Publications

Platform of Action and Beijing Declaration. Fourth World Conference on Women, Beijing, People’s Republic of China
4-15 September 1995.

“Take gender impact into consideration in the work of the Commission on Sustainable Development and other appropriate United Nations bodies and in the activities of international financial institutions.” (para. 254 [a])

“Family disintegration, population movements between urban and rural areas within countries, international migrations, wars and internal displacements are factors contributing to female headed households.” (para. 21)

“Revise laws and administrative practices to ensure women’s equal rights and access to economic resources” (item A2)

“Generate and disseminate gender- disaggregated data and information for planning and evaluation.” (item H3)

“Take measures to integrate a gender perspective in the design and implementation of, among other things, environmentally sound and sustainable resource management mechanisms, production techniques and infrastructure development in rural and urban areas.”

Convention on the Elimination of All forms of Discrimination against Women, 1979

The Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women states that “States/Parties shall undertake all appropriate measures to eliminate discrimination against women in rural areas in order to ensure, on a basis of equality of men and women, that they participate in and benefit from rural development and, in particular, shall ensure to such women the right…(h) to enjoy adequate living conditions, particularly in relation to housing, sanitation, electricity and water supply, transport and communications.”

The Committee has focused its attention on the equal right of women to access, own, and inherit land, because this is a major factor affecting the situation of rural women. Concerns have been expressed on the negative impact of globalization and macroeconomic policies on the rural economy and on land distribution through market mechanisms in particular. Even in countries where the law provides equality between men and women with regard to land, the Committee cautions that prejudices and customary rights often hinder the implementation of the law.

The Committee has also been concerned about the need for equal treatment of women in various government schemes for housing allowances, state loans for housing, and access to credit, as well as equal provision of workers housing. The Committee encourages the States/Parties to give full attention to the needs of rural women and to ensure their active and participatory role in the design, implementation, and monitoring of all policies and programs that are intended to benefit them, particularly women who are heads of households and their families, in areas such as access to health and social services, income-generation projects, and housing.

The Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights

The Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights devoted a day of general discussion to the issue on the right to adequate housing at its fourth session in 1990, and in December 1991 the Committee at its sixth session adopted the General Comment No. 4 on the right to adequate housing.1 The General Comment reflects both the holistic conception of the right and the value it gains from the aspect of adequacy. The Committee guides States/Parties not to interpret the right to housing narrowly or restrictively as “merely having a roof over one’s head or…as a commodity. Rather it should be seen as the right to live somewhere in security, peace and dignity.” (para. 7)

Based on this broad interpretation, the General Comment identified seven aspects of the right to housing that determine “adequacy”: (a) legal security of tenure including legal protection against forced evictions; (b) availability of services, materials, facilities, and infrastructure; (c) affordability; (d) habitability; (e) accessibility for disadvantaged groups; (f) location; and (g) cultural adequacy. (para. 8)
In its sixteenth session in 1997, the Committee adopted General Comment No. 7 on forced eviction,2 which defined the term as “the permanent or temporary removal against their will of individuals, fami-lies and/or communities from the homes and/or land which they occupy, without the provision of, and access to, appropriate forms of legal or other protection.” (para. 3) General Comment No. 7 clarified the obligations of States/Parties to use “all appropriate means” in accordance with the Article 2.1 of the Covenant, and stated that “legislation against forced evictions is an essential basis upon which to build a system of effective protection.” (para. 9)

General Comment No. 6 (thirteenth session, 1995) on the economic, social, and cultural rights of the elderly emphasizes, inter alia, “…that housing for the elderly must be viewed as more than mere shelter and that, in addition to the physical, it has psychological and social significance which should be taken into account.” (para. 32)

1.Contained in document E/1992/23. Also available on the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) website.
2.Contained in document E/1998/22, annex IV. Also available on the OHCHR website.