Southern Africa Rural Women's Assembly

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Southern Africa Rural Women's Assembly The Rural Women’s Assembly (RWA) is a self-organised network or alliance of rural women in Africa.

The Rural Women’s Assembly (RWA) is a self-organised network or alliance of national rural women’s movements, assemblies, grassroots organisations and chapters of mixed peasant unions, federations and movements across eight countries in the SADC region. Over a period of four years, we have gathered together poor, rural women into regional Rural Women’s Assemblies; into international platforms coinciding with major multi-lateral events, such as COP 17 and Rio +20; and into regional lobbying processes that have run parallel to SADC meetings, as well. National chapters of the RWA have also organised their own lobbying events and activities to coincide with important national meetings, summits and on international days, such as International Rural Women’s Day and International Women’s Day.

🌿 Day 2: Agroecology Feminist School in Lesotho 💜Today’s learning focused on climate change, El Niño and climate change ...
05/08/2026

🌿 Day 2: Agroecology Feminist School in Lesotho 💜

Today’s learning focused on climate change, El Niño and climate change adaptation. Participants reflected on how changing rainfall patterns, droughts and extreme weather affect rural women, food production and community livelihoods.

The discussions highlighted agroecology, indigenous knowledge and women’s leadership as essential pathways for building climate-resilient communities.

Stay tuned for more updates from the school.

🌿 The Agroecology Feminist School is underway in Lesotho! 💜From 2 to 8 August, rural women from across Southern Africa a...
03/08/2026

🌿 The Agroecology Feminist School is underway in Lesotho! 💜

From 2 to 8 August, rural women from across Southern Africa are gathering to exchange knowledge, strengthen solidarity and advance agroecology in a time of growing food insecurity.

Stay tuned for updates, stories and key moments from the school.

RWA FEMINIST AGROECOLOGY SCHOOL 2026The Rural Women’s Assembly is pleased to announce that this year’s Feminist Agroecol...
22/07/2026

RWA FEMINIST AGROECOLOGY SCHOOL 2026

The Rural Women’s Assembly is pleased to announce that this year’s Feminist Agroecology School will take place in Lesotho from 2 to 8 August 2026 under the theme:

🌱 “Agroecology in the Time of Growing Food Insecurity”

The school will bring together rural women, farmers and agroecology practitioners from across Southern Africa to reflect on the growing food crisis and strengthen community led solutions rooted in agroecology. Participants will engage in practical learning and exchanges on seed sovereignty, soil restoration, organic fertiliser production, biological pest control, water conservation, climate resilience and farmers’ rights. The school will also create space for rural women to share knowledge, learn from one another and strengthen collective action for healthier, fairer and more resilient food systems. At a time when communities are facing rising food prices, climate shocks and increasing dependence on costly agricultural inputs, the Agroecology School will affirm the knowledge, leadership and solutions of rural women.

📍 Lesotho
📅 2 to 8 August 2026

https://www.ruralwomensassembly.org/agroecology-in-the-time-of-growing-food-insecurity-rural-women-gather-in-lesotho/

Agroecology is our pathway to food sovereignty, resilience and dignity.

🌍 Webinar Invitation | Cultivating Change: Women Reclaiming and Transforming Food SystemsAs part of the International Ye...
19/06/2026

🌍 Webinar Invitation | Cultivating Change: Women Reclaiming and Transforming Food Systems

As part of the International Year of the Woman Farmer, we are pleased to invite you to the second session of the international webinar series “Cultivating Change: Women Reclaiming and Transforming Food Systems.”

This webinar series is jointly organised by GIZ FemHub, UN Women National Committee Germany, and Rural Women’s Assembly (RWA).

For RWA, this space is important because it brings forward the voices, lived realities and solutions of rural women farmers who continue to defend land rights, food sovereignty, seed justice and climate justice across communities and movements.

📌 Webinar 2: Structural Barriers and Gender Inequalities in Food Systems
📅 Date: Monday, 22 June 2026
⏰ Time: 14:00 – 15:30 SAST
🌍 Language: English

This session will explore the structural barriers faced by women farmers, including access to land, seed and decision-making. It will also reflect on how the climate crisis affects women differently.

Speakers will share practical experiences, women-led solutions and reflections on what it means to transform seed and food systems from the ground up.

🔗 Register here:
https://us02web.zoom.us/meeting/register/MOD7oCdESriMV7EmzJe-9A

📖 Read more about the webinar series:
https://unwomen.de/international-year-of-the-women-farmer-2026-webinar-series/

Let us continue cultivating change by centering the leadership, knowledge and resilience of women farmers.

🌱 DAY 3 | WE HAVE ANSWERS: FROM DIALOGUE TO ACTIONToday marks the final day of the Rural Women's Assembly Southern Afric...
09/06/2026

🌱 DAY 3 | WE HAVE ANSWERS: FROM DIALOGUE TO ACTION

Today marks the final day of the Rural Women's Assembly Southern Africa Consultative Dialogue, "We Have Answers: Building Resilient Food Systems."

Over the past two days, rural women from across Southern Africa have shared powerful stories of resilience, seed sovereignty, agroecology, climate adaptation, and community-led solutions. We have heard directly from the women who are feeding communities, protecting biodiversity, preserving indigenous knowledge, and building alternatives to failing food systems.

Today, we turn these experiences into collective demands and policy recommendations.

As we celebrate the International Year of the Woman Farmer, we reaffirm that rural women are not victims of climate change and food insecurity—they are leaders, innovators, seed custodians, and solution builders.

