control Land and property

Introduction Natural resources (land, sold minerals- i.e. gold, diamonds, bauxite, zircon; forests; natural gas, oil and waters-i.e. lakes, rivers and sea) have an undeniable impact on the life of a state: they affect the economy, its wealth, institutions, its social and political agendas. A constitution is a crucial part of the governance of natural resources: creating institutions, establishing basic rules for markets, income distribution, transparent systems and management of natural resources for the benefits of citizens and the state.

Key challenges • Mismanagement, lack of accountability, or unfairness in the sharing of the benefits arising from natural resources • Definition of stakeholder for purpose of allocation of revenues from natural resources • Definition of right of property ownership of natural resources: communal and customary rights, private ownership, state ownership etc

Challenges …… • Definition of governing bodies (national and provincial levels of government) who should have the authority to make and administer laws relating to the development and exploitation of natural resources (i.e. taxation, royalty ,employment practices, safety and environmental standards, labour laws, import and export permits and tariffs, etc. for development of the natural-resources sector

Challenges…. Establishment of clear framework for the treatment of natural resources revenues (i.e. transparent and fair generation, collection and sharing of natural-resource revenues) • Allocation based on right to directly collect certain types of revenues by a state or local government • Collection of revenues into a single account and then sharing by all stakeholders (Formula-Based revenue sharing)

Challenges …… • Delineation of territorial boundaries to address the issue of resources which traverse national and district boundaries such as water, Marine resources, Oils and natural gases • Land accessibility and the Land tenure system particularly for case of women in Sierra Leone

Challenges ….. • Free, prior and informed consent of the indigenous people on land natural resources use and management • Land grabbing in Sierra Leone (giving away land to investors on abusive or unfair terms and large scale production of non-food agricultural commodities creates little employment and food for the local people

Activities • Conducting consultative meetings and focus group discussion; • In the process, facilitating the generation and collecting ideas, suggestion and others matters as contribution to the Constitutional Review process

Methodology The field officers will organise and conduct consultative meetings/focus group discussions at community level; Small groups of participants maximum 10, will include communities and traditional leaders, women, and youth groups, CSOs, Local councils, NGOs and representatives of relevant Ministries

Geographical Coverage • The activity will be carried out in 7 District (3 in the Northern and 4 in the Southern) Province • 36 chiefdoms in Northern Province • 54 chiefdoms in the Southern Province • Targeted population of 1,773 in the Northern province • Targeted population of 2,666 in the Southern Province

Project contribution to the CR process By engaging communities, traditional leaders, women and youth groups to the CR process on land and natural resources good governance best practices, the project will lead to inclusiveness in the constitutional review process It will lead to generation of ideas and debate of the best frameworks, systems and mechanisms for managing natural resources to be included in the constitution

Contribution… By engaging CSOs, Local councils, NGOs, relevant MDAs in the project area, the project will be laying a foundation for implementation of the national constitution as well as a sustainability strategy for the program

END Thank you.

Organization: NRMABCDS