📢 Our message remains clear: We are not waiting for answers. We Have Answers.

Together, we call for: 🌾 Secure access to land and natural resources
🌱 Recognition and protection of farmer-managed seed systems
🌍 Greater investment in agroecology and climate justice
👩🏾‍🌾 Meaningful participation of rural women in decision-making
🤝 Policies that support food sovereignty and community resilience

The dialogue may be ending, but the movement continues.

🌱 Learning From One Another, Growing TogetherOne of the most powerful moments of the RWA Consultative Dialogue has been ...
08/06/2026

🌱 Learning From One Another, Growing Together

One of the most powerful moments of the RWA Consultative Dialogue has been the parallel learning sessions, where rural women from across Southern Africa have come together to teach, learn, and share practical knowledge.

From seed saving and seed multiplication, to building community seed banks, agroforestry, bio-fertilisers, pest control, and value addition, sisters are sharing skills rooted in lived experience and generations of knowledge.

These sessions remind us that some of our greatest teachers are each other. Every seed saved, every technique shared, and every lesson passed on strengthens our collective ability to build resilient food systems.

As rural women, we know that knowledge grows when it is shared. When one woman learns, an entire community benefits. When one sister teaches another, resilience spreads across borders.

🌾 Teaching one, reaching many. 🌾 Learning together, growing together. 🌾 We Have Answers.

🌱 DAY 2 | WE HAVE ANSWERS: BUILDING RESILIENT FOOD SYSTEMSToday, our voices take centre stage.Across Southern Africa, wo...
08/06/2026

🌱 DAY 2 | WE HAVE ANSWERS: BUILDING RESILIENT FOOD SYSTEMS

Today, our voices take centre stage.

Across Southern Africa, women continue to confront the realities of climate change, food insecurity, land dispossession, water scarcity, biodiversity loss, and shrinking seed systems. Yet despite these challenges, rural women are not standing still. They are organising, saving seeds, restoring ecosystems, producing food, and building resilient communities.

Day 2 of the Rural Women's Assembly Consultative Dialogue focuses on listening to these experiences and learning from the solutions women are already implementing through agroecology, seed sovereignty, collective action, and indigenous knowledge.

As women from 11 countries share their stories, one message continues to resonate across the region:

We are not waiting for solutions. We are already creating them.

Today is about speaking truth, sharing experiences, influencing policy, and ensuring that the voices of rural women help shape the future of food systems in Africa.

🌾 Our stories matter. 🌾 Our knowledge matters. 🌾 Our solutions matter.

🌱 DAY 1 | WE HAVE ANSWERS: BUILDING RESILIENT FOOD SYSTEMSToday, rural women leaders, policymakers, researchers, and par...
07/06/2026

🌱 DAY 1 | WE HAVE ANSWERS: BUILDING RESILIENT FOOD SYSTEMS

Today, rural women leaders, policymakers, researchers, and partners from across Southern Africa gather in Pretoria, South Africa, for the opening of the Rural Women’s Assembly High-Level Dialogue.

Held during the International Year of the Woman Farmer this dialogue is rooted in a simple powerful truth: rural women already have answers.

Across our region, women are protecting indigenous seeds, practising agroecology, restoring ecosystems, feeding communities, and building resilience in the face of climate change and food insecurity.

Day One focuses on sharing grassroots innovations, celebrating women as guardians of land, life, and seeds, and creating space for meaningful dialogue between communities and policymakers.

As we begin this important journey together, we reaffirm that the solutions to the food, climate, and biodiversity crises already exist within our communities.

🌾 We are not waiting for answers.
🌾 We are growing them.
🌾 We Have Answers.

🌍 Africa Day: No African Is a Foreigner in AfricaAs we mark Africa Day, the Rural Women’s Assembly stands in solidarity ...
25/05/2026

🌍 Africa Day: No African Is a Foreigner in Africa

As we mark Africa Day, the Rural Women’s Assembly stands in solidarity with Rural Women’s Assembly South Africa against the ongoing xenophobia that continues to divide our communities and threaten the dignity and safety of African people.

Africa Day reminds us that our struggles are shared. Poverty, unemployment, hunger, climate crisis and inequality are not caused by migrants or refugees. They are the result of unjust systems, weak leadership and economies that fail ordinary people.

As rural women, peasants and food producers, we reject hatred and violence. No African is our enemy. Our enemies are hunger, inequality, landlessness, corporate greed and the politics of division.

Today, we call for unity, dignity and justice across Africa.

No to xenophobia | Yes to African unity | Yes to justice for all.

🌱 WHY THIS DIALOGUE MATTERS 🌱Across Southern Africa, rural women continue to face the harsh realities of the climate cri...
13/05/2026

🌱 WHY THIS DIALOGUE MATTERS 🌱

Across Southern Africa, rural women continue to face the harsh realities of the climate crisis every day.Droughts, floods, rising food prices, disappearing indigenous seeds, and growing food insecurity.

But even in the midst of these challenges, rural women are already leading solutions. From saving indigenous seeds and practising agroecology to restoring soils and strengthening community resilience, women across our region are building sustainable food systems from the ground up.

Our upcoming Consultative Dialogue: “We Have Answers; Building Resilient Food Systems” is more than just a meeting. It is a space to amplify grassroots solutions, strengthen solidarity, influence policy, and affirm that the answers to the climate and food crises already exist within our communities.

📍 University of Pretoria, South Africa
📅 7–9 June 2026

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Pretoria

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